Posted on 06/11/2005 7:27:43 AM PDT by sionnsar
Can. 3. It has been decided likewise that if anyone says that for this reason the Lord said: "In my Father's 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 the blessed 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", 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. (Council of Mileum II, 416)
It (The Roman Church) teaches ... that the souls ... of those who die in mortal sin, or with only original sin descend immediately into hell; however, to be punished with different penalties and in different places. (Pope John XXII, Letter "Nequaquam sine dolere", To the Armenians, Nov. 21, 1321)
If what We have said up to now concerns the protection and care of natural life, much more so must it concern the supernatural life, which the newly born receives with Baptism. In the present economy there is no other way to communicate that life to the child who has not attained the use of reason. Above all, the state of grace is absolutely necessary at the moment of death without it salvation and supernatural happiness—the beatific vision of God—are impossible. An act of love is sufficient for the adult to obtain sanctifying grace and to supply the lack of baptism; to the still unborn or newly born this way is not open. Therefore, if it is considered that charity to our fellowman obliges us to assist him in the case of necessity, then this obligation is so much the more important and urgent as the good to be obtained or the evil to be avoided is the greater, and in the measure that the needy person is incapable of helping or saving himself with his own powers; and so it is easy to understand the great importance of providing for the baptism of the child deprived of complete reason who finds himself in grave danger or at death's threshold. (Pius XII, Allocution to Midwives, Oct. 29, 1951)
The puzzlement here, at least between the Orthodox and the Augustinians, was about the nature of Original Sin and the effects of that nature. To understand those, and in particular, to avoid a caricature of Catholicism that we saw on occasion on this thread, one must study the post-Augustinian teaching.
"Aren't the newborn (along with righteous pagans, etc.) destined to heaven through the operation of invincible ignorance?"
Perhaps you misspoke, which seems the simplest explanation for your later posts which don't seem to share this quite mistaken thought.
We must be careful not to veer into thinking as if Christ Himself is bound by His Sacraments.
Yet we also must be careful not to veer into thinking that He will not keep His promises. "Amen, amen, I say to thee, unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God." "Amen, amen, I say unto you: except you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you."
One must be careful not to confuse what is frequently called Augustinism, especially by the Jansenists, Calvinists, and Lutherans, and what Catholics have taken from St. Augustine and incorporated as an explanation of the Faith.
Every system of grace expounded in Catholic theology, Augustinism, Thomism, Molinism, Congruism, Syncretism (all approved), Jansenism (condemned) claims to be teaching the exact truths St. Augustine attempted to communicate. Obviously St. Augustine did not teach all (or perhaps even any) of them, nor can they all be correct.
In any case, Catholics are not "Augustinians".
Noting your incredulous tone that I had never heard of this feast day in all my 12 years of Catholic school, I've tried finding more info on this.
I've searched various Catholic websites looking for May 31 and as always that date is for celebrating the Visitation to Elizabeth.
Here are the links where I looked:
Can you point me to an official Roman Catholic calendar that celebrates this Mediatrix of all Graces day?
The truth is that they go to Limbus Infantium, which is the state of perfect natural happiness. They are not in a state of mortal sin, as was alleged here and are not condemned to suffering.
I will not re-argue about the Limbo on this thread when I presented the teaching of the Catholic Church on the subject on a dedicated thread: Limbo
Indeed they aren't. St. Augustine's teaching on the Original Sin is what is called Augustinianism; the Catholic doctrine on Original Sin was in consensus with the Greek Fathers prior to that, and returned to essentially the same teaching with St. Thomas Aquinas.
The term "Augustinian" is frequently used in the same sense I use it, not to discard the immense work of St. Augustine's overall, but to point out elements of his teaching that fell outside of the approved doctrine, by the Catholic Encyclopedia article I am referring to, Limbo.
The Catholic Church essentially accepts St. Augustine's teachings on Original Sin as he formulated it. And these teachings are in consensus with the Greek Fathers and St. Thomas Aquinas.
See Denzinger 101 and 102 (Council of Carthage, AD 418), 109 (Epistle of Pope Zozimus to the Eastern Churches, AD 418), 130 (Catalog of Authoritative Statements of the Past Bishops of the Holy See Concerning the Grace of God), 174 and 175 (Council of Orange).
Similarly, there is the pronouncement of Pope St. Gelasius I:
"For the purpose of instruction, the holy, that is, the Roman Church, does ... regularly accept ... the works of blessed Caecilius Cyprian and in the same way the works of Gregory Nazianzen, Basil, Athanasius, John (Chrysostom), Theophilus, Cyril of Alexandria, Hilary, Ambrose, Augustine, Jerome, and Prosper" (Epistle 42, "De recipiendis et non recipiendis libris", AD 495)
The Visitation was traditionally kept on July 2 (which seems odd since that falls after the birthday of St. John the Baptist on June 24). The May 31 date is a post-Vatican II reshuffling of the Calendar.
Pope Benedict XV granted a feast and Mass on May 31 for "The Blessed Virgin Mary, Mediatrix of All Graces". Look in any traditional Latin Mass handmissal.
In the Catholic Encyclopedia article I linked in 280 a distinction is drawn between pre-Augustinian thought, St. Augustine's teaching, and post-Augistinian, particularly Thomist, teaching on Limbo. Do you think that the article is incorrect, or that the distinction that exists is covered by your caveat "essentially accepts"?
Church teaching on the nature of Limbo is speculative. Teaching on Original Sin is dogmatic.
Obviously, theological speculation about Limbo can change and is the subject of disagreement. One need only compare the lot of those dying in Original Sin alone in the Summa of St. Thomas and the Divine Comedy of Dante.
The theology of Original Sin is not subject to change, nor did it originate in St. Augustine. The nature of Original Sin is perfectly clear in the writings of Origen and St. Cyprian, 150 years before St. Augustine.
The "essentially accepts" refers to some of St. Augustine's speculations on the roles of grace and free will in the process of justification, some of his theorizings on the nature of predestination and reprobation, etc. It is to be expected that St. Augustine expressed himself in more than one way, and perhaps not in the exact manner the Church ultimately adopted as a guidepost, since he was the one who more than all the others combined, worked through these issues in the struggle with Pelagian heresy, sometimes coming back to change or tweak his position, as in his book of Retractions.
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