At face value, this is an amazingly comforting thought. That God loves you in this present moment and in your present state is undeniable. What some naturally conclude from this statement howeveris that God does not desire us to change for the better.
If the doctrine of sola fide - that a person is granted irrevocable entry into heaven as soon as he turns to Jesus Christ in faith - is true, then "God loves you just the way you are" and the natural conclusion that improvement in habit and character is not strictly necessary for salvation makes perfect sense. We have turned to God in faith, we are therefor saved, and that, as they say, is the end of that. The next logical concusion we can draw from this line of reasoning is that we can go on our merry way, behaving exactly as we did before, we accepted Jesus Christ, comitting all kinds of grave sins which are counter to the will of God and he sill still grant us entry into heaven.
Modern progressive Protestantism acknowleges that this last conclusion cannot possibly be correct and attempts to blunt this line of reasoning in two ways.
The first method is to return us to the beginning of our through process by claiming that lack of improvement in some objective and measurable way probably means that we really wern't saved in the first place - that we somehow didn't have enough faith or that we really didn't surrender our will completely or that we simply didn't mean it when we turned to Jesus in faith.. The second method of addressing the this line of reasoning is to tack on the qualifier, "...but he refuses to leave you that way" to the original propostion that God loves us just the way we are. The former uses circular logica dn therefore proves nothing. The latter, at least, is intellectually honest.
Modern feel-good Christianity, in spite of professing submission to the Bible as the authority on religious truth, never speaks about sin and it's consequences and all but ignores the Bible's constant plea to "Persevere", "Endure", and "Win the prize." Mans' role we are told, is not to struggle, but to "Let go and let God", as if we can simply take our hands off the wheel on the interstate and God will steer the car safely to our final destination.
Catholicism on the other hand, knowing that we were born with original sin, acknowledging the evil force which actively seeks our damnation, and recognizing the very real temptation we face at every moment in our lives, bids us to try as hard as we can and asks us to "make every effort" to win the struggle and realize the prize of eternal life. And then the Church, by the authority granted to it through Jesus Christ, actually gives us a way to do so!
God certainly does love us the way we are. Both Catholicism and modern progressive Christianity acknowledge that God desires us to change for the better and that change is either inevitable or necessary, depending upon who you listen to and so it would seem that God does not love us "Just" the way we are in that he would love us to become the people who he meant us to be.
Mass-marketed popular Christianity encourages us to have a seat and relax for the battle has already been won. Catholicism encourages us to get into the gym, and to get ready for a battle, the outcome of which is uncertain and the results of which will never be known while we are alive on this earth. These are profound differences and need to be seriously considered by those who are contemplating leaving the percieved rigorous demands of the Catholic Church for what seems to be the relative ease of non-judgemental salvation by faith alone Evangelical Protestantism.
-Tim-
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