Regardless if a person is ignorant of the gospel or invincible ignorant of the gospel both cannot come to the truth and accept it without God's grace.

Even if an ignorant person could use the internet to learn the Catholic faith they would still need God's grace to do so, because the Truth is a good thing and all good things come from God.

An invincible ignorant person might not be able to find the gospel on their own but what difference would it be from an non-invincible ignorant person? If they could come to the truth on their own without God's grace it would be pelagianism?

There is no one that can say they found the Gospel and accepted without God's grace, the whole idea of a person being saved outside the Church while invincibly ignorant is frankly nonsense, I can't see the practical difference between an ignorant person and an invincibly ignorant person, if both are given the grace for the truth both still have the freewill to reject it.

So both hear the gospel due to God's grace, and both can reject it due to their own free will... what is the difference here? Where did the idea that a person can be 'invincible' about the gospel even come from? If a person hears it and rejects it, they heard it due to Grace and are condemned. If an invincible ignorant person doesn't hear it they are condemned because they didn't have the Catholic faith (necessary for salvation) and they weren't baptised (necessary for salvation) (assuming not an infant for limbo).

If you say it's not fair that they never had the opportunity then you are questioning God's judgement. (which is blasphemous??? is it, what is the correct term here?)
If they weren't among the elect it doesn't matter if they (invincible) heard the Gospel, because they would have been condemned anyway (the logical conclusion since the non-elect are not saved), so not hearing the Gospel is infact an act of mercy, as hearing it and rejecting it, or hearing it and accepting it and still going to hell is worse than not hearing it at all and going to hell.

So what is the difference between a regular ignorant person or an invincible ignorance person? Is it bad will? But both would go to hell due to sin (bad/evil will).

I don't see why some believe that someone could be saved outside the Church, or if you want to cope and believe they are somehow members of the Church without baptism (they're not) that they are somehow saved without the Faith or without baptism... how did it even come to this point? Are modern Catholics just some kind of pelagian that doesn't believe God could provide? This isn't even just about Grace and if God can (or will) provide. It's a fundamental denial of Baptism and Faith.


If you believe in this invincible ignorance salvation nonsense please provide me a DEFINITION of it so I can see the core issue. As far I can currently see this idea is completely ILLOGICAL, it makes literally ZERO SENSE.

Forgot quote 

I am the vine: you the branches: he that abideth in me, and I in him, the same beareth much fruit: for without me you can do nothing.
[John 15:5]

You cannot even breathe, think, talk, type, walk or even exist if God didn't allow it, is this not also grace?

The difference is that those who are invincibly ignorant are not held guilty for that about which they were invincibly ignorant.

So, an Aztec in 1280 is going to be invincibly ignorant about the gospel (because the Gospel has not yet come to his lands, in fact the Church did not even know such a person existed to be evangelized at the time). As a result, he won't be judged guilty of the sin of infidelity.

An Aztec living in 2025 is almost assuredly not going to be invincibly ignorant of the Gospel, because he is surrounded by Christians and lives in a culture with many Christian influenced. He will be held accountable for the sin of infidelity.

As far as the rest of your post, it is true that we are incapable of supernatural good on our own, and the doctrine of divine conservation means that everything we do finds its first cause in God. However, we *are* capable of natural good on our own (in fact, I believe there is a censure or anathema attached to denying this). The natural law is discernible by reason alone, and even pagans are expected to follow it. In general, I do not believe one can claim invincible ignorance of the natural law. And grace, although a great aid in acting virtuously, is not necessary for conducting one's self by the natural law.

The invincible person still going to hell for their others sins is also why I said no practical difference.

I should clarify, some say that an invincible person can be saved outside the church/without faith/baptism because it was outside of their control, but this is an issue because it's pelagian. Since both invincible or normal ignorant person required grace to have faith why should I believe that an invincible person can be saved in that state while a normal ignorant cannot? When the difference is due to their own possible free choice yet it's not their free choice that is the deciding factor but grace.

