‘Pope’ Francis Claims Aborted Children Go to Heaven

False pope misleads post-abortive women…

‘Pope’ Francis Claims Aborted Children Go to Heaven

The Jesuit apostate Jorge Bergoglio on June 2, 2024

The month of November is traditionally dedicated to remembering and interceding for the faithful departed, that is, the holy souls in purgatory.

Year after year, the Argentinian apostate Jorge Bergoglio (‘Pope Francis’), a man of many words but also of expressive gestures, has certainly not failed to make his own contributions to the topic of death, dying, and judgment. So far this month, he has managed to stage at least two public appearances that convey very different messages. He has

Given these two ‘papal’ events, it is perhaps time we once again considered the issue of what happens to those human beings who die without baptism but before the full attainment of reason — in other words, those who have never committed any personal sin of their own but whose souls are still deprived of sanctifying grace because they were conceived in original sin and have never, for whatever reason, received the sacrament of baptism.

Among such people we must number (a) all unborn children who die in the womb (miscarriage, stillbirth, abortion, etc.) and therefore without baptism; (b) all born but unbaptized children who have not yet attained the use of reason; and (c) people of any age who have always lacked the use of reason on account of mental disability and such like.

In the Novus Ordo religion, the typical attitude is that such souls will — of course! — go to heaven. Such, however, is not at all the traditional Catholic teaching on the matter, and for good reason.

Francis Lies to Post-Abortive Women

Before we get into the matter, we must recall that Francis, not surprisingly, is on record affirming the typical Novus Ordo attitude, stating that children who die in the womb, and thus without baptism, go to Heaven. He said this back in 2019 in one of his infamous in-flight press conferences aboard the ‘papal’ plane returning from World Youth Day in Panama:

Q: During the Via Crucis [Stations of the Cross] there were very strong words on abortion. Do radical positions respect women?

A: The message of mercy is for all, also for the human person that is in gestation. After having committed this failure, there is mercy also. But it’s a difficult mercy because the problem isn’t to give forgiveness but to accompany a woman who has become conscious of having aborted. They are terrible dramas. Once I heard a doctor who spoke about a theory according to which a cell of the just-conceived foetus goes to the mother’s marrow and it receives there also a physical memory. This is a theory, but to say what a woman thinks about what she has done . . . I tell you the truth. It’s necessary to be in the confessional, and there you must give her consolation. Therefore, I have given the authority to absolve an abortion out of mercy, because many times they must meet with the child. Many times I counsel them when they have this anguish: “Your child is in Heaven. Talk with him. Sing to him the lullaby you were unable to sing to him.” And I found there is a way of reconciliation of the mother with the child. With God there is already forgiveness; God always forgives. But mercy, you must elaborate on this. To understand well the drama of abortion, one must be in a confessional.

(Source: “Holy Father’s In-flight Discussion with Reporters (Full Text)”, Zenit, Jan. 29, 2019; underlining added.)

To say that unbaptized children who die — whether preborn or born makes no difference here if the unbaptized child dies before reaching the age of reason — is a scandalous error that is at least highly favorable to heresy. However, what makes the matter even worse is that the ‘Pope’ stated this explicitly in the context of abortion and forgiveness, for it makes the ghastly evil of preborn child murder appear less serious than it actually is.

Before we continue, we want to be clear that nothing written in the present post is in any way meant to lead anyone to despair. The purpose, rather, is that of a dispassionate presentation of the theological facts. Some people reading this post may be the parents of a young child who has died without baptism, perhaps due to ignorance, negligence, or malice on the parents’ part, or perhaps due to no fault of theirs at all. Some women reading this may have had abortions, and some men may have consented to, encouraged, facilitated, enabled, or even performed abortions. No sin is so great that it could not be forgiven — yes, God is willing to forgive even the sin of abortion, even if it has been committed more than once! But this forgiveness can only be obtained after a genuine conversion of heart, which requires supernatural contrition, a firm purpose of amendment, confession and absolution, etc. While we want to condemn abortion in the strongest possible terms, no less do we want to make clear that no sin committed in the past is a cause for despair. It is the devil who wants post-abortive women (and their enablers) to think there is no hope for them. It is a lie! “If your sins be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow: and if they be red as crimson, they shall be white as wool” (Isaias 1:18).

The Actual Catholic Teaching

To refute Bergoglio’s error on unbaptized infants who die, let’s begin with a theological overview and then reinforce it with some magisterial pronouncements by Popes and ecumenical councils.

