Posted on 10/04/2006 6:41:15 AM PDT by NYer
Rome reports indicate that the Holy See's International Theological Commission is examining the notion of limbo at a meeting this week and may be on the verge of scrapping it.
Ad Kronos International (AKI) reports that the Vatican reportedly appears set to abolish the Catholic tradition that holds that the souls of children who die before being baptised going to limbo.
Citing a report in Turin, Italy newspaper, La Stampa, AKI says that the issue is being discussed this weeke by the International Theological Commission, a body of Catholic theologians from around the world that advises the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
According to the 1904 catechism published by Pope St Pius X in 1904, "children who died without baptism go to the limbo where they do not enjoy God but don't suffer either as having the original sin, and only that, they do not deserve Paradise nor Hell or Purgatory".
The Church however has for a long time stopped referring to the concept Limbo and in 1984 theologian Joseph Ratzinger, elected Pope Benedict XVI in April last year, said that Limbo "was never a truth of the faith."
"I would let it drop as this has always only been a theological hypothesis," he said.
According to the Fathers of the Church, the concept limbo is that people who lived good lives but died before the Resurrection did not go to heaven, but rather had to wait for Christ to open the gates of heaven.
The term limbo does not appear in the Bible. In Holy Scripture, limbo is referred to as the term bosom of Abraham, appearing twice in it.
The bosom of Abraham represents the blissful state where the righteous dead await their eternal reward.
As such, this concept corresponds to the concept of limbo of the fathers in that it is neither heaven nor hell and the people there are waiting to enter paradise.
SOURCE
Vatican: Limbo for children likely to be scrapped (AdKronos International, 3/10/06)
If you would have bothered to read the article you'd know that it is "a line item". Also, it would be nice if you'd at least acknowledge that you were incorrect in claiming that the Catholic Church eliminated the 2nd commandment.
2Ti 3:15 And that from a child thou hast known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.
2Ti 3:16 All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
Not so...Timothy did not learn of salvation thru faith in Jesus from reading the OT scripture...He learned it from the NT SCRIPTURE...
Not so...This verse discredits the 'people' that wrest the scripture...
It is theologically incorrect to call the Catholic Church the "ordinary means" of salvation, since as murph has pointed out, the Catholic Church has declared and defined that She (not murph, but the Church) is THE means of salvation. That's Catholic dogma. Modernism would dearly love to pretend that this isn't the truth, and that there are "extra-ordinary means" of salvation, but the Church has not stated this, and in fact, has without a doubt ruled it out. Completely. There is, in fact, absolutely and positively no salvation outsdie the Catholic Church according to infallible Catholic dogma.
If you lift the Catholic 10 Commandments off of the Vatican Catechism web site that I quoted, there is no prohibition of idolatry to be found. I am talking just the Catechetal formula column, not the Bible columns. This from the church that prays to self appointed saints, lights candles to them, and yes, even kneels before statues of them, is incredibly convenient.
Mary: Mother of God, Queen of Heaven, Mediatrix, Purveyor of salvation, purveyor of mercy, etc., etc...:
Luk 11:27 And it came to pass, as he spake these things, a certain woman of the company lifted up her voice, and said unto him, Blessed is the womb that bare thee, and the paps which thou hast sucked.
Luk 11:28 But he said, Yea rather, blessed are they that hear the word of God, and keep it.
Some woman was trying to focus attention on the Mother of God...Jesus knocked her ladder right over and told her that Christians are more blessed than the Mother of God...And ofcourse Mary would be more blessed as a follower of Christ than the Mother of God...
Luk 2:48 And when they saw him, they were amazed: and his mother said unto him, Son, why hast thou thus dealt with us? behold, thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing.
Luk 2:49 And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me? wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business?
It's clear to me that while Mary was probably an excellent Mother to the Jewish boy Jesus, her possible role as the Mother of God was inconceivable...
Yes, I worded it wrong. I am not a theologian, obviously. What I was talking about was the visible appearance of belonging to the Church.
One can theoretically not visibly belong to the Church, yet be connected with Her in a mysterious way.
That is disingenuous, or worse, because what you claim is false. Read the whole article you linked, not just the abbreviation of the 10 Commandments.
Just 3 pages after the page you linked in the Catechism, is stated the 1st Commandment as Catholics know it:
I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them or serve them.
"Limbo makes more sense than any other theological opinion about unbaptized babies I've heard."
I agree.
Personally, I think the effort should be focused on refining *what* the Limbo of the Infants really is. It seems to me, prior Church statements related to baptism and unoriginal sin (e.g. Council of Lyons, Florence and Trent) certainly imply rather clearly a loss is suffered by unbaptized infants - that can only be explained by a unique state in the after life. The 2000 years of development on this issue has centered not on whether it is heaven or hell for these poor souls, but whether it is hell or something 'less than heaven' (i.e. the hypothesized limbo).
To argue that all unbaptized infants who die go to heaven, would seem to suggest that it might be better to be a victim of an abortion or miscarriage - and it would seem to undermine the traditional admonition of the Church that parents have their children baptized as soon as possible after birth.
