Father Cantalamessa on Limbo and the Unbaptized

ROME, JAN. 24, 2006 (Zenit.org).- A commentary by Capuchin Father Raniero Cantalamessa, published Jan. 6 in ZENIT, prompted questions about the status of unbaptized children who die.

The topic has been under the consideration by the International Theological Commission, at the urging of Pope John Paul II (see ZENIT, Oct. 7, 2004).

Father Cantalamessa, the preacher to the Pontifical Household, offered these further reflections on the topic.

* * *

Some readers have said that they are perplexed by my affirmation that unbaptized children will not go to limbo but to heaven, which I expressed in my recent commentary on the Gospel of the feast of Christ's Baptism, published by ZENIT News. This gives me the opportunity to clarify the reasons for my affirmation.

Jesus instituted the sacraments as ordinary means to salvation. They are ordinarily necessary and people who can receive them and refuse are accountable before God. But God didn't bind himself to these means. Also of the Eucharist Jesus says: "Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man you shall not have life" (John 6:53), but this doesn't mean that anyone who has never received the Eucharist is not saved.

Baptism of desire and the feast of the Holy Innocents are confirmations of this. Some may counter that Jesus is involved in the death of Innocents who died because of him, which is not always the case of unbaptized babies. True, but also of what is done to the least of his brothers Jesus says: "You have done it to me" (Matthew 25:40).

The doctrine of limbo has never been defined as dogma by the Church; it was a theological hypothesis mostly depending on St. Augustine's doctrine of original sin and was abandoned in practice long ago and theology too now dismisses it.

We should take seriously the truth of God's universal will for salvation ("God wants everybody to be saved," 1 Timothy 2:4), and also the truth that "Jesus died for all." The following text of the Catechism of the Catholic Church seems to hold exactly the same position:

"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,' 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, 1261).

I don't think that to affirm that unbaptized babies are saved will encourage abortion. People who neglect Church doctrine on abortion are scarcely concerned about other doctrines of the same Church. Even if there were grounds for such a fear, the abuse of a doctrine should never prevent us from holding it.

I must confess that the mere idea of a God eternally depriving an innocent creature of his vision simply because another person has sinned, or because of an accidental miscarriage, makes me shudder … and I am sure would make any unbeliever happy to stay away from the Christian faith. If hell consists essentially in the deprivation of God, limbo is hell!

Of course God is bound by the Sacraments.

He has promised that every time one is properly celebrated, it will be effective.

Can God do things apart from the Sacraments? Yes, He is God, so he can do anything that is possible.

But should we expect Him to contradict Himself on the most grave issue of the salvation of mankind?

Faith comes by hearing, salvation by Baptism, eternal life from the Eucharist. God is needed for all three, but they can only come to a man by a man.

If there really was some other simple way for all those hordes of non-Christians so that they might be saved, why would God even bother with Catholicism and all its rituals and missions?

Isn't the fact that God does not just wave his hands, say abracadabra over us and make us saved tell us that it isn't some simple matter for God to save an infidel apart from the Church?

And isn't that because salvation is a cooperative effort on the part of God with the man being saved? And if that man is ignorant, base, wallowing in sins, apart from the communion of love in the Church, in short bereft of grace, what hope precisely are we to hold out to him other than the good news we should be preaching?

Yes, grace is pouring down constantly upon him, urging him to turnabout his life, but he has no sense of it because his spiritual eyes are closed, and he has no one to open them.

There he is, drowning in a sea of his own crimes that he cannot stop committing, and the modernist looks over at him from his perch atop a pile of divine life-preservers and says "Don't worry there old chap! You really aren't that bad a fellow after all! Don't you know that God will save you in the end regardless of what happens? It says it right here 'God will have all to be saved.' So stop that pitiful whimpering already, its disturbing my afternoon nap. I'd throw you one of these life preservers, but I would be greatly troubled by it because it would be patronizing to you to tell you you are drowning and can't be helped by your alternative religion. So just try to save yourself, okay? And in the mean time, quiet down."

Isn't the Catechism clear enough? "God wills the salvation of everyone through the knowledge of the truth." (No. 851). His universal will for salvation does not include willing the salvation of the ignorant in spite of themselves and their wilful resistance.

What is most disappointing is to think what if only the effort that had been used dreaming up specious reasoning to avoid missionary work had instead been put into being another St. Paul or St. Francis Xavier, especially amongst the clergy. For every St. Ignatius, 1000 of his sons are off in a corner scribling out new reasons to avoid the Great Commission.

