My thoughts on Gospel passages where Jesus speaks about salvation.

[Matthew]
{19:13} Then they brought to him little children, so that he would place his hands upon them and pray. But the disciples rebuked them.
{19:14} Yet truly, Jesus said to them: “Allow the little children to come to me, and do not choose to prohibit them. For the kingdom of heaven is among such as these.”
{19:15} And when he had imposed his hands upon them, he went away from there.

They wanted Jesus to bless little children by placing his hands on them and praying. But some among the disciples — not necessarily the Apostles — thought this was inappropriate. These disciples rebuked the adults who were bringing children to Jesus. But what did Jesus say in response? The Lord rebuked those disciples; they were wrong.

Jesus: “Allow the little children to come to me, and do not choose to prohibit them. For the kingdom of heaven is among such as these.”

The quote above is a fairly literal translation by me from the Latin Vulgate. Jesus not only says that His disciples — even today!! — should allow children to come to him, but also adds that they must not be prohibited. Is that redundant? No. What this means is that, in addition to allowing children to come to Jesus, in various ways we will discuss below, that the Church and the faithful should not put up obstacles or excessive requirements making it difficult for children to approach Jesus. Allow them AND make it easy for them. Clear away any obstacles. Do not add unnecessary conditions. Be lenient and generous. That is the way of the Lord Jesus.

Now we know that in the Catholic Church, children can be baptized at any age, and can receive Confession and holy Communion relatively early. Then, in the Eastern Rites, children as young as infants are given Baptism, then immediately holy Communion, and then immediately Confirmation. So the Church allows the little children to come to Jesus.

This verse also has a meaning in salvation theology (soteriology). It is as if Jesus were also saying: ‘In your theology, understand that God allows the little children to come to Him, and He does not place any obstacles before them.’

Some Catholic Christians think that little children are not saved, unless they receive the formal Sacrament of Baptism with water. They admit no other path to salvation for prenatals, infants, and young children. This is the heresy of Feeneyism, applied to the very young.

Such persons claim that prenatals, infants, and young children, who die without a baptism of water, end up in Limbo. Some say that this is Limbo as a third final destination, neither Heaven nor Hell. Others claim that this is the limbo of Hell, a fringe of Hell, which has the chief punishment of Hell, the deprivation of the Beatific Vision of God and the deprivation of all the other joys of Heaven, but no active punishments. Such an opinion is incompatible with the Gospel teaching and with magisterial teaching throughout the centuries.

According to the words of Jesus in this Gospel passage, God wants the little children to come to Him in Heaven, and God will not prohibit them or place any obstacles in their path. For the kingdom of heaven is among them, even while they are on earth. They are innocents blessed by Jesus. Just as Jesus laid His very hands on them and prayed over them on earth, so in every age Jesus gives the little children, who unfortunately die at a young age, a path to salvation.

And my understanding is that this path is by means of what the Church calls a baptism of blood. They receive a non-formal baptism, which is not the full Sacrament of Baptism with water, and yet has the main salvific effects of Baptism: forgiveness of original sin, forgiveness of any personal sins (for older children), and the granting of the state of grace, including the infused theological virtues of love, faith, and hope. This baptism of blood is granted, in my opinion, to all prenatals, infants, and young children, who die at that young age without the formal Sacrament of Baptism. No little children go to Hell or Limbo (of any kind). And the Gospel passage where Jesus speaks of little children absolutely support this understanding of salvation.

All human persons who die as prenatals or infants or young children, without a Baptism with water, receive a baptism of blood. They are baptized directly by Christ, dying for our salvation on the Cross. They are figuratively baptized in His blood, by virtue of their suffering of dying at such a young age, by virtue of the love, mercy, justice, and salvific death of Christ, the Son of God. It is as if He is placing His hands upon them and praying for their salvation.

Jesus rebukes those Christians who think that little children go to Limbo or to the Limbo of Hell. For they would prohibit the children from coming to Jesus, with their merciless theology. But as Jesus also said, earlier in the Gospel of Matthew:

{18:3} And he said: “Amen I say to you, unless you change and become like little children, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.
{18:4} Therefore, whoever will have humbled himself like this little child, such a one is greater in the kingdom of heaven.
{18:5} And whoever shall accept one such little child in my name, accepts me.

Those who reject little children, by claiming that they go to the Limbo of Hell, or to a version of Limbo that supposedly has “perfect natural happiness” — but without the Beatific Vision of God, without the union with God that occurs in Heaven, without all of their loved ones who went to Heaven, without the other joys of Heaven, and without the state of grace and the virtue of love — whoever thinks such a thing is rebuked by Jesus in the above passage from the Gospels.

If everyone must become like little children to enter Heaven, then certainly those who are already little children cannot fail to enter.

You adults, who think you know salvation better than Jesus, you will not enter Heaven, “unless you change and become like little children”. So how can you say that children are not saved, unless they have the Sacrament of Baptism with water? The Church has always taught that there are two other types of baptism, desire and blood. And Pope Saint John Paul II taught, in the papal encyclical Redemptoris Missio:

“The universality of salvation means that it is granted not only to those who explicitly believe in Christ and have entered the Church. Since salvation is offered to all, it must be made concretely available to all.” [RM 10]

You do not have to enter the Church by the Sacrament of Baptism with water to be saved. There are two other types of baptism (desire, blood). And since God wills all human persons to be saved — this is a dogma of the Church called the universal salvific will of God — little children who die without the Sacrament of Baptism, and without any actual mortal sins, must be offered salvation by one of the other types of baptism. Then many of them are too young to desire, implicitly or explicitly, baptism; the only path to fulfill the universal salvific will of God for them is a baptism of blood. So they must receive this, prior to their deaths at such a young age. Otherwise, the dogma of the universal salvific will of God would be false and otherwise, the teaching of Jesus in the Gospels on salvation would be false, which is impossible.

No prenatals, infants, or young children, who die at that young age, go to Hell, nor to Limbo of any kind. They are granted some type of baptism by the universal salvific will of Jesus Christ, through His salvific death on the Cross (which is the power in every type of baptism).

Pope Innocent III: “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….” []

Ronald L Conte Jr

For a comprehensive presentation of Church teaching on salvation, see my book: Forgiveness and Salvation for Everyone

All quotations from Sacred Scripture are from the Catholic Public Domain Version, translated and edited by Ronald L Conte Jr