If I'm following correctly, the parallel would not be in any similarity between the deaths of the Holy Innocents and other infants, but in the manner in which God communicated with them: He would be "bringing up" the former to the age of reason so as to confer on them the glory of willed martyrdom and bringing up the latter to the age or reason so as to allow for their being baptized by desire. (Of course, the Holy Innocents were already in the way of salvation if they were eight days old and had observant Jєωιѕн parents.)

One could point to the "miraculous" manner in which all human beings will be brought up or down to the age of Christ at the time of His Death and Resurrection -early to mid thirties- to draw a picture in which the scenario of God's previously having brought unbaptized infants up to the age of reason might seem more plausible.

The fact is that theologians were permitted to reason along these lines in the days of Pope Pius XII. They wrote books which only priests read. I recall that one was named Glorieaux or something like that. But they were blown out of the water by theologians with better sense and a firmer grasp of dogmatic history and theological principles. That's what is bound to happen if we're taking pre-Vatican II Revealed Truth and Church Teaching seriously.

I was just trying to follow the logic of the theory proposed. I was granting for the sake of argument that what this so-far unnamed saint is said to have said was revealed to him or her about the Holy Innocents' being given some sort of special revelation so that they might consent to being martyrs for Christ might fall within the realm of possibility the way a private revelation about Our Lady's incorrupt body being hidden somewhere in the Holy Land, like the Ark of the Covenant, would not. And that therefore a parallel COULD reasonably (if presumptuously) be drawn to the very different case of infants generally receiving illumination that would result in their salvation and their ascent to the Beatific Vision as far as the proposed modus operandi goes.

My own thought is, "Give 'em an inch and they'll take a mile." But if we are willing to admit into this discussion at all a revelation about the Holy Innocents' consenting to martyrdom, we could allow that a parallel to unbaptized infants suggests itself, given what theologians who were allowed to roam wild by a pope whom we all see as a pope and were very influential speculated on that particular problem. Given also the veritable fixation on bringing modern comforts to the world to come on the part of eminent Churchmen and the faithful generally in modern times, which, for example, resulted in the pathetic yet hilarious embarrassment of the great Garrigou-Lagrange's run-down on how MANY the saved would be, Invincible Ignorance being so great a savior...

I myself think that it's a question of grasping at straws. But if the straws are there we have to give our theological adversaries leave to make the most of  them before we huff and puff and blow their straw house down.

Let's face something. Let's own up to something. It's inevitable, this drive to theologize cozily about the souls of poor little tykes, however the Councils pontificated... Who made it so? I would say that it was the peerless Aristotelian genius who speculated that there was joy beyond all telling and not even the pain of loss in a domain that he accepted as part of Hell.

I think that speculations on the fate of unbaptized infants which go beyond Aquinas' radiant paradise of a hell are bound to start savoring of heresy against the Church teachings cited in a post or two above if they are pressed too hard, and presumptuously said to be probable. I would ask all the questions that have already been asked here. I would want to know how one alleged REVELATION BY GOD to a Saint about the Holy Innocents in particular can help to render theologically probable ARBITRARY HUMAN SPECULATIONS about the general fate of unbaptized infants which at the least seem to fly in the face of Church Teaching.

"Those who die in original sin go to Hell." But who besides children below the age of reason dies with original sin only? (The retarded and adults who have been comatose since early childhood, I guess...) I don't see how any Catholic with a Catholic Sense could fail to recoil from proposing theories that render this Church Teaching a "meaningless formula."

"Ah, you say that, yet Aquinas..." Aquinas nonetheless placed unbaptized infants on the borders of Hell. He as well as Augustine taught that they were damned. That's as good as it gets as far as theological probability and anything that could be called Church Teaching. We can pray all we want that things might be better for unbaptized babies in the world to come in ways we could never comprehend. But what's the point of positing incomprehensible possibilities about the next world at the risk of sinning against Definite Truth that we can and should comprehend in this world? The Truth about what kinds of souls go where when as taught by Popes and Councils.

Things are never going to get any better theologically for unbaptized infants than they are in Aquinas' book. Not without doing violence to the Church as Teacher.

No, we have no proof that God "communicated" with the Holy Innocents at all. Nor do we even have so far any proof that any Saint ever said anything on the subject of the Holy Innocents as martyrs with extraordinary self-awareness as such. I just thought it would be nice in an informal forum to allow that the poster above was recalling correctly, and that there was something to what the Saint said, and therefore, possibly, something at least marginally respectable about the use of this saintly revelation to bolster what some sentimental but serious theologians have speculated about: the whole "Illumination" theory of salvation through baptism of desire on the part of infants.

The reference to the Saint rings true to me. It rings a bell. I do believe that a Saint said what is related above about the Holy Innocents consenting to martyrdom and that it was not expurgated from his or her Acta in the interests of not getting any unsound theological balls rolling.