Well, why not just look at a couple of the assertions made above.

... my affirmation that unbaptized children will not go to limbo but to heaven ...

He isn't speculating, but insisting that he has now discovered the truth after 2000 years, and that it contradicts the Christian message as clearly found in the Fathers.

Jesus instituted the sacraments as ordinary means to salvation. They are ordinarily necessary and people who can receive them and refuse are accountable before God.

Baptism and the Eucharist are not merely ordinary means, but are necessary as a necessity of means for salvation. It is impossible to be saved apart from them, and apart from them, no one will be saved.

True, but also of what is done to the least of his brothers Jesus says: "You have done it to me" (Matthew 25:40).

A complete non-sequitur which makes no sense whatsoever.

The doctrine of limbo has never been defined as dogma by the Church;

A lack of definition by the Church does not falsify a theological premise. Baptism of blood has yet to be defined by the Church. That doesn't mean the consensus of theological teaching on it is false.

... it was a theological hypothesis mostly depending on St. Augustine's doctrine of original sin and was abandoned in practice long ago and theology too now dismisses it.

St. Augustine was opposed to the whole concept of Limbo! Limbo doesn't come from his teaching.

And Original Sin is not St. Augustine's doctrine either. It is the dogma of the Catholic Church, which St. Augustine helped to clarify when Pelagius and Co. attacked it.

As to theology abandoning it, that appears to be true only in the rarified air of Fr. Cantalamessa. Every recent Catechism or manual on Baptism I've seen from Bishops here and abraod emphsizes the dire importance of infant Baptism as the only way to assure little children of the beatific vision, and that their fate otherwise is that of Limbo.

We should take seriously the truth of God's universal will for salvation ("God wants everybody to be saved," 1 Timothy 2:4), and also the truth that "Jesus died for all."

This is a straw man attack upon the opposition, as if holding the contrary belief of the dire importance of mission, is not taking these things seriously.

I don't think that to affirm that unbaptized babies are saved will encourage abortion.

Why not? If 100% of aborted babies are saved, but some lesser percentage of those who are lucky enough to be born, isn't abortion in their eternal interest? Since it becomes a strong arm of salvation in Fr. Cantalamessa's system, doesn't abortion almost become a quasi-sacrament.

People who neglect Church doctrine on abortion are scarcely concerned about other doctrines of the same Church.

Apparently Fr. has never actually talked to anyone who has had or has considered an abortion, because this is demonstratively false. People do many foolish things out of fear knowing that they are sins but feeling that they have no alternative. That doesn't make all of them unconcerned about Church doctrine.

Even if there were grounds for such a fear, the abuse of a doctrine should never prevent us from holding it.

But if a proposed doctrine is an abuse it should.

I must confess that the mere idea of a God eternally depriving an innocent creature of his vision simply because another person has sinned, or because of an accidental miscarriage, makes me shudder

As I said before, this really is a very confusing way of looking at things. God isn't shutting Himself off to them. They are shut off to Him because of original and actual sin. God didn't create original sin, and God doesn't cause actual sins. How then is the damnation of anyone a work of God?

The misfortune of the unbaptized is not them dying and falling into the merciless punishment of God. Their misfortune is being unregnerate humanity.

If their lot is really what Fr. Cantalamessa insists, the Church should just close up shop now, because there is no reason for it to exist apart from saving souls from themselves. If God is already well pleased with every soul coming into the world, ready to grant it eternal rewards as soon as its body dies, then there is nothing for the Church to work on improving upon.

and I am sure would make any unbeliever happy to stay away from the Christian faith.

The assertion is made that Christian doctrine must be palatable to unbelievers for it to be true doctrine. If only St. Francis Xavier could have been told sooner! He wouldn't have had to go through all that trouble with unbelievers being sad at the fate of their infidel ancestors.

If hell consists essentially in the deprivation of God, limbo is hell!

It is difficult to believe he cannot grasp the truth in his exclamation. Has he never read the Summa of St. Thomas? The Divine Comedy of Dante? Where exactly does he think Limbo to be? There is no third place.

Fr. Cantalamessa appears from this to be some sort of Pelagian at best, but possibly even a Universalist.

Don't let fancy titles fool you into overlooking utter nonesense, false assumptions, slurs, and error.

Limbo is not in the universal catechism. Baptism of blood is #1258

In #1257 the Church teaches "Baptism is necessary for salvation for those to whom the Gospel haa been proclaimed and who have had the possibility of asking for this sacrament"

A sermon/homily is not a complete catechesis of Christian Doctrine. As I read him, Fr. C. is radically Christian in preaching Christ and Grace.

