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codefro
Guest
I guess I see the danger in that thought- He’s God, therefore all will be saved. Something that can be heard out of the mouths of many today.
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TK421
Guest
It just means that physical obstructions such as our mental faculties aren’t an impediment that will somehow prevent God from knowing who his sheep are. He’s the one that enables our ability to reason and decide in the first place.
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codefro
Guest
But my next question is- why aren’t you at your post!?
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thistle
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Your statement says that Limbo for Infants became an official Church teaching. That is completely incorrect. It was never a Church teaching and it still is not a Church teaching.
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TK421
Guest
It was a part of official Church teaching, but it was not dogmatically defined.
It’s hard to define what ‘official Church teaching’ entails in the distant past, since there was no formal catechism prior to the Council of Trent, but it is an idea which permeated into the most advanced minds of the Church. St Augustine, St Aquinas, St Liguori, etc., all did not believe in a hope of salvation for unbaptized infants. The closest parallel is the concept that people in pagan lands had no hope of salvation. If you were a random Joe born in 8th century Nepal, the understanding of the Church is that you were damned. The concept of invincible ignorance and the hope of salvation outside of the visible sacraments isn’t something that started to gradually gain momentum until Christianity started becoming a cosmopolitan faith, in parallel with European imperialism. Suddenly Christians were encountering foreign human faces more and more, and we began to severely question past theological understandings. When Christianity was (for the most part, save for a few Middle Eastern minorities) pinned down in Europe for many centuries, with the Atlantic to its west, the arctic to its north, malaria to its south, and Islam to its east, these newer concepts didn’t seem to develop much at all.
It’s hard to define what ‘official Church teaching’ entails in the distant past, since there was no formal catechism prior to the Council of Trent, but it is an idea which permeated into the most advanced minds of the Church. St Augustine, St Aquinas, St Liguori, etc., all did not believe in a hope of salvation for unbaptized infants. The closest parallel is the concept that people in pagan lands had no hope of salvation. If you were a random Joe born in 8th century Nepal, the understanding of the Church is that you were damned. The concept of invincible ignorance and the hope of salvation outside of the visible sacraments isn’t something that started to gradually gain momentum until Christianity started becoming a cosmopolitan faith, in parallel with European imperialism. Suddenly Christians were encountering foreign human faces more and more, and we began to severely question past theological understandings. When Christianity was (for the most part, save for a few Middle Eastern minorities) pinned down in Europe for many centuries, with the Atlantic to its west, the arctic to its north, malaria to its south, and Islam to its east, these newer concepts didn’t seem to develop much at all.
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thistle
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It was NEVER Church doctrine. It was only ever a theological hypothesis.
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TK421
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Right, it isn’t a doctrine.
I’m not 100% familiar with the terminology that is frequently used in theology, but “it was just a theological hypothesis” smacks of powerful understatement, at least to me. It was not believed within the Church (or Christianity in general) that unbaptized persons (unborn, infants, or otherwise) could be saved until relatively recently; it’s something that slowly and painfully started developing after Christianity was unpinned from its demographically trapped location in Europe. Even baptism by desire was understood to be an explicit, knowing desire for baptism. The Popes, the clergy, the brightest Doctors of the Church in the past; all of them believed this, and although it was never dogmatically declared, they certainly considered it more than speculative. Saying what we are currently saying would have gotten us into trouble in the distant past.
“No salvation outside the Church” is no longer viewed in the manner that it was once viewed, including how it applies to the concept of a limbo. Our recent Popes don’t, and the idea has pretty much bled out. However, there is at least one immensely important lesson to be taken out of this. The Church fathers were gravely concerned with a more loose understanding of salvation, not only because they thought it was wrong, but because they believed such a view would have suffocated the edification and evangelistic mission of the Church. Charity cries out for a continued development and struggle towards understanding truth, but there is grave responsibility attached to that. It can be, and is being, misused among some.
I’m not 100% familiar with the terminology that is frequently used in theology, but “it was just a theological hypothesis” smacks of powerful understatement, at least to me. It was not believed within the Church (or Christianity in general) that unbaptized persons (unborn, infants, or otherwise) could be saved until relatively recently; it’s something that slowly and painfully started developing after Christianity was unpinned from its demographically trapped location in Europe. Even baptism by desire was understood to be an explicit, knowing desire for baptism. The Popes, the clergy, the brightest Doctors of the Church in the past; all of them believed this, and although it was never dogmatically declared, they certainly considered it more than speculative. Saying what we are currently saying would have gotten us into trouble in the distant past.
“No salvation outside the Church” is no longer viewed in the manner that it was once viewed, including how it applies to the concept of a limbo. Our recent Popes don’t, and the idea has pretty much bled out. However, there is at least one immensely important lesson to be taken out of this. The Church fathers were gravely concerned with a more loose understanding of salvation, not only because they thought it was wrong, but because they believed such a view would have suffocated the edification and evangelistic mission of the Church. Charity cries out for a continued development and struggle towards understanding truth, but there is grave responsibility attached to that. It can be, and is being, misused among some.
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thistle
Guest
You seem to under the misconception that some Church doctrines have been changed.
That is incorrect. Church doctrines have NOT changed.
Disciplines can and have changed.