In a nutshell, the true state of affairs is this: From the very beginning when God created man, He ordered him to a supernatural end. This supernatural end is Eternal Beatitude, also called the Beatific Vision, the seeing of God as He is. Its attainment is the ultimate purpose of man’s existence and the reason why God created human beings in the first place. The Beatific Vision is the supreme supernatural happiness man can experience. In order to enable man to attain this end, God bestowed upon him, freely and without any kind of necessity, supernatural grace to make him just and holy. This sanctifying grace is not part of human nature but is added on to it and perfects it. It raises man from the condition of being merely God’s creature to actually being God’s adopted child, worthy of the inheritance of the Beatific Vision (cf. Rom 8:17).

In the Garden of Eden, through the first sin of Adam, man lost the supernatural grace which made him holy and thus put him in friendship with God and enabled him to eventually enjoy the Beatific Vision. As the physical head of the human race, Adam’s sin triggered the loss of this grace not only for himself but also for all of his descendants, because lacking himself in supernatural friendship with God, he can pass on none to his descendants. Thus every descendant of Adam, every human being, from the first moment of his existence, is lacking in sanctifying grace, and this lack is called original sin. (An exception to this is the Blessed Virgin Mary, but only because Christ miraculously prevented her from incurring the stain of original sin through the merits of His subsequent Redemption; cf. Lk 1:47; Denz. 792.)

To restore the lost grace was not within man’s power, and so a Savior, a Redeemer, was needed, One who would offer a perfect sin-atoning Sacrifice to Almighty God and merit for man the grace of justification. Since man was unable to provide such a Redeemer, God Himself provided Him in Jesus Christ, who is God incarnate (see Is 35:4; Jn 1:1-17). Being true God, the merits of Christ’s Passion and Death would be infinite in value; being true man, His merits would truly redeem the human race. The sanctifying grace thus merited does not only remit sin, it also makes the souls to which it is applied genuinely holy, that is, it makes souls positively and supernaturally pleasing to God.

The only way to have the grace of justification applied to one’s soul is through a genuine spiritual rebirth. The “old man” of sin must die (see Rom 6:6; Eph 4:22); a man must be “born again”, “regenerated” in Christ (see Jn 3:3,5), thus becoming a “new man” (see Eph 2:15, 4:24). This spiritual rebirth is accomplished only through the the sacrament of baptism, which must be received either in actual fact or at least through an efficacious desire thereof. (We will elaborate on that later.)

Only souls thus regenerated can be made partakers of the Beatific Vision because God, who is perfectly holy, cannot admit into His heavenly Presence souls that do not possess genuine holiness and thus a certain, albeit created, supernatural likeness to Him; but this holiness, this likeness, is lacking in any soul that is not in the state of sanctifying grace. Since a baby cannot receive sanctifying grace except through actual reception of the sacrament of baptism — an efficacious desire for it being impossible for anyone lacking the use of reason — unbaptized babies who die cannot enter Heaven. Being guilty of no personal sin but nevertheless afflicted with original sin, they go to a permanent place of natural happiness. This place is typically called the Limbo of Infants and is thought to be situated on the edge of hell (cf. Denz. 1526).

With this understanding in place, we can now better appreciate the Church’s magisterial pronouncements on these issues, of which we present the following:

By [Christ’s] death that bond of death introduced into all of us by Adam and transmitted to every soul, that bond contracted by propagation is broken, in which no one of our children is held not guilty until he is freed through baptism. (Pope St. Zosimus, Epistle Tractatoria ad Orientalis Ecclesias, Denz. 109a)

The punishment of original sin is deprivation of the vision of God…. (Pope Innocent III, Apostolic Letter Ex Parte Tua; Denz. 410)

…the souls of those who depart in actual mortal sin or in original sin only, descend immediately into hell but to undergo punishments of different kinds. (Council of Florence, Bull Laetentur Coeli; Denz. 693)

Regarding children, indeed, because of danger of death, which can often take place, when no help can be brought to them by another remedy than through the sacrament of baptism, through which they are snatched from the domination of the Devil and adopted among the sons of God, it advises that holy baptism ought not be deferred for forty or eighty days, or any time according to the observance of certain people…. (Council of Florence, Bull Cantate Domino; Denz. 712; underlining added.)

If anyone denies that infants newly born from their mothers’ wombs, are to be baptized, even though they be born of baptized parents, or says that they are baptized indeed for the remission of sins, but that they derive nothing of original sin from Adam, which must be expiated by the laver of regeneration for the attainment of life everlasting, whence it follows, that in them the form of baptism for the remission of sins is understood to be not true, but false: let him be anathema. For what the Apostle has said: ‘By one man sin entered into the world, and by sin death, and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned’ [Romans 5:12], is not to be understood otherwise than as the Catholic Church spread everywhere has always understood it. For by reason of this rule of faith from a tradition of the apostles even infants, who could not as yet commit any sins of themselves, are for this reason truly baptized for the remission of sins, so that in them there may be washed away by regeneration, what they have contracted by generation. ‘For unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God’ [John 3:5]. (Council of Trent, Decree on Original Sin; Denz. 791; underlining added.)

