Do most people make it to heaven?

Q: I recently took a six-week theology class, and the priest teaching it was pretty emphatic that most don't make it to heaven. First, we must be without mortal sin. So all those who forsake Mass or the Holy Sabbath would not be eligible. I have also heard other well-known priests state the same thing. One used the parable of the sower (the one with rocks, weeds, path and rich soil) to illustrate that per Jesus only 25% make it to Heaven. Yet often I hear priests say the opposite. What is your take on the parable?

A: To me, it seems that looking at this parable in terms of celestial statistics is a fairly unusual interpretation.

The parable of the sower is found in the three "synoptic Gospels" of Matthew (Mt 13:3-9), Mark (Mk 4:3-9), and Luke (Lk 8:5-8). As we read in Luke's account:

"A sower went out to sow his seed. And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path and was trampled, and the birds of the sky ate it up. Some seed fell on rocky ground, and when it grew, it withered for lack of moisture. Some seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew with it and choked it. And some seed fell on good soil, and when it grew, it produced fruit a hundredfold."

One special thing about this particular parable is that Jesus himself is recorded as sharing a detailed explanation of it with his disciples in subsequent verses. That is, the seed represents the word of God, and the different kinds of soils represent those who hear it. Jesus states that the hard path is like the hard hearts of those who are never open to receiving God's word; the rocky ground represents those who have some faith, but only in a shallow way; and the thorns represent the worldly distractions that can choke out the faith of even sincere believers. And of course, those in whose souls the word of God takes root and flourishes are like the "good soil" at the end of the parable.

So, we know with certainty that Jesus was trying to make a point about hearing the "Good News," and the ways in which it might bear fruit or not bear fruit in us. Jesus was trying to explain the goal and some possible pitfalls to avoid. He never suggests that he was giving us a breakdown of who attains salvation in terms of percentages.

Granted, in some cases it is possible to legitimately find an extra layer of symbolic meaning in some scriptural passages. But such extra layers must always be in harmony with the church's constant teaching. And the church has never taught that only a specific numerical ratio of souls would be saved.

Further, while the church has the canonization process for formally recognizing that some especially holy people are already in heaven, the reverse does not hold true. That is, although the church does teach that going to hell is a real possibility, the church has never and will never declare definitively that any individual is known to be in hell.

In fact, although this is educated speculation rather than church teaching, some theologians -- such as, perhaps most notably, the 20th-century Swiss theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar -- have even proposed that we could at least entertain the hope that all might be saved.

Whether or not we personally see this theory of von Balthasar's as being practically realistic, it does hint at a real and uncontroversial truth of our faith. Namely, that God desires the salvation of all, and is patient and ready to forgive even the worst sinner who repents. As Jesus states in John's Gospel: "And this is the will of the one who sent me, that I should not lose anything of what he gave me, but that I should raise it [on] the last day" (Jn 6:39).