Now why do the Cushingites ABSOLUTELY REFUSE to admit that St. Thomas and St. Alphonsus were wrong about BoD? Because in the final analysis they have ABSOLUTELY NOTHING ON THEIR SIDE EXCEPT "AUTHORITY". There's never been a theological argument demonstrating how BoD derives from Church doctrine. Never. Not one. So the BoDers have nothing but to bring out the "authority" sock puppets and try to beat you over the head with the INFAAALIBLE authority of St. Thomas and St. Alphonsus whereas what you actually have is nothing but their exercise in SPECULATIVE THEOLOGY.
Of course what St. Thomas and St. Robert and St. Alphonsus teach has absolutely NOTHING do with what any Church Father ever taught or what any Doctor ever taught; it has nothing to do with LoT and Ambrose's Pelagianism. LoT admits on another thread that there's no point in BoD if those ignorant of their obligation to be Catholic cannot be saved. In point of fact, the Doctors limited BoD specifically to the case of the catechumens who died before Baptism. In fact, that's THE CONCRETE CASE from which the speculations regarding BoD arose.
People saw catechumens who tried to live good lives dying while they saw others who chose to defer Baptism so they could carry on in their sin receiving Baptism on their death beds. So they started to think that something about that was not fair. St. Augustine briefly sided with that in his early days, but then in the end realized that it led STRAIGHT TO PELAGIANISM. He dismissed the speculation, after he had matured in his faith, based on what might or might not be fair for God to do as leading inexorably to a "vortex of confusion", and said that this thinking must be rejected by all who "wish to remain Catholic". But that's where the BoDer devotion to the great thinking of Augustine ends. After that, they ignore him as irrelevant. He was fine when he was speculating shortly after his conversion but eventually lapsed into the error of rejecting BoD towards the end of his life. Poor St. Augustine. But, thankfully, LoT is here to save the day.