If anyone shall say that baptism is optional, that is, not necessary for salvation: let him be anathema. (Council of Trent, Canons on the Sacrament of Baptism, Canon 5; Denz. 861)

Since infant children have no other means of salvation except Baptism, we may easily understand how griveously those persons sin who permit them to remain without the grace of the Sacrament longer than necessity may require…. (Pope St. Pius V, Catechism of the Council of Trent, Part II: The Sacraments: “The Sacrament of Baptism”; underlining added.)

Baptism, the gateway and foundation of the Sacraments, actually or at least in desire is necessary for all for salvation…. (Pope Benedict XV, 1917 Code of Canon Law, Canon 737 §1)

“Original sin” is the hereditary but impersonal fault of Adam’s descendants, who have sinned in him (Rom. v. 12). It is the loss of grace, and therefore of eternal life, together with a propensity to evil, which everybody must, with the assistance of grace, penance, resistance and moral effort, repress and conquer. The passion and death of the Son of God has redeemed the world from the hereditary curse of sin and death. Faith in these truths … belongs to the inalienable treasury of Christian revelation. (Pope Pius XI, Encyclical Mit Brennender Sorge, n. 25)

If what We have said up to now deals with the protection and the care of the natural life, it should hold all the more in regard to the supernatural life which the newly-born infant receives with baptism. In the present economy, there is no other way of communicating this life to the child who has not yet the use of reason. But, nevertheless, the state of grace at the moment of death is absolutely necessary for salvation. Without it, it is not possible to attain supernatural happiness, the beatific vision of God. An act of love can suffice for an adult to obtain sanctifying grace and supply for the absence of baptism; for the unborn child or for the newly-born, this way is not open. (Pope Pius XII, Address Vegliare to Midwives on the Nature of their Profession, Oct. 29, 1951; underlining added.)

Thus the traditional Catholic position is clear.

But… Is It ‘Fair’?

To sum up: The reason why a human being who dies in original sin only cannot go to Heaven is that he does not have sanctifying grace in his soul, which is absolutely necessary to enjoy the Beatific Vision; at the same time, he cannot go to hell since he is not personally guilty of any wrongdoing. Neither could he go to purgatory, for purgatory is only a temporary state of cleansing for souls already in the state of grace. Thus there must be some other eternal state for such souls in which, though deprived of the Beatific Vision, they nevertheless enjoy a permanent natural happiness.

Thus is answered the objection often made that “it’s not fair” that unbaptized children who die don’t go to Heaven. Strictly speaking, Heaven is owed to no one, and although God “will have all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Tim 2:4), this salvation depends upon the free cooperation of men and is not imposed on anyone. God can be said to ‘owe’ Heaven to those who die in the state of grace only in the sense that He has freely decided to bestow sanctifying grace and its heavenly reward on human beings in the first place. Yes, God ‘owes’ Heaven to such people, but only because He has first freely promised it to them, not because they have an intrinsic right to it on account of being human.

We must remember that God is not only all-merciful but also all-knowing, and that means He knows not only what will happen in the future but also what would happen if things were different. In His all-wise Providence, perhaps God is allowing for certain preborn deaths to occur because He knows that if the child were to be born and grow into adulthood, he would eventually lose his soul or cause many other people to lose their souls. That is just speculation, of course — we do not know, and we do not need to know, why God allows one unbaptized child to live but not another. However, it is absolutely certain that God does not need lectures from us miserable sinners on how to be just and merciful! Heaven is not a right but an undeserved gift; and an eternity of natural happiness in Limbo is certainly better than an eternity in hell!

Concluding Remarks

That “Pope” Francis would say aborted/unbaptized children go to Heaven is not surprising at all. After all, Bergoglio is a Naturalist, and the denial of original sin is one of the fundamental components of Naturalism, which is also a bedrock principle of Freemasonry. In 1884, Pope Leo XIII wrote: “But the naturalists and Freemasons, having no faith in those things which we have learned by the revelation of God, deny that our first parents sinned…” (Encyclical Humanum Genus, n. 20). We also saw this Naturalism at work in Francis when he said in 2018 that that “good atheists” go to Heaven., or when he suggested earlier this year that “all religions are ways to arrive at God”.

The denial of original sin — a favorite also of ‘Pope’ Benedict XVI, we might add — is a most damnable heresy because it effectively dismantles the entire Catholic religion. If man is not conceived in and born with original sin (cf. Ps 50:7), then there is no need for sanctification and consequently no need for a Redeemer. The Christian religion thus becomes nothing more than a gigantic waste of time. That is also the reason why the Vatican II Sect places so much emphasis on the temporal world and its problems — from migration issues to climate change to sustainable farming and integral ecology. In the Novus Ordo Church, the supernatural has been subordinated to, and placed at the service of, the natural, especially in the pseudo-magisterium of Francis, which has replaced the true Gospel with what we call the ‘gospel of man’. As St. John the Baptist said, “He that is of the earth, of the earth he is, and of the earth he speaketh” (Jn 3:31).

