If you believe it as fact, it's heretical because no saint, nor pope, nor council has ever taught such a thing. (if you want to just speculate on it, then heresy may not be involved, but I'd suggest you pray hard for wisdom since such errors can take root quickly). The Church Fathers, St Thomas, St Alphonsus, etc never applied BOD to anyone but formal catechumens. If you want to argue that this new view is catholic, you have a lot to prove.
.
The corruption of BOD began in the 1700-1800s when such novelties were inserted into the Baltimore Catechism in America and it took off from there (adding to the fact that during this time, in America society, more and more Catholics were becoming friends with Protestants, so the social and sentimental reasons for wanting your non-Catholic friends to be saved increased).
.
By the 1940s and 50s, it had gotten so liberal that the formerly-catholic Harvard University was openly teaching that non-catholics can be saved. This is when Fr Feeney stepped in to debate them, since he lived in the Massachusetts area. Then modernist rome officials stepped in to silence him (because this was only a few years before V2, and this idea of universal salvation was a key component of their V2 plans). And the rest is history.
That's what I'm trying to figure out. Whether its actually a new position. It doesn't seem to be. I presented Justin Martyr on another thread. I've cited Augustine's Letter 43 several times, regarding the Donatists (not relevant to BOD 'cause they were baptized and trinitarian, but seemingly relevant to the Protestantism issue). I have too many question marks at this point to state that its "fact." For one thing, it definitely does not seem to me that *all* of the Fathers taught this. It might even be the case that the majority of them were absolutists, but again, I'm not sure (proof-texting quotes can go wrong quickly as well.) Assuming Vatican II is not dogmatic, I don't think there's anything dogmatic about this. As far as Vatican II goes, Lumen Gentium seems to allow for the possibility of non-Christians being saved, but you could easily enough interpret that (and we should if its more traditional) to mean that a soul who follows the natural law and is not evangelized through no fault of his own will somehow supernaturally (Perhaps an angel will come to them) be enlightened to the Catholic faith. Unitatis Redintegratio says that non-Catholic communities are a means of salvation, and that majorly, majorly bothers me (my best attempt to reconcile it, were I to try, would be to point to the valid baptisms in Protestant sects, combined with Augustine's theory on certain donatists, but I still think that section is a ticking time bomb that was from its inception abuseable).
I hold all my conclusions as less than definitive at the moment. If the hardline position is correct, and everyone who doesn't consciously believe in Catholicism is damned, blessed by the name of the Lord. I accept that that's a possibility, and I have no complaint or cry of "injustice" if so. I'm just less than convinced the Church does, or even did before Vatican II, definitively demand that position, which is why I settle for saying you have to, in some way, be inside the Church in order to have a chance of salvation ,and that the only safe way to ensure one is inside the Church is to formally join, participate in her sacraments, etc. If that makes me a modernist, I pray for further enlightenment.