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By: Jay Dyer

Since Dr. Taylor Marshall declines a public debate, it’s time to show the weakness of his apologetic.  Some time back Marshall wrote a piece that sounded closer to Orthodoxy that Tridentine Roman Catholicism.  Marshall attempted to show the Roman dogma did not adhere to “inherited guilt” for unbaptized infants, but rather infants inherit the effects of Adam’s sin, the deprivation of the “beatific vision,” with actual sins meriting the fire of damnation as children eventually adopt the use of reason and make moral decisions to sin.  Marshall’s recast is not correct, as he writes:

“All their children (i.e. all human babies) receive only the penalty of sin (reatus poena), which is defined as being without grace, subject to suffering and death, etc. If you not convinced, simply note that human babies die, suffer, and become sick. As they attain the operation of reason and language, they universally commit sins. Lamentably, none of us are not [sic] living the life of paradise. Each baby is not guilty of eating the forbidden fruit, but each baby does receive the penalty of that sin.”

Is it true that inherited guilt was never taught and that it only meant the effects of Adam’s sin (something closer to Orthodox theology)?  On the contrary, what this issue shows is the massive evolution and innovation of dogma on the part of the Roman Church on this question.  In fact, not only have recent discussions on this topic shed light on this mistaken recast, it also shows two places Roman Catholic dogmatic theology has specifically contradicted on the matter, as well will see. First, we must recall that in the Latin West after St. Augustine it was the norm that unbaptized infants are all de facto damned: Augustine was very clear on his view of that matter, while the East knew no such clear rigor in the matter and commended these infants to God’s mercy.

Regardless, in the West by the late Middle Ages the doctrine became clear as the Vatican’s own recent declaration on infants (which Marshall completely ignored) as unbaptized infants were considered part of the mass damnata:

“5. The fate of unbaptised infants first became the subject of sustained theological reflection in the West during the anti-Pelagian controversies of the early 5th century. St. Augustine addressed the question because Pelagius was teaching that infants could be saved without Baptism. Pelagius questioned whether St. Paul’s letter to the Romans really taught that all human beings sinned “in Adam” (Rom 5:12) and that concupiscence, suffering, and death were a consequence of the Fall.[22] Since he denied that Adam’s sin was transmitted to his descendants, he regarded newborn infants as innocent. Pelagius promised infants who died unbaptised entry into “eternal life” (not, however, into the “Kingdom of God” [Jn 3:5]), reasoning that God would not condemn to hell those who were not personally guilty of sin.[23]

16. In countering Pelagius, Augustine was led to state that infants who die without Baptism are consigned to hell.[24] He appealed to the Lord’s precept, John 3:5, and to the Church’s liturgical practice. Why are little children brought to the baptismal font, especially infants in danger of death, if not to assure them entrance into the Kingdom of God? Why are they subjected to exorcisms and exsufflations if they do not have to be delivered from the devil?[25] Why are they born again if they do not need to be made new? Liturgical practice confirms the Church’s belief that all inherit Adam’s sin and must be transferred from the power of darkness into the kingdom of light (Col 1:13).[26]There is only one Baptism, the same for infants and adults, and it is for the forgiveness of sins.[27] If little children are baptized, then, it is because they are sinners. Although they clearly are not guilty of personal sin, according to Romans 5:12 (in the Latin translation available to Augustine), they have sinned “in Adam”.[28] “Why did Christ die for them if they are not guilty?”[29] All need Christ as their Saviour.

17. In Augustine’s judgement, Pelagius undermined belief in Jesus Christ, the one Mediator (1 Tim 2:5), and in the need for the saving grace he won for us on the Cross. Christ came to save sinners. He is the “Great Physician” who offers even infants the medicine of Baptism to save them from the inherited sin of Adam.[30]The sole remedy for the sin of Adam, passed on to everyone through human generation, is Baptism. Those who are not baptized cannot enter the Kingdom of God. At the judgement, those who do not enter the Kingdom (Mt 25:34) will be condemned to hell (Mt 25:41). There is no “middle ground” between heaven and hell. “There is no middle place left, where you can put babies”.[31] Anyone “who is not with Christ must be with the devil”.[32]

18. God is just. If he condemns unbaptised children to hell, it is because they are sinners. Although these infants are punished in hell, they will suffer only the “mildest condemnation” (“mitissima poena”),[33] “the lightest punishment of all”,[34] for there are diverse punishments in proportion to the guilt of the sinner.[35]These infants were unable to help themselves, but there is no injustice in their condemnation because all belong to “the same mass”, the mass destined for perdition. God does no injustice to those who are not elected, for all deserve hell.[36] Why is it that some are vessels of wrath and others vessels of mercy? Augustine admits that he “cannot find a satisfactory and worthy explanation”. He can only exclaim with St. Paul: “How inscrutable [God’s] judgments, and untraceable his ways!”[37]Rather than condemn divine authority, he gives a restrictive interpretation of God’s universal salvific will..[38] The Church believes that if anyone is redeemed, it is only by God’s unmerited mercy; but if anyone is condemned, it is by his well-merited judgment. We shall discover the justice of God’s will in the next world.[39]”

