Are You A Child of God?

[GodsGrace]

Part II of IV

The "amniotic fluid" theory is novel and I think it is demonstrably erroneous for a couple of reasons. First, if it does refer to natural birth, Jesus would be affirming Nicodemus' erroneous understanding of being born again. Secondly, NOWHERE in Scripture is being born synonymous with being "born of water." Lastly, our Blessed Lord says man must be born "of" water. The Greek word for "of" is ἐk, which means from / of / an origin of something. (Source) Man is not birthed from water, but rather from a mother; that is, a person. Man is not born from water / amniotic fluid. In other words, water is not the origin of man's natural birth and Scripture never refers to it as such. (e.g. Matthew 1:1-11)

This amniotic fluid idea is always put forth by anti-Sacramentalists. I am fond of saying that in Christianity, matter...matters.

Nicodemus also asks Jesus how it could be possible for him to go back into his mother's womb.
Jesus does not correct him either .....
John 3:5.......How can a man enter a second time into his mother's womb.

John 3:6 Jesus tells N. : That which is flesh is flesh...
That which is spirit is spirit. It does seem as though one has to be born of the flesh first.....and then also of the spirit.

However, I do know that water in the bible refers to baptism...even in the O.T. when some would go into the Jordon to be healed by the water..I think at a certain time of year...not sure.

Not exactly. Water by itself does nothing; for of and by itself it exercises no spiritual influence upon man. But baptism, by definition, involves BOTH water AND the Holy Ghost. (cf. John 3:5) Because it is a sacrament, the water in baptism is the material sign of what is communicated invisibly / spiritually in the soul.

Once again, in Christianity, matter...matters.

I agree. I might have mis-spoken. During baptism a baby is annointed with chrism.

Yes, I do believe all baptized babies do go to heaven. They have been regenerated and furthermore are guilty of no actual sin (since they are incapable of even committing actual sin).

Do you believe baptized babies do not go to heaven? (Be careful, as this is a sola fide trap.)

Did I say that???
I believe baptized babies go to heaven and unbaptized babies go to heaven.
Of course all babies are not guilty of Actual Sin.
Augustine created this problem of unbaptized babies going to hell. This teaching did not exist before him.

While St. Augustine may have written much and helped develop the understanding of original sin, I have demonstrated that the doctrine long preceded him.

Original sin, the concept of original sin, existed before Augustine. HE made it a formal doctrine...HE passed on the teaching about babies going to hell if they died sans baptism. Here is a link's statement again, incl those you also have mentioned...


Tertullian (2nd/3rd c.) and Cyprian (3rd c.). They explicitly reflected on (infant) baptism and (the Adamic) sin, issues relevant for the doctrine of original sin, and Augustine refers to their writings for this reason. Did Tertullian and Cyprian lay the foundations of the doctor gratiae’s highly sophisticated doctrine of original sin? To answer this question, we gathered as exhaustively as possible all available evidence. Processing this quite elaborate collection of sources shows that Tertullian and Cyprian created a conceptual framework in which it was possible for Augustine to develop all aspects of his doctrine of original sin, some of which differed considerably from the positions of Tertullian and Cyprian, including also some of the extreme implications of the Augustinian view.

The foundation was laid...of course...but Augustine, as stated above, developed the doctrine of O.S.
Some of which differed from T. and C. and all the other ECFs, to say nothing of creating the teaching that babies go to hell if not baptized[/QUOTE]

 

[GodsGrace]

Part III of IV

Yes, which we call original sin. He does so again in 1 Cor. 15:21-22.


To demonstrate the doctrine of original sin preceded St. Augustine.


Great.


He did not make it acceptable throughout the Church, since we see it being taught long before St. Augustine arrived on the scene. However, I concede he was instrumental in helping develop the doctrine.

I don't disagree. However, it is important to remember that some of St. Augustine's thoughts on original sin were never accepted by the Church. (e.g. the fate of unbaptized infants)

The church accepted more of Augustine's theories than it ever should have. He changed his mind on so many different doctrine that I trust him not on anything.

He was a gnostic and a manichean and a student of Plato before he became a Christian...all this affected his thoughts and writings.

This might be of help to you.
It's from the Vatican.
It might be a Papal Bull...I forgot to check.

vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv

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]

19. The Council of Carthage of 418 rejected the teaching of Pelagius. It condemned the opinion that infants “do not contract from Adam any trace of original sin, which must be expiated by the bath of regeneration that leads to eternal life”. Positively, this council taught that “even children who of themselves cannot have yet committed any sin are truly baptised for the remission of sins, so that by regeneration they may be cleansed from what they contracted through generation”.[40] It was also added that there is no “intermediate or other happy dwelling place for children who have left this life without Baptism, without which they cannot enter the kingdom of heaven, that is, eternal life”.[41] This council did not, however, explicitly endorse all aspects of Augustine's stern view about the destiny of infants who die without Baptism.

