When does a baby receive it's soul?

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The Catholic Church does not discriminate between sexes. It is therefore not correct to think that souls for females will be given later.Let us have faith in Church and not in some heresays

Nishkalank
 
The soul is what animates the living, so at conception.
By this thinking dogs cats and fish have souls? I understand that animals do not go to heaven, but if they have souls is there a conflict here?
 
By this thinking dogs cats and fish have souls? I understand that animals do not go to heaven, but if they have souls is there a conflict here?
Every living thing has a soul. Cats, Dogs, Trees. Only Humans have immortal, rational souls.
 
We could look at the call to Jeremiah.

Now the word of the LORD came to me saying, 5"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, And before you were born I consecrated you; I have appointed you a prophet to the nations."

God seems to be involved through the entire process.
 
I was fortunate to attend a Dominican High School. We were thought that at the moment of Conception the baby regardless if it is a boy or a girl receives has a soul. It does not make any sense that there would be a diffence for male babies as opposed to female babies.
Why is there such a discrepancy. Wow! I was thought babies, boy or girl, receive their souls at the time of conception. Is this Catholic where she learned the information? If so, how is they are still teaching that or believing such a thing?
 
to all concerned: By the soul we mean the source of the activity coming within all animated being, vegetable animal, and human Vegetative life is started by a seed which receives external stimuli, sun, water, and chemicals from earth. It grows, has a root system, it even heals itself if wounded, and creates more seed to propagate itself It’s life depends on mater, not spiritual.

Animal life also depends on seed, sperm and ovary. They need to get nourishment from all that grows, vegetables, grass, other animals that contain chemicals as protien. carbohydrates etc. They have the five senses generally. They have physical locomotion. Their life also depends on mater. they do what seems to be a spiritual intelligence, but it is instinctive, They don’t rationalize. They have what is called sense knowledge, I call them sophisticated biological computers (designed and programed by God) They propagate by their seed, sperm and ovary. Their life is dependent on mater. Their bodies can also heal themselves if injured. Once an animal always an animal They don’t evolve into humans.

Human life contains all the activities contained in vegetative life, and animal life. In human life their is also a spiritual activity called "thinking or rational life " there is also “voluntary life” The activity of the intellect with its dependence on the brain to remember sense impressions, and the ability to make a choice dependent on the intellect, this is called “will” these are called the spiritual faculties of the soul,and this is what makes humans a different species from animals. We have animality and rationality both in one human being. We are infused with a spiritual soul which makes us like God who is Pure Spirit

When humans propagate through marriage, they beget their own kind, that is a fact, they don’t beget animals, this is a self evident truth, and it goes without saying and shouldn’t have to be rationalized, Whether or not the human spiritual soul is infused immediately or not shouldn’t matter because God set the whole process in motion when two humans come together to propagate. Destroy the initial stage in the process is to go against God’s will. So it is justified morally to say the soul is infused at conception An animal can not give what it doesn’t have. If the baby eventually shows signs of spiritual intelligence (it can think, talk, laugh and cry) then from the start it is human. People try to justify taking the life of a child by rationalizing and avoiding self-evident truth. The baby is not a parasite, a mass of animal tissue and life. Jesus please "enlighten humanity inspite of ourselves, please!! Animals don’t evolve into humans, but humans can act like animals if they don’t act with rational intelligence. And this happens when we commit sin, we let our feelings and our passions dictate what we do, instead of our rational intelligence.
 
The idea of God “ensouling” a female 40 days after is idiotic. What it probably comes from is a private revelation by a saint or a blessed. . THIS IS NOT REQUIRED BY US TO BELIEVE.Private revelations can be good or not so good. But holding it up in a Catholic meeting as dogma is not only bad it is sinful. Confusing the faithful with such silliness is harmful and people who do so should be removed.
 
The idea of God “ensouling” a female 40 days after is idiotic. What it probably comes from is a private revelation by a saint or a blessed. . THIS IS NOT REQUIRED BY US TO BELIEVE.Private revelations can be good or not so good. But holding it up in a Catholic meeting as dogma is not only bad it is sinful. Confusing the faithful with such silliness is harmful and people who do so should be removed.
I agree. I also feel it is very disrespectful. I’m glad you said it is ‘such silliness’. I feel better after reading numerous responses.
 