This was the normative view in the Latin West for centuries, as well as in papally-affirmed medieval Roman Dogma, as we will see.  From the outset, however, we can see that Marshall’s simplistic portrayal doesn’t even take into account these well-known issues, but presents the Roman view as if it was a coherent dogmatic presentation.  Rather, the Roman dogma evolved from the post-Augustinian period to affirm the well-known idea of the limbo of infants, which would eventually achieve dogmatic status in Rome.  Before we reach that, recall this was the papal norm in the West, as well:

“20. So great was Augustine’s authority in the West, however, that the Latin Fathers (e.g., Jerome, Fulgentius, Avitus of Vienne, and Gregory the Great) did adopt his opinion. Gregory the Great asserts that God condemns even those with only original sin on their souls; even infants who have never sinned by their own will must go to “everlasting torments”. He cites Job 14:4-5 (LXX), John 3:5, and Ephesians 2:3 on our condition at birth as “children of wrath”.[42]”

Not only was this made clear, at least up into the 13th century Roman Dogma still affirmed this view and mandated in Denzinger 410 that infants are deprived of the beatific vision due to the guilt of original sin, and then incur torments of hell based on the actual sins they commit.  This quote is a classic because not only does it show the Latin church for centuries still affirmed the extreme Augustinian view, it will also demonstrate a boldface dogmatic contradiction with the Council of Florence on the efficacy of the Old Testament sacraments!:

The Effect of Baptism (and the Character) *

410   (For) they [those the Latins are saying err here who affirmed a neo-Pelagianism] assert that baptism is conferred uselessly on children. . . . We respond that baptism has taken the place of circumcision. . . . Therefore as “the soul of the circumcised did not perish from the people” [Gen. 17:4], so “he who has been reborn from water and the Holy Spirit will obtain entrance to the kingdom of heaven” [ John 3:5]. . . .Although original sin was remitted by the mystery of circumcision, and the danger of damnation was avoided, nevertheless there was no arriving at the kingdom of heaven, which up to the death of Christ was barred to all. But through the sacrament of baptism the guilt of one made red by the blood of Christ is remitted, and to the kingdom of heaven one also arrives, whose gate the blood of Christ has mercifully opened for His faithful. For God forbid that all children of whom daily so great a multitude die, would perish, but that also for these the merciful God who wishes no one to perish has procured some remedy unto salvation. . . . As to what opponents say, (namely), that faith or love or other virtues are not infused in children, inasmuch as they do not consent, is absolutely not granted by most. . . . some asserting that by the power of baptism guilt indeed is remitted to little ones but grace is not conferred; and some indeed saying both that sin is forgiven and that virtues are infused in them as they hold virtues as a possession not as a function, until they arrive at adult age. . . . We say that a distinction must be made, that sin is twofold: namely, original and actual: original, which is contracted without consent; and actual which is committed with consent. Original, therefore, which is committed without consent, is remitted without consent through the power of the sacrament; but actual, which is contracted with consent, is not mitigated in the slightest without consent. . . . The punishment of original sin is deprivation of the vision of God, but the punishment of actual sin is the torments of everlasting hell. . . .”

In other words, the guilt of original sin is remitted in baptism.  Marshall is correct about the distinctions in original and actual in Latin theology, but his recast is not accurate concerning the fact it’s still considered guilt, as the Augustinian tradition and the Vatican statement show.  This is because the Roman dogmas (shocker!) develop and evolve – as the whole Latin church since the late Middle Ages began to be based on greater and greater innovations, from celibate priests (denying Nicaea II) to forbidding paedocommunion to the Filioque.  “Original guilt” is remitted here, while the infusion of graces are also given, the paragraph is arguing – it is not saying infants possess no guilt.

And lastly, on the necessity of baptism for infants, we read:

“791 4. “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 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” [Rom. 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, [see n. 102]. “For unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God” [John 3:5].”

Indeed, the limbo of infants soon achieves dogmatic status in Roman theology as we see implied in 410, and then later in 493a:

“Hell and Limbo(?)*

[From the letter “Nequaquam sine dolore” to the Armenians,

Nov. 21, 1321]

493a It (The Roman Church) teaches. . . . . that the souls . . . . . of those who die in mortal sin, or with only original sin descend immediately into hell; however, to be punished with different penalties and in different places.”

And clearly in Denzinger 1525-6:

“The Punishment of Those Who Die with Original Sin Only

[Baptism, sec. 3]

1526 26. The doctrine which rejects as a Pelagian fable, that place of the lower regions (which the faithful generally designate by the name of the limbo of children) in which the souls of those departing with the sole guilt of original sin are punished with the punishment of the condemned, exclusive of the punishment of fire, just as if, by this very fact, that these who remove the punishment of fire introduced that middle place and state free of guilt and of punishment between the kingdom of God and eternal damnation, such as that about which the Pelagians idly talk,–false, rash, injurious to Catholic schools.”