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]

source: http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/c...aith_doc_20070419_un-baptised-infants_en.html

(it's not a Papal Bull)

I don't believe you'll find any ECFs,,,, pre Nicene,,,,that adhere to what Augustine believed.

 

[Randy]

PART 2 OF 2

Sorry, W...this is too much for me to handle all at once...just for time's sake.

Let's take it one idea at a time....

WHAT about Augustine did I misrepresent??
WHO came up with the idea of Original Sin if not him?

Here is an article from Wiki that I agree with.

Augustine of Hippowrote that original sin is transmitted by concupiscence and enfeebles freedom of the will without destroying it.[2]
Augustine of Hippo (354–430) taught that Adam's sin[35] is transmitted by concupiscence, or "hurtful desire",[36][37] resulting in humanity becoming a massa damnata (mass of perdition, condemned crowd), with much enfeebled, though not destroyed, freedom of will.[2] When Adam sinned, human nature was thenceforth transformed. Adam and Eve, via sexual reproduction, recreated human nature. Their descendants now live in sin, in the form of concupiscence, a term Augustine used in a metaphysical, not a psychological sense.[38] Augustine insisted that concupiscence was not a being but a bad quality, the privation of good or a wound.[39] He admitted that sexual concupiscence (libido) might have been present in the perfect human nature in paradise, and that only later it became disobedient to human will as a result of the first couple's disobedience to God's will in the original sin.[40] In Augustine's view (termed "Realism"), all of humanity was really present in Adam when he sinned, and therefore all have sinned. Original sin, according to Augustine, consists of the guilt of Adam which all humans inherit. Justo Gonzalez interprets Augustine's teaching that humans are utterly depraved in nature and grace is irresistible, results in conversion, and leads to perseverance.[41] Although earlier Christian authors taught the elements of physical death, moral weakness, and a sin propensity within original sin, Augustine was the first to add the concept of inherited guilt (reatus) from Adam whereby an infant was eternally damned at birth. Augustine held the traditional view that free will was weakened but not destroyed by original sin until he converted in 412 CE to the Stoic view that humanity had no free will except to sin as a result of his anti-Pelagian view of infant baptism.[42] [He converted about numerous ideas]

Augustine articulated his explanation in reaction to Pelagianism, which insisted that humans have of themselves, without the necessary help of God's grace, the ability to lead a morally good life, and thus denied both the importance of baptism and the teaching that God is the giver of all that is good. Pelagius claimed that the influence of Adam on other humans was merely that of bad example. Augustine held that the effects of Adam's sin are transmitted to his descendants not by example but by the very fact of generation from that ancestor. A wounded nature comes to the soul and body of the new person from his/her parents, who experience libido (or concupiscence). Augustine's view was that human procreation was the way the transmission was being effected. He did not blame, however, the sexual passion itself, but the spiritual concupiscence present in human nature, soul and body, even after baptismal regeneration.[43] Christian parents transmit their wounded nature to children, because they give them birth, not the "re-birth".[44] Augustine used Ciceronian Stoic concept of passions, to interpret St. Paul's doctrine of universal sin and redemption. In that view, also sexual desire itself as well as other bodily passions were consequence of the original sin, in which pure affections were wounded by vice and became disobedient to human reason and will. As long as they carry a threat to the dominion of reason over the soul they constitute moral evil, but since they do not presuppose consent, one cannot call them sins. Humanity will be liberated from passions, and pure affections will be restored only when all sin has been washed away and ended, that is in the resurrection of the dead.[45][46]

Augustine believed that unbaptized infants go to hell as a consequence of original sin.[47][48] The Latin Church Fathers who followed Augustine adopted his position, which became a point of reference for Latin theologians in the Middle Ages.[49] In the later medieval period, some theologians continued to hold Augustine's view, others held that unbaptized infants suffered no pain at all: unaware of being deprived of the beatific vision, they enjoyed a state of natural, not supernatural happiness.

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_sin#History_of_the_doctrine

The answer to your question is we know by the Spirit of Christ in us.

I would consider ALL infants to be blameless if they were to die. - No soul death.
In other words they would come before the one who judges and Jesus would make a judgment in their favor since they were infants at the time of their death.

"With light comes accountability" Justice to the nations.
Jesus-If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin; but now they have no excuse for THEIR sin. (not Adams)

To be sure anyone who sins is a slave to sin unless the Son sets them free. And if the Son sets them free they are free indeed.