I would hate to think this alleged theological commission would just ignore the many prior papal and conciliar statements that relate to the issue.
"Timothy did not learn of salvation thru faith in Jesus from reading the OT scripture...He learned it from the NT SCRIPTURE..."
I'm sorry, I'm not quite following you here. As far as we know, Timothy and Jesus would have been approximate contemporaries in age, give or take a decade or two, although it's doubtful that they ever met, Timothy having been converted as an adult during Paul's first visit to Lystra in approx. 47-49 AD, before any of the New Testament had been written(1 Tim 1:2; 2 Tim 3:11.)
We don't know exactly when the Gospels were written, but it would certainly have been after the death of Jesus (!)--- therefore Timothy could not have read any of the New Testament as a child.
Please don't think I'm trying to insult you by pointing out something so obvious. I'm just trying to figure out what part of the New Testament you think Timothy had known as a child. Maybe you could provide an approximate timeline of his life?
the kjv? m'kay.
I don't know when Timothy got converted...He could have been a child...Paul obviously knew his mother and grandmother personally and talks about their great faith...
Paul had been in the ministry for a minimum of 14 years and probably longer before Timothy shows up in the scripture...
I say Timothy was raised on the OT as well on NT teaching...
The question then (I guess) is what is scripture...
Paul was a mentor of Timothy...Paul learned what he taught directly from the Glorified Jesus Christ...So when Paul wrote a letter to a church, I can believe it was 'scripture'...And it was known as scripture given the known authority that was given to Paul...And that scripture no doubt was being copied and distributed thru out the churches of the world from the minute it was received...
And the clincher is the 2nd part of the verse...
(the scriptures) which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.
As we know, the doctrine of salvation thru faith falls within the ministry of Paul...Therefore the Scripture in the verse has to include NT scripture as well...
Either believe in what the Church teaches or do not. If a heretical belief becomes widespread enough that an infallible clarification is needed, it will come.
SD
One question, and I hope you can answer it better than you can provide the Biblical citation to the enumerated Commandments.
What part of "I am the Lord your God. You shall have no other gods before Me." do you interpret to be approving of the creation and worship of graven idols?
Even if all you say is true and Catholics are never, ever presented with a verbatim prohibition against graven idols (that is, if Catholics are never taught anything other than the bumper sticker version of the 10 Commandments), what part of having only One God and no others do you read to allow the worship of idols?
Does this logic escape you?
SD
"LIMBO."
Much ado about "NOWHERE."
-Theo
The timing you cite in your post does not support the idea that Timothy could have been taught the New Testament when he was a child. You need to tell me (with supportive evidence) when the various books of the New Testament were written.
Taking the broadest possible estimate of the scholars, the texts now comprising the New Testament were first written in Greek, somewhere between the middle of the first century A.D. and the middle of the second century A.D.
Many scholars believe that 1 Thessalonians was the first book written, around 49 or 50 A.D., and that 2 Peter was the last New Testament book to be written, sometime between 110 and 140 A.D.
The VERY earliest I have ever read about is recorded by Eusebius of Caesarea in his Church History (ca. 330 AD), book II, chap. xv, who described St. Peter's first visit in Rome in ca. 44 AD, stating:
"And so greatly did the splendour of piety illumine the minds of Peter's hearers that they were not satisfied with hearing once only, and were not content with the unwritten teaching of the divine Gospel, but with all sorts of entreaties they besought Mark, a follower of Peter, and the one whose Gospel is extant, that he would leave them a written monument of the doctrine which had been orally communicated to them. Nor did they cease until they had prevailed with the man, and had thus become the occasion of the written Gospel which bears the name of Mark."
This was years after Timothy's childhood.
And your "clincher" -- ahem --- does not clinch. I presume you've read St. Paul's Epistles? Then you would know this:
Romans 4:1,12-13, 16
"What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather, discovered in this matter?
And he is also the father of...those who also walk in the footsteps of the faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised. It was not through law that Abraham and his offspring received the promise that he would be heir of the world, but through the righteousness that comes by faith.
Therefore, the promise comes by faith, so that it may be by grace and may be guaranteed to all Abraham's offspring—not only to those who are of the law but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham. He is the father of us all. The Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: "All nations will be blessed through you."
Galatians 3:9 "So those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith."
So it looks like young Timothy learned about "salvation through faith" by learning about Abraham. I'm sure his Jewish mother and grandmother would have known about him!
Agreed.
I read it. The only thing new to me was:
This abbreviation has led anti-Catholics to virtually explode with rage, declaring that the Catholic Church has "hidden" or "removed" from the Ten Commandments the prohibition of idolatry. This assertion stems from two sources: (1) their misinterpretation of the idolatry command as a prohibition of all religious images (see "The Court of God") and (2) their intense hostility toward the Catholic Church.
Now, who on this thread has "exploded in rage"?, my FRiend Which side of the debate on this thread is illustrative of the phrase "intense hostility"?
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