FR. LEONARD FEENEY'S SUPPORTERS

Fr.Leonard Feeney's supporters: It is true that the Letter of the Holy Office 1949 had many technical irregularities and it could be a bishop-to-bishop private document. So we can mention this point in our posts and  also,  that the Letter referred specifically to ‘the dogma’, the ‘infallible statement’.The text of ' the dogma' supports Fr.Leonard Feeney. The dogma carries the literal interpretation of outside the church no salvation and does not mention the baptism of desire or being saved in invincible ignorance. It does not imply that the baptism of desire etc are explicit exceptions to the dogma.

So the Letter of the Holy Office clearly supports Fr.Leonard Feeney here.

Secondly, while mentioning the technical irregularities of the Letter of the Holy Office 1949 we can also bring it to the attention of others that the baptism of desire is not an exception to the dogma extra ecclesiam nulla salus.

Whether anyone is saved with the baptism of desire, or with the baptism of desire along with the baptism of water, is in a sense irrelevant to the dogma outside the church no salvation. It does not contradict the literal interpretation of the dogma by Fr.Leonard Feeney. This is also the interpretation of the Church Fathers, the Church Councils and the popes, Vatican Council I and II, all the Catechism including the present one, Dominus Iesus 20 and other magisterial documents.

The baptism of desire is always ‘speculation’, it can never be known to us. If the cardinals who approved the Letter of the Holy Office 1949 assumed that the baptism of desire was an explicit exception to the dogma then they were making an objective, common sense error.

John comments on Catholicism.org :

"...by a longing and desire" line is speculative, non-binding, and impurity at its worst. Whether the subjects of these theological "constructs" are known to us or not matters not in the least.

I agree.

Even though the baptism of desire accompadies by the baptism of water in certain cases known only to God,  is a possibility, it is ‘speculative’ and ‘non binding’. Correct, whether it is ‘known to us or not matters not in the least’.

 

So there is nothing in Vatican Council II or the Letter of the Holy Office which explicitly contradicts the dogmatic teaching ?

Being saved by 'the seeds of the Word', a ' good conscience', 'invincible ignorance', 'imperfect communion', 'elements of sanctification' etc are known only to God. So they are not explicit exceptions to the dogma which says everyone needs to convert into the Catholic Church to avoid the fires of Hell.

-Lionel Andrades