Limbo

[dairygirl4u2c]

so does anyone know what the papal writings are, per limbo, that caused the baltimore catechism to include it as a teaching?

if limbo is not true, that means that the catechism is not a necessarily infallible source of teaching. doesn't necessarily mean the catholic church isn't true, but.
if limbo is true, it means at least the recent teachings are not true-- not that the recent ones are ncessarily infallible, though they tend to seem so in their attempted intention.

so which is it that is false: the catholic church, the catechism's veracity as authoritative, or recent non-limbo teachings?

ive been wanting to research teh limbo source, for awhile, but haven't gotten around to it. if we can read the sources, we could determine the actual source per infallibility, and say more concretely what the answer is.

Edited May 2, 2010 by dairygirl4u2c

[dairygirl4u2c]

this site says that limbo was never officially taught.
[quote]Though limbo was never officially defined in any church council or document, it became, like other unchallenged elements of the Christian worldview, a part of the common teaching and almost universal catechesis of the church. Since the late 19th century, it was written on the psyche of every young Catholic through the Baltimore Catechism. For example, Baltimore Catechism No. 3 states, with its usual air of certainty: “Persons, such as infants, who have not committed actual sin and who, through no fault of theirs, die without baptism, cannot enter heaven; but it is the common belief they will go to some place similar to limbo, where they will be free from suffering, though deprived of the happiness of heaven” (Q. 632). Most Catholics, of course, made no distinction between defined doctrines and what appeared in the catechism. It was all church teaching, to be accepted without question.[/quote]

if we can say it wasn't official, then the current trend in teaching, or official teaching if that's teh case, then the new stuff can be accepted as possibly infallible.
but even if we accepted that, the whole situation definitely gives room for argument, that teh teachings of teh catholic church are like a magic bunny hat of the ordinary magisterium. take out of the tradition what you want, and say 'it was never official' for other stuff. it makes the magic bunny hat all the more depressing, given all the 'it's not definite, but you have to believe it out of the ordinary magisterium's power, anyway'. and then all teh sudden, that teaching ya thought was definitive, definitive by the ordinary magisterium, is no longer so.

[dairygirl4u2c]

[quote]This teaching, in the broader context of the doctrine of original sin, led to an urgency to baptize infants who died at birth or were in danger of death. Nurses, doctors and ordinary Christians were instructed to baptize in these circumstances to ensure the infants’ entrance into heaven. As late as 1966, when I began the study of moral theology, my course notes on the morality of the sacraments included several graphic pages on the procedure for interuterine baptism in cases where the fetus was in danger of death.[/quote]
kinda sad, really

[dairygirl4u2c]

it's deceptive to read that quote above from teh catechism, alone, though, cause it acknowledges 'it is common belief'- if it's common belief only, which it's tsating, then one couldnt say the catholic church led people to think it was ordinary magisterium in an infallible sense.

here's an anathema statement though, on infalllible, this might be the answer to my own question, from one of my past posts in fact, that i forgot about:
“It has been decided likewise that if anyone says that for this reason the Lord said: “In my house there are many mansions”: that it might be understood that in the kingdom of heaven there will be some middle place or some place anywhere where happy infants live who departed from this life without baptism, without which they cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven, which is life eternal, let him be anathema. For when the Lord says: “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he shall not enter into the kingdom of God” [John 3:5], what Catholic will doubt that he will be a partner of the devil who has not deserved to be a coheir of Christ? For he who lacks the right part will without doubt run into the left [cf. Matt. 25:41,46].”

and more explicitly, and less flaky in definitiveness, the catechism:
"“Babies dead without baptism go to Limbo, where they do not enjoy God, but neither do they suffer, because, having original sin alone, they do not deserve paradise, but neither do they merit hell or purgatory.” ~1905 Catechism of the Catholic Church


so i ask now, just what people's thoguhts on are this stuff.


here's the site that says it has been definiitevely defined, and notes other stuff.

[quote]Popes have taken Four Contrary Positions on the Fate of Unbaptized Infants





[This is only a brief overview of what popes have said about Limbo. For a fuller discussion of the history of the Limbo heresy, see Unbaptized Infants Suffer Fire and Limbo is a Heretical Pelagian Fable.]



Summary


Popes of the Roman Catholic Church have taken four contrary positions regarding the fate of infants who die without baptism.