Pope John Paul and Pope Benedict are, if your concerns are accurate, promoting heresy making them complicit in heresy.

I really don't think you want to go there.

It is undeniable you are an intelligent man with great zeal for the Faith and I am quite certain I am not the one to convince you Fr. C, isn't a heretic. I am not well enough informed. So, I say follow your Holy Fathers who are experts in Theology and Doctrine. Google Fr. C. and read some of his preaching. I find him radical in the best way but my personal opinions are inconsequential.

I am a faithful Catholic (In writing that, I in no way intend to indicate you aren't. I think you are asking real questions and have no intention of severing the Bonds of Unity.) I was raised to follow the Pope. If the Pope leads me over the cliff into heresy, God will understand as He is the one who taught me to follow the Pope. However, he promised the Christian Catholic Church would never teach error.

Mine is a very simple, some would say crude and ignorant, Faith. I agree. It is one reason I begin each day thanking God He made me this way.

Campion is far better informed. Listen to him.

Peace, brother

Pope John Paul and Pope Benedict are, if your concerns are accurate, promoting heresy making them complicit in heresy.

As has been pointed out, Fr. Cantalamessa is CONTRADICTING the teaching of Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI in the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The Catechism teaches that all men are conceived with the stain of Original Sin and that baptism is necessary for salvation. Fr. Cantalamessa is ambiguous on original sin (he calls it an Augustinian doctrine abandoned by the Church? huh?) and claims that baptism is only the ordinary means of salvation, not a necessary means of salvation. The Catechism teaches that it's urgent to baptize infants for the remission of sins: Fr. Cantalamessa teaches that all unbaptized little children go to heaven if they die, and if anyone says otherwise he's contradicting Scripture!

Following St. Paul, the Church has always taught that the overwhelming misery which oppresses men and their inclination towards evil and death cannot be understood apart from their connection with Adam's sin and the fact that he has transmitted to us a sin with which we are all born afflicted, a sin which is the "death of the soul". Because of this certainty of faith, the Church baptizes for the remission of sins even tiny infants who have not committed personal sin. [. . .]
The Lord himself affirms that Baptism is necessary for salvation. He also commands his disciples to proclaim the Gospel to all nations and to baptize them. Baptism is necessary for salvation for those to whom the Gospel has been proclaimed and who have had the possibility of asking for this sacrament. The Church does not know of any means other than Baptism that assures entry into eternal beatitude; this is why she takes care not to neglect the mission she has received from the Lord to see that all who can be baptized are "reborn of water and the Spirit." God has bound salvation to the sacrament of Baptism, but he himself is not bound by his sacraments. [A discussion of baptism of desire and baptism of blood follows . . .]
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," 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.

This is not what Fr. Cantalamessa is saying.

Well, I think Fr. C is right about Limbo. As I understand it, the CDF is reviewing it and because it is undefined I think any theologian is at liberty to, essentially, theologize it out of existence, correct?

As to your other points, I very much appreciate them and I will have to reconsider my ideas because I too just thought unbaptized children who died without the Sacrament would be brought to Heaven. As to how to explain that in the Divine Economy of Salvation and how to account for that according to the action of Grace? I really don't know. I am sure it will be and it will be considered a legitimate development of Doctrine, but who knows?

Hell, I might be a material heretic for that matter (I am not being sarcastic or acting the surprised victim). I really will have to reconsider my basic orientation. Maybe I have applied my obedience to the Pope a bit too widely. I am seriously going to think and pray about this; although, I do know the Pope can't teach error or heresy.

Thank you, brothers.

Oh, yeah, herm, I do not want to go there :)

Another, Oh yeah, the Pope you mentioned corrected his error while alive.

However, I am surprised that if you two are right the Pope hasn't corrected Fr. C or encouraged Fr. C. to advance another explanation for his remarks so that makes me think Fr. C may not be heretical but in advance of the cusp of doctrinal development.

We shall see. In any event, I really do appreciate both your posts and I really will think and pray about it

Dear bornacatholic,

Uh... I'll take... what's behind... Door #3!!

Seriously, I don't know.

I accept what the Catechism says - we entrust these souls to the mercy of God, Who is good.