So, there are two types of ignorance, where it comes to the faith, formal and material (similar to the two types of heresy, for instance).

I could be a Catholic and am ignorant about a certain dogma or two the Church teaches, but I nevertheless intend to believe anything the Church teaches, just don't know about some of them.  Someone in this category can have Catholic faith, though he may or may not sin depending upon whether there's some culpability, i.e. you were just too lazy to study your catechism, but it's also possible that you don't even know what you don't know, so never thought to look into it.  God alone knows the degree of culpability.

Now, if I don't even know about the Church, and do not at least know about the minimum essential dogmas of the faith, i.e. the Holy Trinity and Incarnation, then I cannot have faith, and this is therefore formal ignorance.  St. Pius X discussed this distinction somewhere, and so did the Holy Office in rejecting the notion that believe in a Rewarder God might suffice, declaring these truths to be necessary by necessity of means for supernatural faith and for salvation.

No amount of "sincerity" or "good will" or lack of culpability would supply for this second type of ignorance, for without this basic knowledge supernatural faith is impossible and someone cannot have the supernatural formal motive of faith.  Same with Protestants, since they don't believe the Magisterium is the rule of faith, they lack the formal motive of faith, and their "sincerity" (such as it might be) cannot supply for a lack of this formal motive of faith.

Invincibility speaks only to culpability with regard to any ACTUAL SIN against faith, as St. Thomas teaches.  If my ignorance is invincible, then I commit no sin, but it still does not mean that I can have supernatural faith without those bare minimums.  As St. Thomas teaches also, if there is such a one who has placed no impediments of sin (whether culpable sin against faith or mortal sin against natural law, etc.) in the way of receiving faith, God will bring the faith to such a one, either by an internal illumination or sending an angel to teach the faith if necessary, or bilocating a Mary of Agreda or someone else to them, etc.  Of course, the very same may be said regarding the Sacrament of Baptism.  If God's already bringing an angel or bilocating some missionary to teach the faith, why couldn't that individual also perform the Sacrament of Baptism?

Now, many of the Cushingites claim that it's contrary to God's salvific will for all not to provide some implicit means of having supernatural faith and Baptism ... though of course, as I pointed out, that is not implicit BoD but implicit faith.  That's nonsense.  What about the unbaptized infant?  Is it contrary to God's salvific will for all if such an infant never had a chance?  No, in some cases, God will withhold this enlightenment out of mercy.  God would know that this unbaptized infant, if he were to live, would end up in hell, so He grants the mercy of perfect natural happiness in limbo.  That is why I believe that the number of abortions has been allowed to skyrocket.  God knows that the vast majority of those growing up in this world will end up in hell.  Similarly for some adult, God would know that if the person's "invincible ignorance" were lifted, he would either reject the faith, therefore meriting greater punishment for eternity, or perhaps, having receive it, might lose his soul anyway ... both situations in which his eternal fate would have been worse had God NOT broken through the invincibility of their ignorance.

Bishop Williamson, God rest his soul, was the first one to mention at one point God's withholding of various actual graces out of mercy, to prevent them from suffering on account of rejecting them.

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My advice is if you want to have a discussion about theological concepts as sophisticated as grace and predestination, you banish an expression like "no practical difference" from your vocabulary.

There absolutely is a difference, and it's significant (whether it's practical or not) between the reprobate guilty of infidelity and the reprobate not guilty of infidelity. Imagine spending eternity being punished for refusing the call of God.

Our merits and demerits are involved in reckoning our rewards and punishments. To refuse a distinction between the reprobate who are invincibly and vincibly ignorant is like refusing a distinction between two of the elect, one of whom leads a sinful life and has a deathbed conversion and one of whom leads an exemplary life, with little to no actual sin, who lives and dies in the bosom of the Church without interruption. Is claiming "no practical difference" between the two a meaningful statement?

"no practical difference" in the sense that both require the grace of God to be saved. The idea of invincible ignorance that most people understand is that that person is saved while in the state of ignorance and outside the Church, without faith or baptism...