Unbaptised children
Official doctrine
“103. What has been revealed to us is that the ordinary way of salvation is by the sacrament of Baptism. None of the above considerations should be taken as qualifying the necessity of Baptism or justifying delay in administering the sacrament.[135] Rather, as we want to reaffirm in conclusion, they provide strong grounds for hope that God will save infants when we have not been able to do for them what we would have wished to do, namely, to baptize them into the faith and life of the Church.“
Exploring ideas
It seems unlikely that God should either accept or reject a life- who has not had the chance of choice, especially if they cannot fulfill (with any possibility) the requirements of baptism of desire.
Augustine
Augustine thereby penned the idea of limbo- whereby unbaptized children (infants), having died, are neither in heaven nor hell- if they are not baptised, but eternally in between, but this has never been official doctrine.
Some possibilities
- God- being in control of time, and destiny, yet allowing choice- would know which choices a child would have made- and whether it was an object of Mercy or Wrath thereby- allowing him to choose to be merciful or show his wrath.
-The children could have been placed on another realm- like “prison”, where they could be given choice.
- God could place these children in limbo.
Other possibilities
- God could send them strait to heaven
- God could condemn them to hell (unpopular view).
Ultimate answer
Without direct revelation- we cannot say what God does in this matter- but only pray for those dead before baptism- especially those who died because of abortion, or other contraceptive methods- after having been conceived.
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November 25th, 2007 at 8:00 am