Prop on Pope, Again

I posted a story about Pope Benedict XVI earlier today on Miserable Donuts, but that wasn't the first story I saw about the Pope today.

The original story that drew my attention Vatican-way was the one that Daddy Ben (I don't think he likes me calling him that, but I wonder what the translation services would do with it, don't you) is approving a "study" that has concluded that we really don't know diddly about Limbo and therefore babies and really nice non-Christians who never got the chance to get baptized (like Moses and such) may actually be able to get into Heaven.

I couldn't actually read the report since I don't have a subscription to the journal (Origins Online, I won't include a link there since you can't get in any more than I can) in which it was published, but it seems a bit, oh I can't remember the technical term, so let's just call it, goofy.

The idea was "originally" that JC came to free us from Original Sin (that Adam listened to Eve in the Garden of Eden when she listened to the snake). Everybody is a sinner and the only person who was even born without the sin of the original father was the Virgin Mary (the Immaculate Conception). Original Sin was a "Mortal Sin."

Trouble is, Limbo is a bit like Purgatory. Purgatory, the nuns used to tell us, is the place you go to burn off whatever Venial Sins you had on your soul when you died, before you could get into Heaven (anyone except infants with a Mortal Sin would get a one-way ticket to furnace-ville). You could get out of Purgatory (my grandmother used to tell us) if someone on the "outside" (still alive) offered up Graces they earned to your salvation. This led in the middle ages to the sale of a certificate that you had devoted your Graces to a particular loved one, otherwise known as Indulgences (remember old Marty Luther and his tacky list on the door).

Well, I figure that if babies don't get baptized they only way they can get into Heaven is by other people's Graces (actually I think they don't go anywhere since I don't believe in Hell, Purgatory or Limbo, but that's another story) or the whole thing collapses. I mean if they'll let any old (or very young) punk into Heaven, Original Sin or not, then why the heck do we need Jesus anyway?

Also, and I think this is a much more real "danger" it opens the way to the Church giving the nod to abortion. In far future 'studies' I they'll say it's okay to kill the fetus if the mother prays really hard and she was going to die if she didn't get the abortion.

I wonder if they really want to open that level of hell?