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codefro
Guest
What is being misused?
I understand that extra ecclesiam and Lumen Gentium are in harmony based off of baptism of desire/ invincible ignorance for adults. Yet, I still have trouble biting. I can accept God granting salvation to babies that died naturally and were not able to have a chance to be baptized. Yet babies that are aborted or babies that had the chance- I can’t say that because the opportunity was there and they did not desire their own baptism. So one cannot say they had baptism of desire. The only thing you can MAYBE ascribe to the baby is he or she dying when the parents desired their baptism.
Also the statement and catechism says we “prayerfully” entrust them to God. Ralph Martin made this point- if we assume they went to Heaven we do not pray for them. We assume God did all the work. Yet, we are to prayerfully entrust their soul. So if we failed to pray for them, we already have messed up on the Church’s teaching on this.
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TK421
Guest
Hi thistle,
Yes, doctrines do not change. Almost 100% of scripture has not been infallibly interpreted, so theological development is possible on concepts such as limbo and other things. No salvation for the unbaptized was the default view by virtually 100% of the Church for most of its history, but since it was never dogmatically defined, development on this concept was fully possible.
Among the general population, it opens a possible gateway for a complacent attitude towards the evangelistic mission of the Church. I’m not talking about anything the Church itself is doing wrong.
This has me curious. If there is no (observable) means for them to undergo a baptism of desire either way, then what would be the distinction between infants that die naturally and infants that are killed?
Which is something that is universal and not exclusive to the unbaptized, no? It ought to go without saying to pray for those alive and those deceased.
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codefro
Guest
Of course, but we are talking specifically about Limbo, and in this regard Catholics have let things get away from us.
Your first question- I am speculating. There may be no exceptions and all unbaptized infants are in Limbo. I am speculating if death was accidental and their parents wanted to baptize them, that could be interpreted as connecting to baptism of desire. Don’t know if I do interpret it that way, but some clergy try to today.
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TK421
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Hmm, I don’t see a distinction. The reason being that Original Sin is with us upon conception, and therefore Original Sin needs to be cleansed before entering the Beatific Vision. One way or another, the grace of God has to be at work, whether the infant died of natural causes or died by the sword.
If baptism of desire for infants is extended to those who desired it, then this would mean every infant is covered, since their God, their mother, the heavenly angels and saints, and all people of good will on Earth desire the baptism of the child. It paints a beautiful picture.
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codefro
Guest
So then we agree
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TK421
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Well that’s boring.
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codefro
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Point being: I cannot reconcile to personally abandoning the idea of a limbo state with all those quotes I posted on the last page of pre-V II magisterium. I think with infants they cannot will anything which is why we need to baptize them if they are entrusted to us. I think it is unhistorical to say God will save them no matter what. God is gracious and not bound to his sacraments, yet simply reading historical documents from magisterium, it is unlikely they will receive the beatific vision. God did provide the magisterium to bind and loose the teachings of Christ. So we cannot exclude magisterial docs on the subject and say “God is above all that”
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TK421
Guest
That last line was a joke 
For the moment I’m fatigued on the topic and I’m going to bed. Good night.
For the moment I’m fatigued on the topic and I’m going to bed. Good night.
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codefro
Guest
I knowThat last line was a joke
For the moment I’m fatigued on the topic and I’m going to bed. Good night.
As am I, good night.
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Fears
Guest
The whole thing is confused. What I know is that until the 12th century, it was consensus that all unbaptized infants woulg to straight to hell, to experience fire. Augustine and many other saints knew that. It was even declared infallibly:
The XVI Council of Carthage (418) condemned the Pelagian fable that there is some place anywhere where infants who died without baptism live in happiness (Limbo).
The Council taught the Catholic doctrine that infants go into the fire to be eternally punished with the devil, being on the left hand at the judgement.
The teaching of Carthage was infallibly approved as a rule of the Faith by Pope Zosimus and Pope Innocent I and by the ecumenical councils, which were approved by other popes.
“It has been decided likewise that if anyone says that for this reason the Lord said: “In my house there are many mansions”: that it might be understood that in the kingdom of heaven there will be some middle place or some place anywhere where happy infants live who departed from this life without baptism, without which they cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven, which is life eternal, let him be anathema. For when the Lord says: “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he shall not enter into the kingdom of God” [John 3:5], what Catholic will doubt that he will be a partner of the devil who has not deserved to be a coheir of Christ? For he who lacks the right part will without doubt run into the left [cf. Matt. 25:41,46].”
“Then he shall say to them also that shall be on his left: Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels… And these shall go away into everlasting punishment.” ( Matthew 25:41, 46)
Later the doctrine was changed.
“Pope Innocent’s teaching is to the effect that those dying with only original sin on their souls will suffer ‘no other pain, whether from material fire or from the worm of conscience, except the pain of being deprived forever of the vision of God.’ It should be noted, however, that this poena damni incurred for original sin implied, with Abelard and most of the early Scholastics, a certain degree of spiritual torment.” (Toner, Catholic Encyclopedia 1910, Limbo)
Finally, Limbo was abolished.
Remember that once a doctrine is declared infallible, all changes are invalid.
So unbaptized infants go to hell. No limbo.
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JimG
Guest
Here’s an article on Limbo that may be of interest.
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