The problem is you don't seem to "get it" that the ONLY reason anyone CAN say they are saved is because God promised it. Among many other such verses, look at I John 5:13 - "These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God so that you may know you have eternal life..". It's not "self-declaring" anything but declaring trust in the promises of God. To deny that is "self-declaring" you know better than God and you are calling him a liar. In fact, John talked about people like you, "He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God hath made him a liar; because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son. And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. (I John 5:10,11)
Do you have any explanation for God predestining people to hell? Why would one believe that God programs people to do evil and says that those he programmed to do evil will then be pushed into hell forever -- isn't that psychopathic -- why does your believe it?
All I can explain is what the Bible clearly says. I don't come right out and say "God programs people to hell", mainly because Scripture says it is God's will that all be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth. Yet, we know not all do. Did God KNOW before someone was born whether or not they would be saved? Yes, you can't believe in an all-knowing God and doubt he didn't know, can you? How all that works, I don't claim to understand it all, but I DO know one day it will all make sense. I can wait and trust God in the meantime. Will you?
Let's just say we're not the first to fight this battle. I think you are right that at least the finer points will have to wait for the beatific vision.
The big hairy concepts are
Also, I think you over-stated our opposition to "blessed assurance."(I think maybe we overstate it too, maybe.) When I cite Dominic and Terese of Lisieux, I don't mean that those destined to be canonized are the only sort who can enjoy the blessed assurance.
If the proposition to be debated is "Whether Catholics think no one can know he's going to heaven?" I think I've done my job if I can adduce one or two people who talked like they knew and did not get accused of anything.
BUT, just as we observe "All saints" in a few days, because we believe there are PLENTY of saints who are not known to us, so I think, the gift of blessed assurance is granted to many more than to just a couple of famous 'greats'.
It occurs to me that part of OUR problem (if it's a problem) is what I think of as the "Hosannah Rhetoric".
Look at the Mass: The priest does not say: Shuh-ZAYam, We done 'er agin!! He asks. He begs. And he asks for "some small share" of grace. Sure, he partakes and distributes in evident confidence that God has indeed done 'er agin, and so we receive. We ACT in confidence while we beg like beggars, for such we are.
So, maybe, with blessed assurance. (The Mass is central to Catholic life, piety, and thought in a way that is dauntingly hard to express to someone who does not live it.) Just as we are confident that God will do what (we think) he promised as regards the Eucharist, so also I put all my trust in God and His deep and, if I may say so, resilient mercy. He will do, as He always has done, ALL for my benefit. ("He does all for each," says Lewis in a wonderful account of Divine Providence.)
Now imagine the kid who goes to his father and says, "Dad, you know and I know that you're going to give me the money I'm asking for after I've argued and begged and promised for a while. So why don;'t you save us both a lot of time and give it to me now?"
Even if he KNOWS, it is indecent to assume, to adopt that attitude.
SO I think part of our reticence on this matter is more an aesthetic sense than a strict theological sense. It's just TACKY to say, "Oh yeah, I'm cool." We will remain like baby birds squawking with out mouths open for food,and our chief rhetoric will be that of supplication, though we are confident we will not be refused.
(Hosannah, though a cheer and little else, literally is a plea to be saved.)
I'm not saying good or bad. I'm just trying to convey the savor of it.
Look: my tears at Corpus Christi are not tears of fear. They are tears of release, of happiness that so great a need in me is met with so overwhelmingly generous a response. It is my part to beg,and His to grant. And I am happy to beg. Poverty is fun.
To the Catholics I pinged: I did not ping you to pile on boatbums but to ask if you think this is more or less okay.
There's at least one doctoral dissertation waiting on the influence of piety on theology. Lex orandi, lex credendi and all that.