My apologies for the Calvinist comment, I didn't mean you specifically, but the generic "you." I think we can agree that if God chooses to save a soul outside the visible confines of the Catholic Church, He will use a means known to Him. This person would in fact die united to the Church, hence the dogma remains untouched, there is absolutely no salvation, nor the remission of sins outside the Church. From the perspective of Divine Knowledge, this individual would in fact be an elect and God infallibly provides both sufficient and efficacious grace so they may reach their end. My point was to simply say that admitting this possibility doesn't lead to VII ecclesiology which is another animal. I can go into further details as to why if you would like.
Well, I'm not objecting to the Calvinist comment because it was directed at me. I don't really care what anyone thinks of me. I was just objecting to it because it's WRONG. I think I know why you said that, but it's incorrect to hold that EENS translates to (double predestination) Calvinism. So, if you believe that, then EENS is a pernicious doctrine and completely meaningless.
So, St. Thomas explained with regard to the native in the jungle, where he said that explicit faith in the Holy Trinity and Incarnation are necessary for salvation, that if you DID have someone somewhere whom God's Providence permitted to be born into a situation of invincible ignorance, if he did not put any obstacles in the way of salvation, that God would send an angel if necessary to communicate these necessary truths to that person.
At the same time, God also allows some infants to die without Baptism, and the Church has always taught that these cannot be saved. Is that Calvinism? No, God's Providence likely foresaw that these souls, had they been presented with the True Faith, would have rejected it and been lost, or even if they had grown up would have violated the natural law, etc. ... so in an act of His Mercy gives them perfect natural happiness for all eternity.
I do think that part of the problem here in getting a proper balance on this question, is to distuinguish between the natural order and the supernatural. No one is owed supernatural beatitude, since it's above our nature, and constitutes no punishment or lack of Mercy for us not to receive it, since it's a perfectly free gift. This is the distinguish St. Thomas articulated when he finally turned belief in Limbo mainstream (it was anti-BoDer Abelard who first proposed the idea). So, there's a "natural" type of salvation, perfect eternal happiness to the full capacity of one's human nature, resulting in no suffering whatsoever, since there's no privation of any due good, and the supernatural state, a free gift.
One of the early Church Fathers who rejected BoD, St. Gregory "the Theologian" nαzιanzen, held that there are some who are not bad enough to be punished but not good enough to be glorified (glory referring to the supernatural state of the Kingdom).
I personally hold that there can, in addition to the state of perfect natural happiness enjoyed by those in Limbo, or, say, martyrs who had not been baptized, there can be varying degrees of happiness in this state natural state, and varying degrees of unhappiness, right down to the excruciating torments of Hell.
That's one of the biggest reasons people push back on Limbo, where we can see people outside the Church with many natural virtues, kindness, generosity, respect, honesty, etc. ... and the general concept people have that, if they're not saved, they must be thrown into a burning vat of fire right next to Joe Stalin and Judas, a kind of false binary, that you either have the Beatific Vision, or you're burning in Hell. Evolving the concept of Limbo was the first step in undermining that thinking, which is rooted in "false dichtomy", where it's one or the other. Well, per Limbo, there's an in between. One might argue that this concept of mine is not revealed, and pure speculation. Yes, that's certainly true, but then Limbo was not revealed either, but based upon applying theological principles. Contrary to popular believe, one COULD still reject belief in Limbo, but the Church declared that one could not CONDEMN believe in Limbo as if it were tantamount to Pelagianism. God actually revealed very little about the nature of eternity, so there's much more to how things work than we know, but He had His reasons for not giving us the full picture.
Topic: More heresy from anti-Pope (Read 111550 times)