The average catholic struggles with this question:

If you were privileged to know that you were to die tonight at 7:30 p.m., would you honestly be able to say where you would spend eternity?

I answered this question 28 years ago with:

Well, I hope that I would go to Heaven.

This was most certainly a “hope so” salvation. It was not one that brought peace or comfort.

What my hope was in:

My hope was in the catholic church, not in salvation by faith through Jesus Christ. My hope lay in purgatory, where I was dependent on others to pray and have masses said for me to shorten my time there. My hope was in how I lived my life.

What my hope was not in:

My hope was not in Jesus Christ’s shed blood on the cross for my sin. My hope was not in the finished work of Christ. My hope was not in His work but in my own work.

Jesus Christ paid the debt for the punishment of our sins – He paid the debt for everyone. His blood was total payment, not partial payment. Salvation in Him brings peace and freedom of worry of where we will spend eternity. Our eternal destination is not dependent on anything we can do for ourselves. It is, however, dependent on accepting Christ’s finished work on the cross as full payment for our sin. This was His mission and He accomplished it fully.

~Ephesians 2:8-9 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: (8 ) Not of works, lest any man should boast. (9)