The lot assigned by popes to the infants has gradually changed from including hell fire, through involving the pain of loss only and then no pain at all, to full beatitude in heaven.



1. Popes of the patristic era infallibly defined the doctrine of Augustine that unbaptized infants have the eternal torments of the damned in the fires of hell with the devil. We cite Pope Gregory the Great, Pope Zosimus and Pope Innocent I amongst others who taught this.



2. Pope Innocent III adopted the position of Abelard in the twelfth century that unbaptized infants will have the pain of loss but not the pain of fire.



3. Pope Pius X was the first pope to teach that unbaptized infants have no sufferings in his 1905 Catechism.



4. Recent popes, John Paul II and Benedict XVI, have given us to “hope” that all unbaptized infants, and indeed all of humanity, will go to heaven.



First papal position



The XVI Council of Carthage (418) condemned the Pelagian fable that there is some place anywhere where infants who died without baptism live in happiness (Limbo).



The Council taught the Catholic doctrine that infants go into the fire to be eternally punished with the devil, being on the left hand at the judgement.



The teaching of Carthage was infallibly approved as a rule of the Faith by Pope Zosimus and Pope Innocent I and by the ecumenical councils, which were approved by other popes.



“It has been decided likewise that if anyone says that for this reason the Lord said: “In my house there are many mansions”: that it might be understood that in the kingdom of heaven there will be some middle place or some place anywhere where happy infants live who departed from this life without baptism, without which they cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven, which is life eternal, let him be anathema. For when the Lord says: “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he shall not enter into the kingdom of God” [John 3:5], what Catholic will doubt that he will be a partner of the devil who has not deserved to be a coheir of Christ? For he who lacks the right part will without doubt run into the left [cf. Matt. 25:41,46].”



“Then he shall say to them also that shall be on his left: Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels... And these shall go away into everlasting punishment.” ( Matthew 25:41, 46)



This remained the teaching of the Church for several centuries. Indeed any contrary doctrine has been heretical ever since the popes made the teaching of Carthage infallible.



Pope Gregory the Great (-604) taught the eternal torment of infants in his Moralia on the Book of Job.



Gregory the Great: “For there be some that are withdrawn from the present light, before they attain to shew forth the good or evil deserts of an active life. And whereas the Sacraments of salvation do not free them from the sin of their birth, at the same time that here they never did aright by their own act; there they are brought to torment. And these have one wound, viz. to be born in corruption, and another, to die in the flesh. But forasmuch as after death there also follows, death eternal, by a secret and righteous judgment ‘wounds are multiplied to them without cause.’ For they even receive everlasting torments, who never sinned by their own will. And hence it is written, Even the infant of a single day is not pure in His sight upon earth. Hence ‘Truth’ says by His own lips, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. Hence Paul says, We were by nature the children of wrath even as others. He then that adding nothing of his own is mined by the guilt of birth alone, how stands it with such an one at the last account, as far as the calculation of human sense goes, but that he is ‘wounded without cause?’ And yet in the strict account of God it is but just that the stock of mortality, like an unfruitful tree, should preserve in the branches that bitterness which it drew from the root. Therefore he says, For He shall break me with a tempest, and multiply my wounds without cause. As if reviewing the woes of mankind he said in plain words; ‘With what sort of visitation does the strict Judge mercilessly slay those, whom the guilt of their own deeds condemns, if He smites for all eternity even those, whom the guilt of deliberate choice does not impeach?’” (Moralia 9: 32)



Second papal position



Pope Innocent III (-1216) adopted the position of Abelard in the twelfth century. Abelard was the first theologian to dissent from the defined doctrine of hell fire for unbaptized infants.



According to Pope Innocent, infants suffer the pain of knowing that they have lost the vision of God but they do not have the pain of fire.



“Pope Innocent’s teaching is to the effect that those dying with only original sin on their souls will suffer ‘no other pain, whether from material fire or from the worm of conscience, except the pain of being deprived forever of the vision of God.’ It should be noted, however, that this poena damni incurred for original sin implied, with Abelard and most of the early Scholastics, a certain degree of spiritual torment.” (Toner, Catholic Encyclopedia 1910, Limbo)



Third papal position



Aquinas was the first major theologian to teach that the infants have no pain whatsoever, even a pain of loss. In fact he taught that they have a state of natural happiness. Yes, this is sounding more and more like the happy Limbo of the Pelagians, condemned by the Church at Carthage.



