Theoretical possibilities of salvation are not exceptions for the dogma extra ecclesiam nulla salus (EENS). Invisible people in 2023 cannot be exceptions for the past ecclesiology. There has to be an explicit case, an objective case for there to be an exception. Someone seen in the flesh, who has been saved outside the Church, is an exception. But we humans cannot see or meet someone saved outside the Church. We do not know and cannot know of a particular case on earth in the present times.

 

Theoretical  possibilities of salvation are not exceptions for the dogma extra ecclesiam nulla salus (EENS). Invisible people in 2023 cannot be exceptions for the past ecclesiology. There  has to be an explicit case, an objective case for there to be an exception. Someone seen in the flesh, who has been saved outside the Church, is an exception. But we humans cannot see or meet someone saved outside the Church. We do not know and cannot know of a particular case on earth in the present times.

We can accept hypothetical cases of being saved with the baptism of desire(BOD) and in invincible ignorance(I.I), since we cannot project them as exceptions for EENS.This was the mistake in the 1949 Letter of the Holy Office to the Archbishop of Boston. BOD and I.I cannot contradict EENS.

LG 8, LG 14, LG 16, UR 3, NA 2, GS 22 etc, in Vatican Council II are always hypothetical. Fine. Don’t project them as an exception for the Athanasius Creed and the Catechisms which support Feeneyite EENS. This would be false reasoning and fake new doctrine.- Lionel Andrades