The Fate of Unbaptized Infants

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Dan-Man916:
Yes baptism is necessary for salvation.
here is what Trent says specifically:

Council of Trent 6th Session, Decree Concerning Justification
****CHAPTER IV Jan 13, 1547 AD
****A BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE JUSTIFICATION OF THE SINNER
AND ITS MODE IN THE STATE OF GRACE

In which words is given a brief description of the justification of the sinner, as being a translation from that state in which man is born a child of the first Adam, to the state of grace and of the adoption of the sons of God through the second Adam, Jesus Christ, our Savior*. This translation however cannot, since promulgation of the Gospel, be effected except through the laver of regeneration or its desire, as it is written: Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.***[Jn 3:5]
Now, this statement may or may not fit the criteria for being an infallible statement, however, it does have the highest degree of authority since it comes from a Council.

The understanding of the Church is that Baptism is necessary for salvation. However, as St Thomas explains, that baptism has always been understood as a baptism of water, desire, or blood, all 3 of which are only one baptism, the other 2 deriving their efficacy from water baptism. Baptism of desire and Baptism of blood will also Justify a person. So yes, Baptism of desire will forgive on of their sins.

The Baltimore Catechism teaches this:

(cont’d)
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The BC is not infallible… just read in it before what you quoted. How many baptisms are there? Answer: THREE.

Ephesians iv. 5: “ONE Lord, ONE faith, ONE Baptism”

Nicean Creed: “I confess ONE baptism for the remission of sins” (Confiteor UNUM baptisma in remissionem peccatorum).

To address what you quoted from Trent: not every word of a Council is infallible. I would suggest you read Catholic Encyclopedia’s entry on infallibility for more information on this.

The Church declares things ex Cathedra in pronouncements of Canons, such as Trent did in its Canons on Justifcation, Canons on Baptism, etc. (If any man saith… let him be anathema, etc.).

As far as what you said about “or the desire thereof”, did you read what I wrote previously: “The Council does say one cannot come to a forgiveness without the laver of redemption or desire thereof, but 1) it does NOT say: one CAN come to forgiveness without water or desire–it is a negative, not a positive statement”
 
crusade,

a student of Fr. Feeney and the St Benedict center, i see.
 
A Student of Christ the King and His Reign both socially and religiously over all the world.

I am a student of the Church and Her Teaching, not a bastardization of that teaching by Modernists.

I did not discover outside the Church no salvation by St. Benedict Center, but I found them later and saw them as a great organization that proclaims the Faith of Christ, the Catholic Faith, without hestiation.
 
think whatever you want about orthodox Catholicism, the modernist charge is unfounded and to apply it to the Vatican II council is plain conspiratorial.

You are free to believe as you will. I will believe the teaching of the Church that teaches with authority and it the only true body able of properly interpreting the councils of the past.

Lumen Gentium and Unitatis Redintegratio are authoritative documents from a valid and lawful ecumenical council of the Church of Christ. What they teach represents the authentic interpretation of the Tradition of the Church, not your particular interpretation of what you think it means.
 
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Dan-Man916:
think whatever you want about orthodox Catholicism, the modernist charge is unfounded and to apply it to the Vatican II council is plain conspiratorial.

You are free to believe as you will. I will believe the teaching of the Church that teaches with authority and it the only true body able of properly interpreting the councils of the past.

Lumen Gentium and Unitatis Redintegratio are authoritative documents from a valid and lawful ecumenical council of the Church of Christ. What they teach represents the authentic interpretation of the Tradition of the Church, not your particular interpretation of what you think it means.
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Yet neither is infallible, so you cannot condemn my belief, for the Church has not stated in any infallible manner that what I believe is wrong, yet in Lateran IV, Florence, and thousands of other places, the Church has defined that no one can be saved without water Baptism, and even those who believe in baptism of desire/blood admit that this cannot be applied to anyone before the age of use.
 
And with no support to bolster that claim, you leave it as is.
 
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CatholicCrusade:
And with no support to bolster that claim, you leave it as is.
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CCC - A sure norm for teaching the faith JPII

scborromeo.org/ccc/p123a9p3.htm

Wounds to unity

817 In fact, "in this one and only Church of God from its very beginnings there arose certain rifts, which the Apostle strongly censures as damnable. But in subsequent centuries much more serious dissensions appeared and large communities became separated from full communion with the Catholic Church - for which, often enough, men of both sides were to blame."269 The ruptures that wound the unity of Christ’s Body - here we must distinguish heresy, apostasy, and schism270 - do not occur without human sin:

Where there are sins, there are also divisions, schisms, heresies, and disputes. Where there is virtue, however, there also are harmony and unity, from which arise the one heart and one soul of all believers.271

818 "However, one cannot charge with the sin of the separation those who at present are born into these communities [that resulted from such separation] and in them are brought up in the faith of Christ, and the Catholic Church accepts them with respect and affection as brothers . . . . All who have been justified by faith in Baptism are incorporated into Christ; they therefore have a right to be called Christians, and with good reason are accepted as brothers in the Lord by the children of the Catholic Church."272
(My Bold)