Hermann's explication of "limbo" (or whatever one might wish to call it) seems reasonable enough, but it's just a theological speculation. Objections that state that it doesn't make sense that the unbaptized are placed at a disadvantage to those who are baptized seem reasonable enough. But frankly, the same complaint could be made vis a vis baptized babies versus persons permitted to come to and grow past the age of reason.

The objection is this: "If one believes that an unborn child who dies without the benefit of baptism goes to Heaven, then aborting the unborn guarantees them the Beatific Vision, and is a great gift. That cannot be."

Okay, I got that. But if that's the objection, that it puts the unbaptized unborn child at greater advantage to the born and baptized, then why not this objection:

"If one believes that a baptized baby, should he die prematurely in infancy, is assured of salvation, then infanticide of baptized babies guarantees them the Beatific Vision, and is a great gift. That cannot be."

None of us hold that infanticide is a good thing, yet all of us believe that, God forbid, if a baby were to die immediately following baptism, he would obtain the Beatific Vision. Look even at how I write that! "...yet all of us believe that, GOD FORBID"!! It's a horror to think! Yet it flows as logically as the previous statement to which the analogy is offered.

Certainly, in a human way of thinking, the baptized baby who is murdered is at an advantage to the human person who grows to maturity.

Which is why I think that God hasn't told us what happens to unbaptized babies. Because although it will all make sense when we are permitted to behold Him, because it will all make sense once we see clearly, rather than in the mirror darkly, it cannot make sense to us now, limited as we are by time and space, our intellects and souls still attached to sin and darkened by it, our lack of union with God.

My own belief is as follows: it may very well be that somehow God has some way of saving unbaptized babies, of providing them with sanctifying grace to overcome original sin. Yet, it is also advantageous to be baptized, and thus, we should be eager to baptize.

Or, perhaps, we're asking the wrong questions from the wrong perspectives, and we'd do better if we asked the right questions. But perhaps we might not even know the right questions in this life. I kinda suspect that those of us who get to Heaven will say, "Oh my! How obvious! Why didn't I think of that?? My way of thinking about the whole thing was really quite convoluted!!"

As to just what we will know then, well,..., uh..., just what is behind Door #3?

sitetest

I posted at length on this when the issue first came up early this month. The Catholic church does not dogmatically teach that unbaptized infants do not go to heaven. Augustine and Cyprian said they go to hell but were not speaking dogmatically (could not do so); they were corrected by Innocent III etc.. Limbo was never dogmatically taught. Fr. Cantalmessa is not heretical by any stretch of the imagination. Baptism is "necessary for salvation" in the CCC is aimed at those who deny baptismal regeneration. It simply does not address the question of unbaptized infants subject to original "sin" but not subject to actual sin. To attempt to apply it to them to argue they go to hell or to some other state short of heaven is a misapplication. "Necessary" can mean a variety of things, from "fittingness" to absolute metaphysical necessity. It always has to be interpreted by its context.

It is simply a fact that the fate of unbaptized infants has been the subject of immense theological speculation in the West since Cyprian. It is highly significant that even though it was raised by radical Protestants against Calvinists at the time of the Reformation, the Catholic Church did not take a dogmatic position on it at that time except to insist that they do not go to hell. The Council of Trent certainly could have if it had wished to. So the matter was deliberately left undecided.

Those who are critical of the move to "remove" Limbo from Catholic vocabulary often join it with criticism of the position taken at Vatican II on salvation outside the Catholic Church, often a quasi-Feeneyite position. But Vatican II did not innovate on this. Already during the 19thc and even before, papal teaching insisted that only those who deliberately and knowingly leave the Catholic Church for heresy (heresy is deliberate and persistant choice of error) go to hell. Those who never were exposed to the teachings of the Catholic Church (later generations of Protestants who have faith in Christ as God incarnate but who do not even have accurate knowledge of the Catholic Church's ecclesial claims, hence cannot, simply cannot, make a knowing choice for heresy) can be saved and that the "extra" in "nulla salus extra ecclesiam" means deliberately chosen "extraneity" not the accident of birth and education "outside" the visible Catholic Church.

The whole brouhaha about Limbo is a tempest in a teapot. We have better things to argue over. Enough already, let go of Limbo. It was a nice hypothesis. It never had authoritative teaching behind it. Those who claim it did are claiming greater authority to define doctrine than the Church herself claims--claiming to be smarter than the pope. It's just a tad bit wearying to have the former Cardinal Ratzinger lectured to by those who think they've caught him out in bad theology. (And the attacks on Cantalmessa here are in fact veiled attacks on JPII and Ratzinger, the latter being part of the moving factor behind JPII's suggestion that Limbo be consigned to limbo even before JPII died.)

