Pope responds question from atheist - Can a non-believer be saved?

[Craig B]

... If it is defined as doctrine, while you may still be 'required' to accept it, if you don't, the result is not as clear as a disagreement with dogma. You could still be a christian, maybe called a bad christian, but still within the confines of the church. As as we drift off into less strongly insisted upon things, the consequences seem to be even less severe.

I agree. The relevant consideration is what things are at any given moment being "insisted upon", and by whom. Words such as doctrine and dogma are mere expressions of this insistence, and if it is withdrawn they are replaced by other words, like theory or conjecture. I suppose all centralised ideologically-sustained structures, religious or secular, behave in this way. The Soviet Communist Party certainly did. But just as Khrushchev attempted to reform the State and Party, not by abandoning the basic principles of Marxism-Leninism (perish the thought!) but by "insisting" on new sorts of things, so I think Pope Francis is striving to amend some of the "insistences" of his predecessors, and I very much hope he succeeds. It turned out that the Soviet Communist Party was unreformable; I really have no idea whether Francis will have more long term success than Nikita, but I contemplate his words and deeds with interest and sympathy.

 

[Denver]

I agree. The relevant consideration is what things are at any given moment being "insisted upon", and by whom. Words such as doctrine and dogma are mere expressions of this insistence, and if it is withdrawn they are replaced by other words, like theory or conjecture. I suppose all centralised ideologically-sustained structures, religious or secular, behave in this way. The Soviet Communist Party certainly did. But just as Khrushchev attempted to reform the State and Party, not by abandoning the basic principles of Marxism-Leninism (perish the thought!) but by "insisting" on new sorts of things, so I think Pope Francis is striving to amend some of the "insistences" of his predecessors, and I very much hope he succeeds. It turned out that the Soviet Communist Party was unreformable; I really have no idea whether Francis will have more long term success than Nikita, but I contemplate his words and deeds with interest and sympathy.

You could be right. It will be fascinating to watch.

 

[Craig B]

The Canons promulgated by the various Ecumenical Councils, for instance.

Then is Canon 3a Carthage XVI (418) thus "settled and undebatable"?

It has been decided likewise that if anyone says that for this reason the Lord said: “In my house there are many mansions” [John 14:2]: that it might be understood that in the kingdom of heaven there will be some middle place or some place anywhere where the blessed infants live who departed from this life without baptism, without which they cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven, which is life eternal, let him be anathema.

This indeed rejects Limbo but it places the souls of unbaptised children in Hell. Thus, the translation of these infants to Heaven, recently effected under the influence of modern sensitivities in the matter of torturing children, contradicts a Council Canon.

 

[eight bits]

Craig

I don't follow. How does a synod's enactment respond to the quoted remark about ecumenical councils?

 

[Craig B]

Craig

I don't follow. How does a synod's enactment respond to the quoted remark about ecumenical councils?

I inferred that they were ratified by the Second Council of Nicaea, from this and other indications:

It is uncertain when the canons of this Carthaginian synod were done into Greek ... we know it was the code accepted by the Council of Trullo, the canons of which received a quasi-ecumenical authority from the subsequent general imprimatur given them by the Seventh Ecumenical Council, the Second of Nice.

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3816.htm That certainly refers to the 419 Synod, or Council. But inspired by your objection I looked at other sources, and found this:

The Canons of the Synods of Sardica, Carthage, Constantinople, and Carthage Under St. Cyprian, Which Canons Were Received by the Council in Trullo and ratified by II Nice.

http://m.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf214.xv.html. If this means that only those of the earlier Carthage Council held under Cyprian in 256 were ratified at the Second Council of Nicaea, then I'm wrong. But I'll need to look further to resolve this.

 

[A'isha]

Then is Canon 3a Carthage XVI (418) thus "settled and undebatable"? This indeed rejects Limbo but it places the souls of unbaptised children in Hell. Thus, the translation of these infants to Heaven, recently effected under the influence of modern sensitivities in the matter of torturing children, contradicts a Council Canon.

