EENS = Extra ecclesia nulla salus = There is no salvation outside the Church

In my experience with discussions on EENS this is what I typically see:

Most people fly off the handle ... Some want to damn everyone to hell and others want to open the door wide to indifferentism. Everyone walks away hurt and worse, confused about what the Church teaches.

The extreme ends of both positions can be dangerous precipices to wander near and most of the various positions that people hold are within the realm of speculation allowed to be held by the Church, which is why we get wide variance in belief and mostly hurt feelings when talking about them.

The best best simplistic formulation I have seen is as follows (note, this is not official teaching but an agreed upon summary by a group of Catholics debating the matter):

Catholics are required to hold that only members of the Catholic Church will be saved. Catholics are required to hold that a form of membership in the Catholic Church is membership through baptism, whether by by water, blood, or desire. Catholics are required to hold that only God's mercy allows salvation and that no human being can know with infallible certainty whether or not God has extended that mercy to any particular human being unless a particular human being has been properly canonized. Catholics may speculate that baptism by blood or desire can be obtained by those who have no explicit knowledge of the Church, and such individuals may include those who have an utterly distorted knowledge of the Church.

For Catholics we need to understand this. Most Catholics hold a viewpoint that is quite merciful but to say that is the definitive teaching of the Church is going a bit far. The same holds true for those holding to a near Feeneyite position on the matter. There is a key issue that must not be overlooked. It is erroneous for us say that it is not important to be Catholic and that is where the problems arise in formulations of EENS which try to include more than the teachings of the Church allow. For example, what I PERSONALLY believe about the scope of the invincibly ignorant has no bearing on reality. It is not my opinion on the matter that counts.

As Catholics, we need to explain what the Church teaches in ITS OWN TERMS, leaving in all of the vague qualities that exist in them because within that vagueness is a very uncomfortable hard-line that not many of us really like to talk about but cannot exclude.... yet. I understand the point of traditionalists who want to hold to a strict teaching on the matter. It would be tragic of us to give people false hope. There is a true Church and we can know which one it is. At a minimum we must implore our friends to diligently seek the truth. Sacred Scripture promises that those who seek will find. It is vital that urgency never be lost in discussions on EENS. The dogma states clearly that there is no salvation outside the church. We shouldn't spend so much time on what seem like technicalities to wish all of our seperated brethren end up in the Church when the more certain route is active acceptance of the truth of Catholicism and nothing less.

It is also important that it be made clear that the mercy of God is what we are trusting here. We should present the faith, unhindered by our opinions and commit ourselves and our seperated brethren to the mercy of God.