DCD:

The Catholic church does not dogmatically teach that unbaptized infants do not go to heaven.

It has been defined three times that: "But the souls of those who depart this life in actual mortal sin, or in original sin alone, go down straightaway to hell to be punished, but with unequal punishments." (2nd Council of Lyons, Letter of Pope John XXII, Council of Florence)

The only people who have original sin alone are unbaptized children and imbeciles. The dogma is perfectly clear that the unbaptized are condemned.

Augustine and Cyprian said they go to hell but were not speaking dogmatically (could not do so)

The whole of Christian antiquity, including various Popes such as St. Leo the Great taught this. There is almost nothing more universally taught by the Fathers than the necessity of Baptism.

"And because of the transgression of the first man, the whole stock of the human race was tainted; no one can be set free from the state of the old Adam save through Christ’s sacrament of baptism, in which there are no distinctions between the reborn, as the apostle [Paul] says, 'For as many of you as were baptized in Christ did put on Christ; there is neither Jew nor Greek ...' [Gal. 3:27–28]" (Pope St. Leo the Great, Letters 15:10, AD 445)

Baptism is "necessary for salvation" in the CCC is aimed at those who deny baptismal regeneration. It simply does not address the question of unbaptized infants subject to original "sin" but not subject to actual sin. To attempt to apply it to them to argue they go to hell or to some other state short of heaven is a misapplication

The Council of Trent, among others, clearly thought otherwise.

"If any one denies, that infants, newly born from their mothers' wombs, even though they be sprung from baptized parents, are to be baptized; or says that they are baptized indeed for the remission of sins, but that they derive nothing of original sin from Adam, which has need of being expiated by the laver of regeneration for the obtaining life everlasting,--whence it follows as a consequence, that in them the form of baptism, for the remission of sins, is understood to be not true, but false, --let him be anathema. For that which the apostle has said, By one man sin entered into the world, and by sin death, and so death passed upon all men in whom all have sinned, is not to be understood otherwise than as the Catholic Church spread everywhere hath always understood it. For, by reason of this rule of faith, from a tradition of the apostles, even infants, who could not as yet commit any sin of themselves, are for this cause truly baptized for the remission of sins, that in them that may be cleansed away by regeneration, which they have contracted by generation. For, unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." (Canon 4 on Original Sin)

"Necessary" can mean a variety of things, from "fittingness" to absolute metaphysical necessity.

Theologians have unanimously held that necessary here means necessary as a necessity of means, without which the end, salvation, cannot be accomplished. Not a single Catholic theologian has ever denied this.

It is simply a fact that the fate of unbaptized infants has been the subject of immense theological speculation in the West since Cyprian.

Where is this debated speculation? It seems a rather settled and uniform opinion to me.

It is highly significant that even though it was raised by radical Protestants against Calvinists at the time of the Reformation, the Catholic Church did not take a dogmatic position on it at that time except to insist that they do not go to hell.

I gave you the proper references to the contrary definition of the Church above. This is also the common teaching mandated by the Church to be taught to her Priests, as found in St. Thomas Aquinas, where he defines Limbo as the antechamber, so to speak, of hell proper. See the Appendix to the Summa.

http://www.newadvent.org/summa/600100.htm

Also:

http://www.newadvent.org/summa/506906.htm

Already during the 19thc and even before, papal teaching insisted that only those who deliberately and knowingly leave the Catholic Church for heresy (heresy is deliberate and persistant choice of error) go to hell. Those who never were exposed to the teachings of the Catholic Church (later generations of Protestants who have faith in Christ as God incarnate but who do not even have accurate knowledge of the Catholic Church's ecclesial claims, hence cannot, simply cannot, make a knowing choice for heresy) can be saved and that the "extra" in "nulla salus extra ecclesiam" means deliberately chosen "extraneity" not the accident of birth and education "outside" the visible Catholic Church.

You are confused again. The teaching is that those only are to be considered as heretics guilty of heresy who have deliberately left the Catholic Church or refused to enter it. It is certainly not taught that salvation is possible apart from the Church for those who innocently do not enter her portals. Bl. Pope Pius IX in his Syllabus of Errors condemns your proposition: "17. Good hope at least is to be entertained of the eternal salvation of all those who are not at all in the true Church of Christ. -- Encyclical "Quanto conficiamur," Aug. 10, 1863, etc."