I could not agree that it is PURE speculation on the part of a Catholic today that God miraculously enhanced or developed or what have you the intellects and wills of the Holy Innocents if that Catholic can prove that a single saint claimed to have had a revelation that such was the case. (Though, of course, the private revelation of a saint would be no proof at all in the theological sphere, the way, say, a certain tendency among the Greek Fathers to anticipate Thomas Aquinas as to the fate of unbaptized infants was proof to proffer against those who may have wanted to project to the Church itself the strict Augustinian opinion on the subject.) I would be much more impressed by a canonized saint than by one who was just acclaimed as a saint in the early days. Would this be Gertrude the Great, by any chance? Bridget of Sweden? Frances of Rome? Veronica Giuliani? Mary Magdalene of Pazzi?

How about getting a name to go with the anecdote? Even though outside of Inspired Writ statements by Saints about their private revelations have little weight in theological disputes, I suppose that if someone wants to propose that God grants special enlightenment to all or some unbaptized infants that they may attain to heaven, it's not out of bounds to produce as support, or at least a Church-approved step in their direction, a revelation from a saint in a book available to the faithful that God granted special enlightenment to the Holy Innocents that they might have the glory of CHOOSING to die for Christ.

"Ah, so God CAN do extraordinary things with the intellects of infants. And God wills that all men be saved. And God is a loving Father. And Jesus loved the little children. And it's a long way from Augustine to Aquinas as regards the fate of unbaptized infants. Of Mary never enough. Of the Mercy of God never enough. And not a sparrow falls... All of which has got me to thinking..."

Now THAT is pure speculation. Speculative theology, though. Does it come from a School to whose defense any Pontiff ever came, as happened with the Schools that taught Limbo? Well, I would say no....

See, now we are not talking about salvation all around, left and right, for unbaptized infants because The People are more and more upset about the fates of abortion victims and Christ united Himself to every man in becoming man. We're talking about things the Queen of Heaven is said to have said to saints and about saving baptism of desire for infants through extraordinary "illumination." At worst we're back in the Catholic world of the 1940s. Which means we're not in New Pentecostland cerca April 2007, which is a good place not to be Limbo-wise, or anything-wise, if you know what I mean...

How sad to be reminded that it IS AD 2007. That there is something new in the Limbo mix for all of us, though our views on what it is before God vary widely. The ITC docuмent excerpts of which we have read. But then, our views of where and what God's Church is today vary widely.

As for it being the CHURCH that is proposing anything new and different on Limbo recently... I wonder how different Catholics who are trying to remain orthodox for different reasons would reject the claim that it is the Church Herself that is saying something on the subject of Limbo of late. Sedevacantists would reject that claim for obvious reasons. Those who recognize the Vatican II popes or "popes" as popes but more or less resist them insofar as they deviate from Tradition might say that the ITC docuмent is just a pernicious product of the Concilar Church of Rome and not the Eternal Catholic one, though the Pontifical signature on the docuмent would give them pause.

But I think that even a WANDERER school non-Traditionalist conservative who accepts without reservation Vatican II Itself and the Novus Ordo Mass and unresistingly honors Benedict XVI as Holy Father, and duly notes the latter's approbation of the theologians' theorizing (and implied scolding of both St Augustine and St Thomas, among others), would nonetheless take exception to the formula "The Church is now saying this and that about Limbo etc...", referencing the recent ITC docuмent.  That's not a very "nuanced" claim. And nowadays everything should be very "nuanced." That's what the Renewed Church's bishops and approved theologians say. A LOT.

I'm having trouble with limbo and Pope Pius XI's encylical Quanto Conficiamur Moerore... please help.

7. "Here, too, our beloved sons and venerable brothers, it is again necessary to mention and censure a very grave error entrapping some Catholics who believe that it is possible to arrive at eternal salvation although living in error and alienated from the true faith and Catholic unity. Such belief is certainly opposed to Catholic teaching. There are, of course, those who are struggling with invincible ignorance about our most holy religion. Sincerely observing the natural law and its precepts inscribed by God on all hearts and ready to obey God, they live honest lives and are able to attain eternal life by the efficacious virtue of divine light and grace. Because God knows, searches and clearly understands the minds, hearts, thoughts, and nature of all, his supreme kindness and clemency do not permit anyone at all who is not guilty of deliberate sin to suffer eternal punishments."

What is your problem with it, kato?

well, doesn't it go against limbo?  babies baptised or not do not deliberately sin

Limbo is a place of happiness, though not the highest happiness.

It is a place of the highest possible natural happiness, glimpses of which we often experience even while in via.  The major difference is that we know these are fleeting, and that we are in a position to obtain much, much more, while those in limbo are in complete possession of this happiness, and cannot ever lose it.