"The Church has never definitively stated when the ensoulment of the human embryo takes place. It remains an open question.

It is not within the competence of science to decide between these views, because the existence of an immortal soul is not a question in its field. It is a philosophical problem from which our moral affirmation remains independent …”
This is a superb position, because embryos can divide to become twins. To state categorically that ensoulment at conception occurs fails to deal with this difficulty.

But it’s wonderfully simple and dignified to err on the side of caution, and gaze with wonder and awe on creation.
 
This is a superb position, because embryos can divide to become twins. To state categorically that ensoulment at conception occurs fails to deal with this difficulty.

But it’s wonderfully simple and dignified to err on the side of caution, and gaze with wonder and awe on creation.
Why would twins be a difficulty?
 
This is a superb position, because embryos can divide to become twins. To state categorically that ensoulment at conception occurs fails to deal with this difficulty.

But it’s wonderfully simple and dignified to err on the side of caution, and gaze with wonder and awe on creation.
Don’t you think God Knows. Lets give Him a little credit for HIS own creation! Trust HIM! God Bless, Memaw
 
Because you’re then into deciding whether one or two souls have been formed, and that becomes messy to argue/defend.
I see. But wouldn’t each ‘baby’ receiver their own soul? God would know there are 2. I’m not explaining myself very well, sorry.
 
Approximately sixty years ago we were taught by
a delightful order of nuns that babies “quickening”
in the womb- in other words the first kick felt by the
mother- meant the child had received its soul.
A very popular idea where we lived. I didn’t hear about at conception for a
couple decades later.
 
Approximately sixty years ago we were taught by
a delightful order of nuns that babies “quickening”
in the womb- in other words the first kick felt by the
mother- meant the child had received its soul.
A very popular idea where we lived. I didn’t hear about at conception for a
couple decades later.
But they didn’t say just when the child recieved it’s soul ?? Conceptiom was a delicate event to try to explain to innocent children. The medical profession has learned sooo much just in the past 50 years. But God has always known when the Child received it’s soul. We really don’t need to try to second guess HIM. Abortion is evil at any stage. God Bless, Memaw
 
Because you’re then into deciding whether one or two souls have been formed, and that becomes messy to argue/defend.
I believe each baby is given his/her own soul. God knows and He knew before the twins were even conceived that there would be 2. That is how my faith works and I look at it.
 
You have not followed the secular landscape, or perhaps moonscape or marsscape to be more appropriate.

Because primitive parents like Adam and Eve do not understand negative numbers nor the Euler Law conception of imaginary numbers. So how could God know that a cell would be fraternal twins? Well, unless we remember Esau and Jacob, perhaps?

By the way, Pi is equal to three; ask any politician.
Why would twins be a difficulty?
 
I believe each baby is given his/her own soul. God knows and He knew before the twins were even conceived that there would be 2. That is how my faith works and I look at it.
But that puts you in a tough position, doesn’t it? It either forces you to suggest that, at the conception of the single person there were two souls in existence in one person, or it forces you to abandon your “ensoulment at conception” notion. Either way, you’ve got problems, even if you suggest that God pre-knew what would happen…
 
But that puts you in a tough position, doesn’t it? It either forces you to suggest that, at the conception of the single person there were two souls in existence in one person, or it forces you to abandon your “ensoulment at conception” notion. Either way, you’ve got problems, even if you suggest that God pre-knew what would happen…
I see your point. But, wouldn’t God grant the 2nd baby a soul when the egg splits in 2? As you said, it is hard to understand how or what happens.
 
I see your point. But, wouldn’t God grant the 2nd baby a soul when the egg splits in 2? As you said, it is hard to understand how or what happens.
Perhaps. Yet, that division from one organism to two isn’t ‘conception’; conception had already occurred. Hence the problem with the statement that “ensoulment occurs at conception”…
 
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