Note in my analysis I am not interested in the baptism of desire/”Feeneyite” debate, but rather to simply point out where both Dr. Taylor Marshall and Roman Catholic dogma contradict and have evolved.  Thus we can see the guilt of infants is considered guilt and that it is “remitted” in baptism and that this was combined with the eventual dogma of limbo, where infants were placed who had died without baptism (being deprived of the beatific vision), yet lacking actual sin to merit the torments of hell.  Such ridiculous notions of God tormenting infants are precisely one of the many reasons the West has become atheistic and the Roman church is now “blessing” Pachamama idols dedicated to human sacrifice.

Next, however, we want to illustrate Denzinger shows a clear contradiction in Roman Dogma in admitting on the one hand circumcision remitted original sin (Denzinger 410) and later at Florence it clearly did not, as Florence claims the rites of the Old Testament did not confer the grace they signified.  This is yet another absurd contradiction in Roman Catholic dogma:

“410   (For) they assert that baptism is conferred uselessly on children. . . . We respond that baptism has taken the place of circumcision. . . . Therefore as “the soul of the circumcised did not perish from the people” [Gen. 17:4], so “he who has been reborn from water and the Holy Spirit will obtain entrance to the kingdom of heaven” [ John 3:5]. . . .Although original sin was remitted by the mystery of circumcision, and the danger of damnation was avoided, nevertheless there was no arriving at the kingdom of heaven, which up to the death of Christ was barred to all. But through the sacrament of baptism the guilt of one made red by the blood of Christ is remitted, and to the kingdom of heaven one also arrives, whose gate the blood of Christ has mercifully opened for His faithful.”

This is not a mere opinion, this is papally-approved dogma in Denzinger that easily falls under the classification of universal ordinary magisterium (supposedly protected by the charism of infallibility).  Remember, Vatican I said:

“Wherefore, by divine and catholic faith all those things are to be believed

• • • which are contained in the word of God as found in scripture and tradition,
    • and which are proposed by the church as matters to be believed as divinely revealed,
    • whether by her solemn judgment
    • or in her ordinary and universal magisterium.”

In direct contradiction to Denzinger 410, the Council of Florence later states the opposite concerning circumcision:

“Decree for the Armenians *

[From the Bull “Exultate Deo,” Nov. 22, 1439]

695 In the fifth place we have reduced under this very brief formula the truth of the sacraments of the Church for the sake of an easier instruction of the Armenians, the present as well as the future. There are seven sacraments of the new Law: namely, baptism, confirmation, Eucharist, penance, extreme unction, orders, and matrimony, which differ a great deal from the sacraments of the Old Law. For those of the Old Law did not effect grace, but only pronounced that it should be given through the passion of Christ; these sacraments of ours contain grace, and confer it upon those who receive them worthily.”

Of course, being the Olympic level experts in mental gymnastics they are, I suppose it’s possible for Roman Catholics to say the way to reconcile the two would be to have forgiveness in the Old Testament without grace, but at that point the only appropriate reaction is to laugh at the cope.

Finally, it’s worth noting the third contradiction is on the dogma of the limbo of infants itself, which was clearly stated above in Denzinger 493a and 1525-6 as the faith of Catholics, but now, according the the Ratzinger-approved International Theological Commission report on limbo and infant salvation, it’s no longer necessary!  In effect, the Vatican document demonstrates the evolution of these nonsensical western documents, but shows the dogmas of Rome are in constant flux and always subject to change:

“41. Therefore, besides the theory of Limbo (which remains a possible theological opinion), there can be other ways to integrate and safeguard the principles of the faith grounded in Scripture: the creation of the human being in Christ and his vocation to communion with God; the universal salvific will of God; the transmission and the consequences of original sin; the necessity of grace in order to enter into the Kingdom of God and attain the vision of God; the uniqueness and universality of the saving mediation of Christ Jesus; and the necessity of Baptism for salvation. These other ways are not achieved by modifying the principles of the faith, or by elaborating hypothetical theories; rather, they seek an integration and coherent reconciliation of the principles of the faith under the guidance of the ecclesial magisterium, by giving more weight to God’s universal salvific will and to solidarity in Christ (cf. GS 22) in order to account for the hope that infants dying without Baptism could enjoy eternal life in the beatific vision. In keeping with a methodological principle that what is less known must be investigated by way of what is better known, it appears that the point of departure for considering the destiny of these children should be the salvific will of God, the mediation of Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit, and a consideration of the condition of children who receive Baptism and are saved through the action of the Church in the name of Christ. The destiny of unbaptised infants remains, however, a limit-case as regards theological inquiry: theologians should keep in mind the apophatic perspective of the Greek Fathers.”

Over and over we see the Orthodox Church vindicated. Ten years ago I argued with Marshall in comments about the essence-energy distinction, which Marshall denies, ignorantly citing St. John of Damascus about “one energy” and ignoring the other quotes about “many energies.”  The only reason for this is that Marshall hasn’t read either Denzinger or St. John’s Exposition.   Now, he has positioned himself as the face of an incoherent “trad” Catholic movement that is so riddled with contradiction, the entire edifice is collapsing on itself.

See my take on Pachamama and the Amazon Synod here:

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