11 Q. When should infants be brought to the Church to be baptised?
A. Infants should be brought to the Church to be baptised as soon as possible.
12 Q. Why such anxiety to have infants receive Baptism?
A. There should be the greatest anxiety to have infants baptised because, on account of their tender age, they are exposed to many dangers of death, and cannot be saved without Baptism.
13 Q. Do parents sin, then, who, through negligence, allow their children to die without Baptism, or who defer it?
A. Yes, fathers and mothers who, through negligence, allow their children to die without Baptism sin grievously, because they deprive their children of eternal life; and they also sin grievously by putting off Baptism for a long time, because they expose them to danger of dying without having received it.
‘Q. Where do infants go who die without baptism?
A. Infants who die without baptism go to Limbo, where they do not enjoy the sight of God but also do not suffer, this is because having original sin and this alone they do not merit Heaven but neither do they merit purgatory or Hell.’
Catechism of Christian Doctrine
'Before holy baptism, grace encourages the soul towards good from the outside, while Satan lurks in its depths, trying to block all the intellect’s ways of approach to the divine. But from the moment that we are reborn through baptism, the demon is outside, grace is within. Thus, whereas before baptism error ruled the soul, after baptism truth rules it. Nevertheless, even after baptism Satan still acts on the soul, often, indeed, to a greater degree than before. This is not because he is present in the soul together with grace; on the contrary, it is because he uses the body’s humors to befog the intellect with the delight of mindless pleasures. God allows him to do this, so that a man, after passing through a trial of storm and fire, may come in the end to the full enjoyment of divine blessings. For it is written: ‘We went through fire and water, and Thou hast brought us out into a place where the soul is refreshed’
St. Diadochos of Photiki
‘Whoever says that infants are alive in Christ even when they depart this life without being baptized is really both opposing the Apostolic preaching and condemning the whole Church which runs hastily with infants to the baptismal font because it is believed without any doubt that otherwise these infants cannot possibly be alive in Christ.’
St. Augustine
'I saw a throne in heaven on which sat the Lord Jesus Christ as Judge. At his feet sat the Virgin Mary. Surrounding the throne was a host of angels and a countless multitude of saints. A certain monk, a great scholar of theology, stood high up on a rung of a ladder that was fixed in the earth and whose top reached up to heaven. With an impatient and agitated bearing, as though full of wickedness and guile, he put questions to the Judge. . .
First question: Again he appeared on his ladder as before, saying: ”O Judge, I ask you: Why does one infant emerge alive from the mother’s womb and obtain baptism, while another, having received a soul, dies in the mother’s belly?”
Answer to the first question. The Judge answered: ”Friend, your inquiries are not made out of love but are made through my permission. So I answer you through the likeness of words.
You ask why one infant dies in the mother’s belly while another emerges alive. There is a reason. All the strength of the child’s body comes, of course, from the seed of its father and mother; however, if it is conceived without due strength, because of some weakness of its father or mother, it dies quickly. As a result of the negligence or carelessness of the parents as well as of my divine justice, many times it happens that what was joined together comes apart quickly.
Yet a soul is not brought to the harshest punishment for this reason, however little time it had for giving life to the body, but, rather, it comes to the mercy that is known to me. Just as the sun shining into a house is not seen as it is in its beauty - only those who look into the sky see its rays - so too the souls of such children, though they do not see my face for lack of baptism, are nevertheless closer to my mercy than to punishment, but not in the same way as my elect.”
- Revelations of St. Bridget of Sweden