To take the example of EENS, (no salvation outside the Church) the CCC is quite clear

CCC 847 - This affirmation is not aimed at those who, through no fault of their own, do not know Christ and his Church:
Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience - those too may achieve eternal salvation

CCC 838 - The Church knows that she is joined in many ways to the baptized who are honored by the name of Christian, but do not profess the Catholic faith in its entirety or have not preserved unity or communion under the successor of Peter."[322] Those “who believe in Christ and have been properly baptized are put in a certain, although imperfect, communion with the Catholic Church.”[323]

Both of these reference Lumen Gentium. Robert Burns OP pointed out that

“no responsible Catholic theologian would publicly deny them (Vat II documents) as teachings of the Church”

continued
 
CCC - scborromeo.org/ccc/ccc_toc.htm

“Outside the Church there is no salvation”

846 How are we to understand this affirmation, often repeated by the Church Fathers?335 Re-formulated positively, it means that all salvation comes from Christ the Head through the Church which is his Body:

Basing itself on Scripture and Tradition, the Council teaches that the Church, a pilgrim now on earth, is necessary for salvation: the one Christ is the mediator and the way of salvation; he is present to us in his body which is the Church. He himself explicitly asserted the necessity of faith and Baptism, and thereby affirmed at the same time the necessity of the Church which men enter through Baptism as through a door. Hence they could not be saved who, knowing that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary by God through Christ, would refuse either to enter it or to remain in it.336

APOSTOLIC CONSTITUTION
FIDEI DEPOSITUM

ON THE PUBLICATION OF THE

CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

PREPARED FOLLOWING THE SECOND VATICAN ECUMENICAL COUNCIL

JOHN PAUL, BISHOP
SERVANT OF THE SERVANTS OF GOD
FOR EVERLASTING MEMORY

**The Catechism of the Catholic Church, lastly, is offered to every individual who asks us to give an account of the hope that is in us (cf. 1 Pt 3:15) and who wants to know what the Catholic Church believes.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church, which I approved 25 June last and the publication of which I today order by virtue of my Apostolic Authority, is a statement of the Church’s faith and of catholic doctrine, attested to or illumined by Sacred Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition and the Church’s Magisterium. I declare it to be a sure norm for teaching the faith and thus a valid and legitimate instrument for ecclesial communion.
**

(please note the above by the current pope - are you disagreeing with him?)

and

The project was the object of extensive consultation among all Catholic Bishops, their Episcopal Conferences or Synods, and theological and catechetical institutes. As a whole, it received a broadly favorable acceptance on the part of the Episcopate. It can be said that this Catechism is the result of the collaboration of the whole Episcopate of the Catholic Church
 
As I said in the other thread, three infallible documents cannot be trumped by one fallible one… please read the other thread, and let us keep this one on its proper subject.
 
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CatholicCrusade:
As I said in the other thread, three infallible documents cannot be trumped by one fallible one… please read the other thread, and let us keep this one on its proper subject.
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No, your own personal interpretation of the documents cannot ‘trump’ the teaching of the Church.
 
Man… you’re all so well-read, and it appears not to have done an ounce of good. I also read a message board frequented by 16 year old Evangelicals. It strikes me as perversely amusing that nothing more gets accomplished here than there. I’m not trying to insult anyone - but I guess it has me wondering what the point of all this is. The light of human reason seems pretty dim.

That said, I’m not going to be able to sleep at night until I come to a conclusion about all this! I’m not so much concerned with what happens to unbaptized infants per se - what I want to know is whether the Church has made two conflicting “infallable” declarations.

Does anyone dispute that the Councils of Florence and Carthage and Trent are infallable? Does anyone dispute that they said “unbaptized babies can not go to heaven”?

Does anyone on the other side have an example of an infallable teaching from the modern day that says unbaptized babies can go to heaven?

Finally, the Church has said there are baptisms of blood and desire. Whether these could apply to infants as currently defined does not seem to matter to me. The real question is this: if the Church said that there is a newly recognized kind of baptism (or addition to an old definition) that does apply to unbaptized infants, would there be an unavoidable logical inconsistancy with doing this?

I don’t know Latin and I don’t know who “K. Rahner” is. I’m an infant in theology who trusts the Church to keep me warm and fed until I am - if I ever will be - able to take care of myself. Last time I tried figuring things out too much on my own I ended up what I think was called a “Pelegian.” 😛
 
Mike,

It was a common belief in the 1940’s and 1950’s (and before)that the fate of unbaptized babies who die is that they go to a place called Limbo; a place of natural happiness, but yet excluded from the beatific vision of God for all eternity because they still bear the stain of original sin not washed away through baptism.

The belief in the existence of Limbo is still held by many traditionalist Catholics, especially followers of Fr. Leonard Feeney. Proponents of the belief in Limbo cite the 2nd ecumenical council of Lyons in 1274 as the infallible teaching of the Church. The dogmas promulgated at Lyons are protected under the charism of infallibility of the extraordinary Magesterium. There is no doubt about this. However, the conclusions made by traditionalists in applying this dogma give an erroneous conclusion.