Modern man has long lost sight of his supernatural end and therefore seeks his happiness and salvation in the temporal world, which must of necessity pass away. Thus he squanders his life on things that can only bring him destruction: “For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting” (Gal 6:8).

We all know what ‘Pope’ Francis has been sowing.

ADDENDUM ON BAPTISM OF DESIRE

Against those who audaciously reject the Catholic teaching on baptism of desire — which is actually infallible because part of the Church’s infallible universal laws –, we must remind them that while it is true that only water baptism imprints an indelible mark on the soul, also called the sacramental character (on account of which the sacrament cannot and need not ever be repeated), it is not this character that regenerates the soul, it is the grace of justification that does: “Another effect of baptism is the infusion of sanctifying grace and supernatural gifts and virtues. It is this sanctifying grace which renders men the adopted sons of God and confers the right to heavenly glory” (Catholic Encyclopedia, s.v. “Baptism”).

Baptism of desire cannot (and need not) supply the indelible character, but it can and does supply the sanctifying grace that justifies and puts one in supernatural friendship with God. It is this grace which is absolutely necessary for salvation, not the sacramental character.

That these two things — the grace and the character — can be had separately from each other is easy to demonstrate. For one thing, every baptized person who commits mortal sin loses sanctifying grace but does not lose the indelible mark of baptism. The sacramental character without sanctifying grace is of no use in terms of salvation.

Furthermore, if someone were willingly to receive the sacrament of baptism but would do so without any repentance, without any sorrow for sin, perhaps even with a positive intention to commit and remain in mortal sin, such a baptism would be valid (the sacramental character would indeed be imprinted) but it would not confer any sanctifying grace. Thus, such a baptism is called fruitless because it does not regenerate the person, it does not make the soul holy, it does not forgive any sins (neither actual nor original). For such a man to subsequently receive the forgiveness of his sins and the rebirth of his soul, he would have to make a good confession and receive valid absolution.

Thus we see that someone could possess the indelible mark of baptism and yet not be in the state of sanctifying grace; were he to remain in such an unhappy state until death, he would go straight to hell.

Thus we have seen that the sacramental character and the state of grace are two separate things, and one can have the former without having the latter. However — and this is the crux — one can also have the latter without having the former. That is, just as the character of baptism can be had without the grace of baptism, so the grace of baptism can be had without the character. It is the latter we call ‘baptism of desire’.

When we speak of the baptism of desire, we are not merely speaking of some kind of intention or wish to receive the sacrament of baptism. We are speaking of “an act of love of God, [in which] there is necessarily implied perfect contrition for sin and a desire to be baptized…” (Cardinal Peter Gasparri, The Catholic Catechism [London: Sheed & Ward, 1936], n. 360, p. 160).

This possible ‘substitute’ for the sacrament is an integral part of what the Church means by the necessity of baptism for salvation. It is not an ‘exception’ to the dogma, it is part of the correct understanding of this necessity.

The possibility of baptism of desire reflects the goodness and providence of Almighty God. As no one can baptize himself — any such attempt would be invalid –, it is clear that a valid conferral of baptism always depends on the actual and willing participation of another. Furthermore, it also depends, of course, on the availability of natural water, as well as on the minister knowing and using the proper form. Thus it is easy to envision situations in which a dying person wishes to be baptized but at least one of these requirements is lacking.

As St. Robert Bellarmine notes, “there cannot be any doubt that it must be believed that true conversion [i.e. perfect contrition] supplies for Baptism of water, since it is not from contempt, but from necessity that some men die without Baptism of water” (On Baptism & Confirmation, Book I, Chapter VI; Ryan Grant translation [#CommissionsLink]).

Yes, God could miraculously send someone to baptize such a dying person, but miracles are an extraordinary occurrence. We would not say that natural food is not needed for survival simply because God could miraculously sustain us without food. Yes, He could — but He has not promised that He will, and ordinarily He does not. Similarly, the Church asks those who are unable to receive Holy Communion to make a so-called ‘Spiritual Communion’ — which is an “earnest desire … to receive the Blessed Sacrament when one is not able actually to do so” (Catholic Dictionary) –, she does not ask them to wait for Holy Communion to be administered to them miraculously, although obviously God could work such a miracle (and has done so in some rare cases) if He so wished.

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‘Pope’ Francis Claims Aborted Children Go to Heaven