Blog says Holy Innocents received BOB and BOB is "more perfect" than water baptism

We have in Blessed Stephen the fulfillment of his desire to be a martyr with the act of martyrdom; in St. John we find the desire, but not the act of martyrdom; in the Blessed Innocents – the children Herod killed with the intent to kill the Messiah – we have the act of martyrdom, but not the desire.

Indeed, St. Stephen wanted to be a martyr and became one. St. John desired the same, but was not. The Blessed Innocents did not desire to be martyrs, but were.

Is there reason to believe that those children were true martyrs? Where is the merit to obtain the crown of martyrdom? To this doubt, I answer: Would the goodness of Christ be defeated by the cruelty of Herod? Could that impious king order those innocents killed, and Christ not crown those who died because of Him?

Stephen was a martyr before the eyes of men who witnessed his passion which he voluntarily embraced to the point of praying for his persecutors. Thus he showed that he was more sensitive to the crime they were committing than to his own wounds.

John was a martyr before the eyes of the Angels, because those spiritual creatures saw the disposition of his soul.

Certainly those children were Thy martyrs, O God, but neither men nor Angels could see their merit, which was before Thy eyes alone. The favor of Thy grace stood in place of their merit. We who have been baptized by water should be all the more ready to honor those little ones who were baptized in their own blood, and therefore linked to all the mysteries of the Divine Infancy.

St_Polycarp wrote:The article says that "the Holy Innocents gave their lives for the newborn Savior." My question is how did they actually give their lives for Jesus? I mean, it's not like they were persecuted for their faith in Christ, and killed because they wouldn't give it up. They were victims of an evil king. I just have never understood how they could be considered martyrs for Christ.

Jehanne wrote:The One and Triune God is all loving and all merciful but not all righteous. I think that it is far more probable that there are degrees of natural happiness in Limbo than the Holy Innocents are in Paradise.

MarianLibrarian wrote:

Jehanne wrote:The One and Triune God is all loving and all merciful but not all righteous. I think that it is far more probable that there are degrees of natural happiness in Limbo than the Holy Innocents are in Paradise.

We know that they are in Paradise because the Church celebrates their liturgical feast... furthermore, they are somewhat like the Saints of the Old Testament. They died under the Old Law, not being bound by the sacrament of Baptism (which had yet to even be instituted). The Holy Innocents were all circumcised and thus upon their deaths they would've descended to the limbo of the fathers with the rest of the justified under the Old Covenant and followed Our Lord into Heaven after His Ascension.

Jehanne wrote:The One and Triune God is all loving and all merciful but not all righteous. I think that it is far more probable that there are degrees of natural happiness in Limbo than the Holy Innocents are in Paradise.

Jehanne wrote:
Perhaps. I do not know. Does it really matter, at least from a theological POV?

MRyan wrote:

Jehanne wrote:The One and Triune God is all loving and all merciful but not all righteous. I think that it is far more probable that there are degrees of natural happiness in Limbo than the Holy Innocents are in Paradise.

Of course He is “all righteous” (it is heretical to say He is not), and His righteousness is not opposed to His mercy.

But I was half-expecting the old canard that says that their entrance into heaven was made possible only by the fact that they were martyred before the promulgation of the Gospel, but this is too much.

Jehanne, do you understand the implications of what you are saying? Are we to understand that it is "more probable" that the Roman Catholic Latin Church instituted the Feast of the Holy Innocents for those who are actually in hell, in the “Limbo of the children”? So we venerate and pray to the souls of the damned, even if they do not suffer the eternal torments?

I hope you will reconsider.

MRyan wrote:

Jehanne wrote:
Perhaps. I do not know. Does it really matter, at least from a theological POV?

Yes, it does matter. The Church celebrates their feast because she declares with the certainty of tradition and a universal ecclesiastical approbation that they are among the blessed in heaven. And, while it may not enjoy the certain infallibility of a canonization (the infallibility of a dogmatic fact), it does enjoy a universal and constant consent. To suggest that the Church has erred in such a matter is, quite frankly, absurd.

Why is there a “problem” in the first place?

Jehanne wrote:

MRyan wrote:

Jehanne wrote:
Perhaps. I do not know. Does it really matter, at least from a theological POV?

Yes, it does matter. The Church celebrates their feast because she declares with the certainty of tradition and a universal ecclesiastical approbation that they are among the blessed in heaven. And, while it may not enjoy the certain infallibility of a canonization (the infallibility of a dogmatic fact), it does enjoy a universal and constant consent. To suggest that the Church has erred in such a matter is, quite frankly, absurd.

Why is there a “problem” in the first place?

I never claimed that the Church erred. It is de fide that Water Baptism is the only means, the only hope, of salvation for infants and children who have not yet reached the age of reason. So, I find the BoB argument for the Holy Innocents to be a hallow one.