Doc dear, I know what you mean about those postings. You get indignant and peeved and perhaps even somewhat enraged when you read them. You think “??!!” and “Isn’t this rather missing the point?”. You breathe deeply and repeat to yourself several times over ,“Love thy neighbor; Love thy neighbor.” Yes indeed I know EXACTLY what you mean: it’s what I feel when I read the posts debating whether Karol Wojtyla is in heaven. It's also exactly what I feel every time a Roman Catholic says “Score one for our side.” when a Protestant becomes Roman Catholic or pushes the canard that CS Lewis had a deathbed conversion to Roman Catholicism or any variation of this common tale. “Heelloo!” says I, “isn’t the ultimate point “he that believes and is baptized shall be saved”? I don’t see the term Roman Catholic or Orthodox or Lutheran or Baptist or Presbyterian worked into that sentence.” Or as I put it to a RC friend of mine who was exulting that a Protestant friend had become RC, “Go convert someone who does not believe in the saving power of Christ and then color me impressed.”

Some people who proclaim themselves Roman Catholic may be going to Hell, so may some Presbyterians, some Baptists, some Evangelicals and yes even some members of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, and bless us all, they won’t all be from the “Jesus First” gang either, even some members of the LCMS who proclaim themselves to be “Confessional” may actually end up on the real "other side". But whether this is certain and who these people are is unknown and always will be unknown to me and every mortal who has ever walked or ever will walk this Earth until the Last Day, save for One who has always known. But this I do know: it is foolishness, and not the foolishness of God, for anyone other than He to think that we know and thus to speculate on the matter upon a person's death. God’s ways are not ways, for which I heartily thank God, because they are far better than ours could ever be.

So personally when people proclaim themselves to be Christian, I presume in their favor that they acknowledge the saving power of Christ above all things. When they die still claiming the name of the Redeemer as their own, I look forward to rejoicing with them before the throne of the Triune God. As we say LCMS “Grant this, Lord, unto us all.”

(Incidentally my view is hardly shocking. I find upon cruising on the pages that it is merely a badly expressed version of the official position of the LCMS. I blame my poor expression not on the doctrinal training which so many Pastors and fellow members of the LCMS have tried to beat into my thick skull, but rather on my skill with words. )