But no pope taught the doctrine that the unbaptized infants do not suffer in eternity until it was incorporated into the 1905 Catechism of Pope Pius X, most of which he wrote himself and the use of which he imposed on the diocese of Rome.



“Babies dead without baptism go to Limbo, where they do not enjoy God, but neither do they suffer, because, having original sin alone, they do not deserve paradise, but neither do they merit hell or purgatory.”



Fourth papal position



Recent popes have quite outdone their predecessors. They now give us to “hope” that unbaptized infants will be included in the universal salvation of all people.



Cardinal Ratzinger wrote as follows about the efforts of his predecessor, Pope John Paul II.



“This state people called limbo. In the course of our century, that has gradually come to seem problematic to us. This was one way in which people sought to justify the necessity of baptizing infants as early as possible, but the solution is itself questionable. Finally, the pope made a decisive turn in the encyclical Evangelium Vitae, a change already anticipated by the Catechism of the Catholic Church, when he expressed the simple hope that God is powerful enough to draw to himself all those who were unable to receive the sacrament.” (God and the World, Ignatius Press, 2002, p. 401)



The new Catechism, published by John Paul in 1992, encourages us to hope that unbaptized infants go to heaven.



“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.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1261)



Indeed, we are given to hope that all people will be saved.



“The Church prays that no one should be lost: ‘Lord, let me never be parted from you.’ If it is true that no one can save himself, it is also true that God ‘desires all men to be saved’ (1 Tim 2:4), and that for him ‘all things are possible’ (Mt 19:26).” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1058)



“In hope, the Church prays for ‘all men to be saved.’” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1821)



Pope John Paul II wrote more assertively in his 1995 encyclical Evangelium Vitae, telling women who have had an abortion, “you will be able to ask forgiveness from your child, who is now living in the Lord.”



In October 2004 John Paul asked the International Theological Commission to consider the question of the fate of unbaptized infants in the light of the “universal salvific will of God”. Its work has continued under Pope Benedict XVI and The Times recently reported as follows.



“Vatican sources said yesterday that the commission would recommend that Limbo be replaced by the more “compassionate” doctrine that all children who die do so “in the hope of eternal salvation.”” (Times, November 30, 2005)



John Paul seemed quite certain that all people will be saved. He was given to speak of Jesus as follows.



“Christ, Redeemer of man, now for ever ‘clad in a robe dipped in blood’, the everlasting, invincible guarantee of universal salvation.” (Message to the Abbess General of the Order of the Most Holy Saviour of St Bridget)



Update! Non-existent quote from Catechism of Pope Pius X



It has become clear that the passage maintaining the Limbo heresy is not in the early editions of the Catechism of Pius X. Thus the truth is that no pope has ever taught the version of the Limbo heresy that says that unbaptized infants go to a middle place where they do not suffer even the pain of loss. And yet almost all Catholics think that is what the Church has always taught on this matter! This well illustrates the necessity of looking to the ancient Fathers to see what the true Faith is.



Richard Ibranyi recently revealed as follows.



“I believe that my mistake in this case was providential because it proves a very important fact that I mention time and time again; that is, heretics misquote imprimatured books to defend their heresies. That is aside from the fact that many imprimatured books do contain heresy. I trusted the many sources that use the supposed following quote from the Hagan edition of the Catechism of Pope Pius X Catechism to defend the Limbo Heresy that dead unbaptized infants are not in hell.



“A Compendium of Catechetical Instruction (Also known as the Catechism of Pope Pius X), Monsignor John Hagan, 1910, English edition translated from a French version: ‘Babies dead without baptism go to Limbo, where they do not enjoy God, but neither do they suffer, because, having original sin alone, they do not deserve paradise, but neither do they merit hell or purgatory.’



