What is Catholic position on what happens to soul of unbaptized infant who dies?

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bobperk said:
Basically, the Church seems afraid that Limbo will sound too mean and unfair to pronounce as a doctrine, and instead puts forth vague language such as “entrusted to the mercy of God” which implicitly reads like they go to heaven.
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I would suggest to you the Church is (or should be) more frightened to declare who is or is not saved under the infinite Mercy of God. Since the Church does not nor has ever declared someone with absolute certainty is in hell, Wisdom would dictate the alternate as well.

Who comes from more “water” than that of the unborn, other than they bathe in the water of the womb.

The recognition that an unborn child has been denied not only a full life but the right to come into the fullness of Faith in Christ with the Baptism of desire if given the opportunity has been an accepted doctrine of the Church for persons. I see no reason this could not apply to children especially aborted children as being considered “martyred” souls, as though baptized through blood.

Remember, God has bound salvation to the sacrament of Baptism, but He Himself is not bound by His sacraments.
 
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bobperk said:
Unless the Church definitively teaches that Limbo is the destination of the souls of the unborn, it is more difficult to make the case that abortion is evil. Because if everyone thinks that aborted babies just directly go to heaven, then many will see abortion as a mercy rather than a sin.
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The devil is fine with killing innocent babies and sending the, to heaven as long as he can create multiple murderers out of doctors, mothers and everyone involved in a single abortion.
 
Before Christ came to save the world all the innocent and righteous souls did not go to heaven but to a state referred to as Abraham’s Bosom . But once the redemption was accomplished the doors to heaven were opened.
 
And yet the Church has long taught that one who has led a good life and died in invincible ignorance can be saved.
 
Except that this Limbo idea is not a “teaching of the Church”, as you’ve already been told by Gorgias and others. The Church officially teaches that we entrust unbaptized, unborn children to God’s mercy.

It’s your opinion that Limbo applies here, to which you are entitled, and others no doubt share your opinion, but it is not a “teaching of the church”.
 
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Hoosier-Daddy said:
If unbaptized infants populate heaven and the purpose of existence is to be happy with God in heaven as the catechism teaches then abortion would be a salvific procedure.
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This simply isn’t true.

Someone could stand outside and shoot a person who just had Confession,and it would still be murder. The state of the victim’s soul simply isn’t a factor.
 
My older sister had only one child. Whose father was Muslim, so, she was Muslim. My mother lost three children (and my closest female friend had a miscarriage as well). In all those cases (except maybe with my sister’s daughter) baptism would not have been possible. I was reading the Mormon articles of faith, and refuting each one, point by point, and, the second one says “We believe that men will be punished for their own sins, and not for Adam’s transgressions”. This is a misunderstanding of the traditional belief of original sin. Someone cannot be punished for a sin they did not choose to commit. If a child is not baptized, I do not believe they would be punished for that, but their parents, who were supposed to make sure that happened, may be in sin. Of course, it miscarriage, there’s no way to baptize. I don’t think someone would be punished for something they had no control over.
 
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adamhovey1988 said:
Of course, it miscarriage, there’s no way to baptize
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The old guidelines used to say if you miscarried, baptize anything that looks like human tissue.

Of course then you had people arguing over whether the baptism was valid in that case, also cases where the baby was having a breech birth and only the foot came out and the baby was in danger of death, could they baptize the foot, or did it have to be the head.

Not to mention stuff on how to baptize babies in utero if they were in danger of death before being born. I know there’s a saint from several hundred years ago who was actually baptized in that manner.

I really think just relying on God’s mercy in these cases is the common sense thing to do.
 
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You’ve misquoted Florence, here. Moreover, you’re making it say more than it actually says.

Do you know – with certainty – that those unbaptized infants who die, in fact, actually “depart this life in original sin alone” and therefore “go straightaway to hell”? Or, is it possible that God, through a grant of mercy and grace that is His alone to know, remits that original sin and welcomes them into heaven?

If you know… I’d like to know how you know. If you don’t, then it’s probably wise to stick with what the Church teaches – we commend their souls to God and entrust them to Him. ;_
 
The part so many don’t recognize is that God can do anything. He can instantly remove original sin from anyone who comes knocking at the pearly gates, then let them in.

Let’s not put God in a box.
 
To answer this question, all one has to do is look at the concept of The Holy Innocents. These are the children murdered by King Herod the Great shortly after Jesus was born. The specific Bible reference is Matthew 2: 16-18. The Catholic Church recognizes these babies who were murdered before they could be baptized as Saints. Saints are, by definition, in heaven with God. They were deemed innocent of sin by God as well as by The Church. I believe such is also the case for those babies aborted by their mothers.

It would seem that we forget that we serve a loving and JUST God. Where is God’s justice that he would condemn an innocent human, who through no fault of their own knew not of God, to hell? This goes directly against Church teaching from Vatican II.

Just my views on the matter.
 
LumineDiei said:
Perhaps, just to make sure we follow the letter of the law, every pregnant woman should have an amniobaptism done
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I agree, if we believe that life begins at conception and that babies who die for any reason before birth cannot go to Heaven due to the lack of baptism, we would have a duty to be baptizing Catholic babies in utero. And like I said, some people in the past advocated doing that, to the point of checking on whether procedures could be developed using a fluid other than water for putting into the womb. And some people actually did get baptized in utero.
 
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I guess you will have to ask God that, if it is something you are concerned about. I don’t worry about things like that.
 
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LumineDiei said:
This thread has come to that level of absurdity.
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I am the OP. For the record, I contacted Moderator yesterday or day before saying that this thread be can closed as far as I was concerned. I don’t know why it hasn’t been closed yet. My question was answered to my satisfaction a long time ago.
 
If you are saying the children who were killed during the slaughter of the innocents were saved through baptism of blood; then the same argument could be made, that the innocent children who were slaughtered by abortionists working as instruments of the devil were martyred and received the baptism of blood…
 
Gab123 said:
If you are saying the children who were killed during the slaughter of the innocents were saved through baptism of blood; then the same argument could be made, that the innocent children who were slaughtered by abortionists working as instruments of the devil were martyred and received the baptism of blood…
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The Holy Innocents died because Herod wanted to kill Christ. That is not true of babies who are murdered in their mothers wombs.
 
The souls who die by abortion have not been proclaimed as martyrs. It is a stretch to make that argument.
 
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