Midori
wrote:
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Hi, guys —
Good day, and I hope you're well!
I have struggled with this question for a
while and I was hoping for an answer from
any of you!
- When little children die, including stillborn
babies and sick babies, do they go to Heaven
or Hell?
- They haven't done anything wrong or right,
so where would they go?
- I don't understand; it seems to me as
if they would go to Heaven, but do they?
Midori
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{
When little children die, including stillborn babies and sick babies, do they go to Heaven or Hell? }
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Mary
Ann replied:
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Dear Midori,
Such children go into the hands of
God, who cares for them in ways beyond
our imagining.
We know that the God who created
them loves them, and we trust Him.
Pope St. John Paul II said that such children
are living with the Lord. If one
is looking for an explanation of
how God's salvation can reach those
who have not been baptized, we know
that God honors the faith of others
for salvation. He wishes all to be
saved. He cured the crippled because
of the faith of his friends. (Mark 2:1-12)
He gives His grace in the Baptism
of infants because of the faith of
the parents. For this reason, we
should have faith that God cares
for them.
Mary Ann
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Midori
replied:
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Hi, Mary Ann —
- I thought all people were born into
this world as sinners?
Midori
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Mary
Ann replied:
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Dear Midori,
We are all born in a state of estrangement
from God, the result of the original
sin of Adam and Eve, which is not
our personal sin, but a state. However,
Christ has reconciled mankind to
God in principle.
Anyone who sincerely seeks the good
can be saved, and anyone who dies
in innocence, before the age of reason,
but without Baptism, has no sin that
cannot be overcome by this reconciling
act of Christ, so the person does
not go to Hell: the punishment of
those who refuse reconciliation.
They are with God. They did not have
the indwelling of the divine life,
the eternal life given by Baptism,
but that can be imparted by God
as He wishes. Some say that such
innocent souls are in a state of
natural happiness without the Beatific
Vision but that complicates things
unnecessarily and restricts God's
salvific Will and His Mercy, so I
prefer to:
- speak as the Church does in the
funeral Masses for such children,
and
- speak of our confident hope in
God's love for His children.
Mary Ann
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