VATICAN CITY (CNS): After several years of study, the Vatican’s International Theological Commission said there are good reasons to hope that babies who die without being baptised go to heaven.
In a document published on April 20, the commission said the traditional concept of limbo – as a place where unbaptised infants spend eternity but without communion with God – seemed to reflect an “unduly restrictive view of salvation”.
The Church continues to teach that, because of original sin, baptism is the ordinary way of salvation for all people and urges parents to baptise infants, the document said.
But there is greater theological awareness today that God is merciful and “wants all human beings to be saved”, it said.
Grace has priority over sin, and the exclusion of innocent babies from heaven does not seem to reflect Christ’s special love for “the little ones”, it said.
The 41-page document is titled “The Hope of Salvation for Infants who Die without being Baptised”.
The 30-member International Theological Commission acts as an advisory panel to the Vatican, in particular to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
Its documents are not considered expressions of authoritative Church teaching, but they sometimes set the stage for official Vatican pronouncements.
Limbo has never been defined as Church dogma and is not mentioned in the current Catechism of the Catholic Church, which states simply that unbaptised infants are entrusted to God’s mercy.
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