The source of this controversy comes from 2 seemingly contradictory ideas:
  1. God desires all to be saved.
  2. No one has a natural right to the beatific vision without being born again (Jn 3:5)
Limbo is an attempt to harmonize these ideas.
Two good sources to look at the theological question of Limbo are:

Denzinger: The Sources of Catholic Dogma*(Enchiridion Symbolorum)*
Dr. Ludwig Ott: Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, Tan Books
(both have an imprimatur and nihil obstat)

Under Denzinger, there are only 2 passages that can form the basis of the theological opinion of Limbo.

The first one is D 464, from the 2nd Council of Lyons in 1274 in which it says that souls who die in the state of mortal sin or with original sin only immediately descend into hell, yet to be punished with different punishments.”
Ott states that this teaching is de fide, meaning that it is an infallible and irrevocable dogma of the Catholic Church. (Ott page 113-114, 4th edition, 1960)

The different punishments are for those who die in objective mortal sin who have freely rejected God’s grace and offer of salvation of their own free will, and those who have committed no personal sin, but are tainted by the sin of Adam, thus losing their original inheritance. Those in original sin only have no natural right to heaven. Only through the merits of Christ applied to them in Baptism is their soul regenerated.

(cont’d)
 
The other Denzinger citation is D 1526 in which Pius VI (1775-1799) condemns the errors of the Synod of Pistoia. In it, Pius holds to the opinion of the existence of Limbo in condemning those who reject that original sin deprives us of the beatific vision.
Here Pius VI is not making an infallible declaration.

Ott, states that this dogma from the council of II Lyons finds its foundations in the words of Christ in Jn 3:5, “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God.”

He then goes on to explain various theological opinions.
  1. In it he says that the spiritual re-birth of young infants can be achieved in an extra-sacramental manner through baptism of blood.
  2. Other emergency means of baptism for children dying without sacramental baptism such as prayer and the desire of the parents or the Church (vicarious baptism as described by Cajetan), or the attainment of the use of reason in the moment of death so that the dying child can make a decision for or against God (baptism of desire, H. Klee) or the suffering and death of the child as a quasi-sacrament (baptism of suffering, H Schell).
In these, Ott says that these are indeed possible, but cannot be proved from Revelation.

Even before the promulgation of the documents of Vatican II, there is no general universal of all Catholics in the existence of Limbo that would constitute proof from tradition or the *sensus fidelium *(sense of the faithful). There is. In actuality, ample speculation of the salvation of these infants. Therefore, the contention that the Church changed what it believed in the 1940’s and 1950’s is unfounded.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church has no mention of Limbo. It has these sections that deal with unbaptized infants.

CCC1261 says: As regards children who have died without Baptism, the Church can only entrust them to the mercy of God, as she does in her funeral rites for them. Indeed, the great mercy of God who desires that all men should be saved, and Jesus’ tenderness toward children which caused him to say: “Let the children come to me, do not hinder them,”[63] allow us to hope that there is a way of salvation for children who have died without Baptism. All the more urgent is the Church’s call not to prevent little children coming to Christ through the gift of holy Baptism.

CCC 1281 says: Those who die for the faith, those who are catechumens, and all those who, without knowing of the Church but acting under the inspiration of grace, seek God sincerely and strive to fulfill his will, are saved even if they have not been baptized (cf. LG 16).

CCC 1283 says: With respect to children who have died without Baptism, the liturgy of the Church invites us to trust in God’s mercy and to pray for their salvation.

CCC 1261 does not have an infallible Church teaching referenced to it. However, it reflects the current thinking of the Magesterium at this time .

(cont’d)
 
CCC 1283 does not have an infallible Church teaching referenced to it. The question for infants, is whether or not the Baptism of desire can be applied to them since they do not have the use of reason. This is still an open theological question. However, the vastness of God’s mercy compels us to believe that since God desire the salvation of all, then God must make salvation concretely available to all. The encyclical, Dominus Iesus, states that theologians are currently looking into this question further.

Now, getting back to Denzinger 464:

D 464 is de fide, but can only be applied IF those dying infants have not extra-sacramentally obtained justification through baptism of desire or any of the other modes described. If they indeed have received justification through extra sacramental baptism or baptism of desire (as Trent declares), then the infallible dogma promulgated at the council of II Lyons would not even apply here because these infants no longer have the stain of original sin. Trent does not define the limits of Baptism of desire. It leaves the question open as to whether or not this desire must be explicit or if it can be an implicit desire. The Magesterium has not yet defined the limits of what desire means.

Theologians are not infallible nor authoritative, only the Magesterium is, and there can be a variety of scholarly opinions. However, these only become matters of faith or morals when the Magesterium, protected by the charism of Infallibility through the Holy Spirit to lead the Church into all truth(Jn 16:13), declares something to be dogma.

And with Limbo, that is simply not the case. We see no infallible dogma proclaiming that unbaptized infants are unable to achieve justification and thus, salvation.
 
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