You seem to think there is such a straight and easy road leading to heaven outside the Church, and that apart from the Sacraments, it is nothing at all to avoid all sin. If so, why have a Church?

It was a nice hypothesis. It never had authoritative teaching behind it. Those who claim it did are claiming greater authority to define doctrine than the Church herself claims--claiming to be smarter than the pope.

No, we are pointing out that it is still the common teaching of the Church - i.e. it is part of the ordinary magisterium -, and it is a theological hypothesis founded on very clear dogmatic teaching.

The proposals to do away with it are simple outright Pelagianism that turn Catholic Dogma on Baptism on its head, and clear the path once more to gut the entire notion of original sin and the need for Christ and the Church. "Baptism is necessary for salvation" comes to mean "Baptism is necessary for salvation for everyone who is baptised", which is plain old circular nonesense.

This sort of curious nonesense is very much behind the modern trend to delay or even omit Baptism, and turn it into a social ritual, rather than a Sacrament. The same fate has already befallen Confirmation and First Communion.

Your claims regarding the fate of unbaptized infants are directly contradicted by the CCC. You are the confused one. You cite from Trent a statement directed against those who deny baptismal regeneration and specificallly against the Anabaptists (my ancestors!)--against those who have plenty of opportunity to baptize their infants and stubbornly refuse and apply it to the question of unbaptized infants who die before any chance of being baptized. For parents deliberately to withhold baptism from children is a bad thing but that's not the same as parents who are prevented by the child's death from baptizing them. The Anabaptists denied that baptism saved from sin, denied that it had power to remove sin and so on and so forth and for that reason refused to have their children baptized.

You and I may have had this discussion before--at least I know I've been over this ground on a FR thread. Look at Denzinger 410 (Innocent III) in which he speaks of deprivation of the vision of God, poena damni rather than poena sensus. When I said unbaptized infants are not damned to hell I meant Hell-Hell-Hell (poena sensus). The "hell" you refer to with Lyons II is the same as Limbo and Thomas Aquinas considered it compatible with a state of natural bliss. That is NOT hell in the way most people understand the word Hell and for you to quote Lyons II without pointing that out is disingenous or uninformed.

Now, the reference to "Limbo" (the unequal punishment, natural bliss) in Lyons II and Florence, as well as by Pius VI in response to the Synod of Pistoia--was that dogmatically taught? If you want to consider it part of the ordinary magisterium you may. But it has not been definitively taught as such because in all three incidents the limbus puerorum statements were incidental to more central doctrinal concerns--the efficacy of baptism, anti-Pelagianism etc. Theologians throughout the early Church (most of the Greek Fathers--so much for "the whole of Christian antiquity taught your "to hell with unbaptized infants" doctrine--the Greek Fathers most emphatically did not) and Middle Ages and in modern times have openly speculated about the fate of unbaptized infants and the Church never stepped into choose among the varied positions held by theologians. Lyons II does not teach Limbo--it leaves open a variety of ways of explaining just what punishment, if any, the unbaptized suffer. The one thing that is clear and taught definitively, is that they do not suffer hell in the way that term is normally understood. Exactly what happens to them WAS NOT defined at Lyons or Florence or by Pius VI and theologians have always been free, without being heretics or unfaithful Catholics, to offer a variety of explications of what happens to them. "Very light external punishment" is one (even Augustine advocates this one in Enchiridion, so it's really not even fair to say that Augustine said they were condemned to Hell-Hell); Aquinas's "natural bliss" is another. John Paul II's "entrustment to God's mercy" is another and it fits perfectly within Lyons II or Florence or Pius VI. John Paul II (with Ratzinger supporting him) did not say definitively that they go to heaven, he was not advocating a straight and easy path to heaven, he was leaving things undefined, and so did I. And I don't appreciate being called a Pelagian.

What Ratzinger and JPII were challenging is the over-defintion of Limbo as an antechamber to hell or antechamber to heaven, depending on which theologian you read. They are saying that we just don't know. Period.

We don't know. And the Church has never said that we do know. This is a case in which the Western Church, so often accused of overdefining things, is backing away from a tendency on the part of her theologians to say more about this topic than the Church is capable of saying. Lyons II and Florence and Piux VI stopped short of the brink and now JPII and Benedict are saying, let's move a few yards further back from the brink.

The one thing that is definitively and dogmatically defined is that original sin is not the same as actual sin. The position you defend tends to elide the difference too much.

And they are not Pelagian when they do this. So call off the heresy-hunting dogs, please.

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