The Byzantine tradition holds that there will be degrees of glory for those who participate in the vision of God, and that the divine vision entails a never-ending movement (i.e., epektasis) or infinite progression into the tri-hypostatic God, who is infinitely beyond the infinite. Consequently, the East never had to develop a theory of "limbus puerorum," nor did it ever espouse the strange notion that an innocent child, i.e., an infant who committed no personal sins, seeing that it is impossible to commit personal sins before the age of reason, would be damned simply because he was not baptized.

Thus, the following three points summarize my position:

(1) An unbaptized baby that dies in infancy experiences the glory of the vision of God received through the Incarnation of the eternal Logos, but does not receive the glory given through Baptism, Chrismation, and the Eucharist, or through the practice of ascetic virtue.

(2) A baptized baby that dies before reaching the age of reason receives the glory given through the Incarnation, and the glory brought about by the sacraments of Baptism, Chrismation, and the Eucharist, but does not receive the glory given through ascetic practice.

And finally, (3) a man who is fully initiated into the Church through Baptism, Chrismation, and the Eucharist, and who goes on to live a life of virtue receives the glory of the Incarnation, the glory of the sacraments, and the glory achieved by cooperation with God’s energy through the practice of ascesis.

The Fate of Unbaptized Infants

by Steven Todd Kaster

Original Version:  19 May 2008 (from a thread at the Phatmass Phorum)

This brief essay was revised on:

21 April 2025.

Copyright © 2008-2025 Steven Todd Kaster