“I knew that the Hagan edition of the Catechism of Pope Pius X contains the Salvation Heresy, so I assumed that it contained this Limbo Heresy that many said it contained. I should have checked the catechism to verify the quote before I used it in this section of my book. Upon investigation, I discovered that this Limbo Heresy is not in the Hagan edition of the Catechism of Pope Pius X. Therefore, beware of those who use this quote to defend their Limbo Heresy. This is just another example of obstinate heretics lying to defend their heresies, hoping their readers do not catch them lying.” (Damned Infants)[/quote]

[dairygirl4u2c]

course, there's also the option, that the recent popes are false, and things like this, the 'extra nulla sullus' 'no salvation outside the catholic church' etc, only show that they arefalse, and that sedevacantists etc are right.
kinda like how mel gibson is a sedevacantist, and believes in the old teaching of 'extra nulla sullus'

[Laudate_Dominum]

At least one of the 20th century popes was supposed to be pretty darn good at it, but I forget which one at the moment.

[dairygirl4u2c]

good at what? 'it'
are ya replying to the right thread?
a little confused

[Laudate_Dominum]

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BfaQuk5tEKE[/media]


P.S. Who will solve the greatest enigma of our time?

[dairygirl4u2c]

“It has been decided likewise that if anyone says that for this reason the Lord said: “In my house there are many mansions”: that it might be understood that in the kingdom of heaven there will be some middle place or some place anywhere where happy infants live who departed from this life without baptism, without which they cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven, which is life eternal, let him be anathema. For when the Lord says: “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he shall not enter into the kingdom of God” [John 3:5], what Catholic will doubt that he will be a partner of the devil who has not deserved to be a coheir of Christ? For he who lacks the right part will without doubt run into the left [cf. Matt. 25:41,46].”
that's from the council of carthage.

i suppose ya could:
try to minimize it- say that they were only saying the following isn't true: 'limbo should be understood as not true by virtue of the verse of many mansions.' but, that limbo itself as a teaching might be true or not true, is still an open question.
and then state that the other catechism verse is merely not infallible.
that there's no infallible statements on the matter (still would like more sources for why it was included, though
and, thus, the 'it is common belief' thing merely means that it was common belief, but sholdn't be understood as 'ordinary magisterium' in an infallible sense.

[dairygirl4u2c]

[quote name='Laudate_Dominum' date='02 May 2010 - 09:23 PM' timestamp='1272849792' post='2103883']
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BfaQuk5tEKE[/media]


P.S. Who will solve the greatest enigma of our time?
[/quote]

... it appears ive been set up

[dairygirl4u2c]

at least ya didnt use this popular tune:
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4f-P0Q-pqsw&feature=related[/media]

david hasselhoff was a nice touch, very limbo-happy-ish

[dairygirl4u2c]

....

Edited May 3, 2010 by dairygirl4u2c

[dairygirl4u2c]

[quote name='dairygirl4u2c' date='02 May 2010 - 09:29 PM' timestamp='1272850148' post='2103884']
“It has been decided likewise that if anyone says that for this reason the Lord said: “In my house there are many mansions”: that it might be understood that in the kingdom of heaven there will be some middle place or some place anywhere where happy infants live who departed from this life without baptism, without which they cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven, which is life eternal, let him be anathema. For when the Lord says: “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he shall not enter into the kingdom of God” [John 3:5], what Catholic will doubt that he will be a partner of the devil who has not deserved to be a coheir of Christ? For he who lacks the right part will without doubt run into the left [cf. Matt. 25:41,46].”
that's from the council of carthage.

i suppose ya could:
try to minimize it- say that they were only saying the following isn't true: 'limbo should be understood as not true by virtue of the verse of many mansions.' but, that limbo itself as a teaching might be true or not true, is still an open question.
and then state that the other catechism verse is merely not infallible.
that there's no infallible statements on the matter (still would like more sources for why it was included, though
and, thus, the 'it is common belief' thing merely means that it was common belief, but sholdn't be understood as 'ordinary magisterium' in an infallible sense.
[/quote]

actually im not sure one could make that argument.
according to thatsite above, carthage said that this verse applies to infants:
“Then he shall say to them also that shall be on his left: Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels... And these shall go away into everlasting punishment.” ( Matthew 25:41, 46)

[dairygirl4u2c]

this site said the part about 'in my fathers house' was never official at carthage:

""It has been decided likewise that if anyone says that for this reason the Lord said: “In my house there are many mansions”: that it might be understood that in the kingdom of heaven there will be some middle place or some place anywhere where happy infants live who departed from this life without baptism, without which they cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven, which is life eternal, let him be anathema. For when the Lord says: “Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he shall not enter into the kingdom of God” [John 3:5], what Catholic will doubt that he will be a partner of the devil who has not deserved to be a coheir of Christ? For he who lacks the right part will without doubt run into the left [cf. Matt. 25:41,46]."