Carthage XVI was not one of the Ecumenical Councils, but a local synod convoked to address Pelagianism. Canon 3a doesn't even appear in all the manuscripts of its Canons. The Canons from that Council as recorded in the Enchiridion (and therefore, the parts of the Council accepted as doctrine and dogma) do not include the part of its Canon 3a that you quoted, and instead simply assert that infants, even though they are not able to commit any sin themselves, are still subject to Original Sin and therefore should be baptized. Nor is that part of the Canon mentioned in the Indiculus de Gratia Dei, the post-Carthage XVI tract against Pelagianism which has become official Church doctrine regarding it, and which has also been incorporated into the Enchiridion.

[EDIT: To be clear, the Enchiridion is not the doctrine and dogma of the Church in and of itself - the Enchiridion is a compendium of source texts from which the doctrine and dogma of the Church, and the teachings of the Catechism, are drawn.]

 

[A'isha]

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3816.htm That certainly refers to the 419 Synod, or Council.

The 418 Synod is not the 419 Synod (the 419 Synod merely re-assessed all the Canons of the previous Carthaginian Synods and set out which ones were to be finally and formally adopted, the 418 Synod is the one whose Canon you quoted). That site also notes, as I say above,

Canon 110. (Greek cxii. bis)

That infants are baptized for the remission of sins

Likewise it seemed good that whosoever denies that infants newly from their mother's wombs should be baptized, or says that baptism is for remission of sins, but that they derive from Adam no original sin, which needs to be removed by the laver of regeneration, from whence the conclusion follows, that in them the form of baptism for the remission of sins, is to be understood as false and not true, let him be anathema.

For no otherwise can be understood what the Apostle says, "By one man sin has come into the world, and death through sin, and so death passed upon all men in that all have sinned," than the Catholic Church everywhere diffused has always understood it. For on account of this rule of faith (regulam fidei) even infants, who could have committed as yet no sin themselves, therefore are truly baptized for the remission of sins, in order that what in them is the result of generation may be cleansed by regeneration.

The following, says Surius, is found in this place in a very ancient codex. It does not occur in the Greek, nor in Dionysius. Bruns relegates it to a foot-note.

[Also it seemed good, that if anyone should say that the saying of the Lord, "In my Father's house are many mansions" is to be understood as meaning that in the kingdom of heaven there will be a certain middle place, or some place somewhere, in which infants live in happiness who have gone forth from this life without baptism, without which they cannot enter the kingdom of heaven, which is eternal life, let him be anathema. For after our Lord has said: "Unless a man be born again of water and of the Holy Spirit he shall not enter the kingdom of heaven," what Catholic can doubt that he who has not merited to be coheir with Christ shall become a sharer with the devil: for he who fails of the right hand without doubt shall receive the left hand portion.]

It appears that the specific verbiage you quoted was either discarded before the 418 Synod concluded, or was discarded when the 419 Synod considered the Canons of all the previous Carthaginian Synods, and therefore it did not make it into actual Church doctrine or dogma.

 

[Kathie Bondar]

Marketing, the need to conquest new customers while keeping ing the old ones... The more I think about it all, the more I conclude it all boils down to economy. Religions fight for customers, for market niches.

This pope is trying a new approach. Something more modern, which sounds good for the new generations. The old one betted on bracing the conservative sectors. Tradition and it all. The new one thinks the drain of customers from the Catholic church can be stopped -or slowed, or perhaps reversed- by adopting -or displaying- more progressive positions.

You are right. People move away from religion because it does not make much sense. Explain God in clear, concise terms and people will listen. Come to think of it, this is exactly what I am trying to do and I am being ridiculed. I think it is called resistance.

 

[eight bits]

Kathie Bondar

Welcome aboard.

Explain God in clear, concise terms and people will listen.

Looking at the current market leaders, the opposite strategy has an excellent sales record.

Come to think of it, this is exactly what I am trying to do and I am being ridiculed.

Well, George Carlin and Sam Kennison explained God in clear, concise terms and they got laughs, too. Maybe it's something about the subject, rather than anything personal to you.