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I believe getting to the root of it will help us to understand why it is to widespread today. As it is a very subtle error, to such a degree that those teaching it honestly believe it to be Catholic teaching.

Liberalism is undoubtedly at the center of this, sure, as the Archbishop states. I have my own suspicions that it may have emerged from the neo-Thomistic/scholastic movement of the 19th to 20th century. As we see this same idea of an invincible ignorance BoD emerge in the writings of Garrigou-Lagrange. And it would make sense, given that St. Thomas proposed the catechumenate variation of BoD prior to Trent, with Ss. Alphonsus and Bellarmine, both Thomists, continuing the same theory. And this includes those scholastic theologians who wrote BoB/BoD into the catechism.

Yet, as lesser philosophies, like Cartesianism and Kantianism, served to undermine Scholastic thought; this BoD theory was "buried" for a few centuries. Only to re-emerge alongside the neo-Scholastic movement in the 19th century, this time tainted with the growing religious indifferentism of the time; resulting in this new idea that the may consist of not just those in visible communion, but those outside of such, as virtually all trad clerics hold today.

I came across a quote from Fr. Faber in his Spiritual Conferences which shows that this idea was present in the mid-19th century as well:
Not to mention Pope Pius IX's reference to the error in Singulari Quidem, circa 1856; right around the same time.


What we do not have is an individual, group, or sect from which it originates before that era. Leading me to add those within the neo-Scholastics as a possible root of the widespread error today.

I very much agree. This is why I've been so bothered by this issue as of late. As it is clearly an error, and we have every obligation to correct Catholics, but no authority whatsoever to condemn them as formal heretics. Hence why I keep reiterating there being no formal condemnation from the Church in the 500 years since Trent where the theory became more widespread.

Has there ever been an error so widespread and uncondemned for so long?

Without an explicit condemnation literally naming the errors, it seems likely that theologians will once again opine what the declaration *really* means and we'll be no further ahead than we are now.

The good thing is that Vatican I specifically condemned any such interpretations of definitions:

Sess. 3, ch. 4. 14. Hence, too,that meaning of the sacred dogmas is ever to be maintained which has once been declared by holy mother church, and there must never be any abandonment of this sense under the pretext or in the name of a more profound understanding.

But the problem is that due to this Crisis theologians, and now laity, will have the exact same predilection to interpret Conciliar and Papal teachings that V1 condemned. So unless a future Pope specifically condemns not only BoD and BoB, but also reiterates Vatican I, I don't see any end to this error anytime soon.

Has there ever been an error so widespread and uncondemned for so long?

Honestly, not that I've seen, no. Maybe an error will linger for a few decades or more before being specifically condemned by some Bishop. And that's after some wicked prelate begins disseminating it to undermine a dogma. But, in this case, it has been present for centuries alongside Catholic teaching with virtually no specific condemnation from the proper authority, namely, Rome. And it also doesn't seek to deny a dogma outright, as other heresies do, forcing an authoritative definition; but merely expounds upon one (baptism) under the realm of theological speculation. One cannot say Trent defined baptism for this purpose. As Trent was purely there as the official "reform" of the Church in answer to the Protestants.

Which is why I have to question whether it even is an error in its Thomistic/Alphonsian form. That's three doctors teaching the same thing over the course of 400 years? With no authoritative correction until some parish priest points it out in the 1940s-50s? Not even a murmur of other learned theologians on the matter from the 13th to 20th centuries? That's absolutely unheard of.

No, this is either something birthed from the neo-Scholastic movement, or, perhaps we, Fr. Feeney and the Dimonds are wrong and those teaching the possibility are right.