This canon was never dogmatically received into the Church—and it needs to be interpreted in relation to the Pelagian claim that “children just born are in the same state as Adam before his fall”—yet it remains the case that the terror of infant damnation has plagued the Western Church for centuries. Even as late as the twelfth century St Anselm could write: “For they even receive everlasting torments, who never sinned by their own will. And hence it is written, ‘Even the infant of a single day is not pure in His sight upon earth.’” The profession of faith of Michael Palaeologus, which was read to the Council of Lyons II (1274) but neither formally promulgated nor even discussed by the council fathers, can be read as underwriting this view: “As for the souls of those who die in mortal sin or with original sin only, they go down immediately to hell, to be punished however with different punishments” (emphasis mine)."

[dairygirl4u2c]

there's some controvery with the council of florence, too, though:
"Dr Miller believes that the trajectory of the Tradition witnesses against the salvation of unbaptized infants and cites the judgments of two ecumenical councils, II Lyons and Florence: “The souls of those who die in actual mortal sin or in original sin only immediately descend into hell, even though they suffer different penalties.” Yet one needs to be careful with this text, which is a direct quotation of St Fulgentius. Pope Clement IV included this statement in the profession of faith that he sent to Emperor Michael Palaeologus. In The Christian Faith (Neuner-Dupuis), we read about this profession of faith that it “was not written at the Council, nor was it accepted by the Greeks as a basis for a doctrinal agreement with the Latins. It was neither promulgated, nor even discussed by the Council Fathers, but simply read from a letter sent by the Byzantine emperor” (p. 17). The Fulgentius citation was, however, subsequently included in the Florentine decree Laetentus caeli. Traditional Catholics understandably read Florence as reaffirming the Augustinian belief in the damnation of unbaptized infants, just as they understandably read Florence as consigning, without exception, “not only pagans, but also Jews, heretics or schismatics” to “the everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels” (Decree for the Copts). Yet the Catholic Church has not restricted itself to a narrow reading of Florence but has affirmed the possibility of salvation for those outside the sacramental bounds of the Church (see William Most).

The Council of Florence was the one General Council of the second millenium that had a substantial Eastern presence. Though its documents are composed in a Western idiom, this does not mean that the Oriental bishops understood themselves as abandoning in any way their fundamental theological convictions. Their subscription to the decree, therefore, does not mean that they suddenly embraced the views of Augustine and Fulgentius on original sin and infant damnation. The Council of Florence must be read with both Western and Eastern eyes. It was, after all, a council of reunion.

It is a basic rule of dogmatic hermeneutics that dogmatic statements, whether conciliar or papal, do not give direct answers to issues that were not seriously debated. In Avery Cardinal Dulles’s words: “No doctrinal decision of the past directly solves a question that was not asked at the time” (The Survival of Dogma, p. 185). If the question “Do all infants who die without baptism die in original sin?” was not being discussed and argued in the 14th century, as it apparently was not, then the Council of Florence cannot be invoked as providing a definitive, irreformable answer to the question. It may well be that many of the doctors of the council took for granted the possibility, and indeed the reality, of an infant dying “in original sin only”; but this still does not allow us to state that this opinion was formally proposed by the council. That all who die in the state of original sin are excluded from the beatific vision is indeed de fide dogma; but this does not necessarily exclude the possibility that God may regenerate souls by nonsacramental means, even though this possibility might not even have been entertained by the council fathers. This judgment is strengthened by the observation that the paragraph of Laetentus caeli that addresses baptism and original sin is not formulated in the language of solemn definition: it does not call for an irrevocable act of faith and anathematize the contradictory proposition. In his important essay “Unbaptized Infants: May They Be Saved?” Peter Gumpel asserts that the issue addressed by Florence in the paragraph on original sin is the timing of divine retribution—at the the time of death or at the final judgment. “The thesis that there are (some) infants who die de facto in the state of original sin,” he concludes, “is therefore not directly defined” (Downside Review 72 [November 1954]), p. 432)."