The Letter of the Holy Office 1949 was issued to the Archbishop of Boston during the pontificate of Pope Pius XII. It did not make a mistake when it said that every one needs to be incorporated into the church as a member does not exclude those who can be saved with implicit desire.
It means in principle, only as a concept, as a belief there can be non Catholics saved with implicit desire. The Letter if it is saying only in principle ‘it is not always required that he be incorporated into the Church actually as a member’, it has not made a mistake.However if someone misreads the Letter and assumes those saved with an implicit desire are known to us on earth; they are explicitly known, and so are exceptions, so every one does not need to be incorporated as a member into the Church - this is a mistake.We do not know anyone on earth saved with an implicit desire. Neither do we know anyone in Heaven saved with an implicit desire.
The Letter of the Holy Office supports Fr.Leonard Feeney since implicit desire can only be accepted as a possibility and is irrelevant to the literal interpretation of the dogma, as interpreted by Fr.Leonard Feeney and St.Benedict Center.
When the Letter criticizes Fr.Leonard Feeney and the St.Benedict Center it is because they were disobedient to ‘ecclesiastical authority’.So if someone says that the Letter was critical of Fr.Leonard Feeney for denying the baptism of desire, since the baptism of desire is an exception to the literal interpretation of the dogma, then this would be saying that the Magisterium made a mistake. This is not true.
If Fr.Leonard Feeney said there is no baptism of desire, in principle or fact, it is irrelevant to his literal interpretation of the dogma extra ecclesiam nulla salus.
If the media says Fr.Leonard Feeney was excommunicated for denying the baptism of desire, then it would mean the Letter made a mistake, since the baptism of desire cannot be an exception to the dogma.
The Letter instead refers to 'the dogma', the 'infallible statement'. The text of the thrice defined dogma indicates everyone is required to 'be incorporated into the Church actually as a member'.The dogma does not mention any known exceptions of the baptism of desire etc.This was the Richard Cushing Error. It was the Archbishop of Boston Cardinal Cushing and the Jesuits of Boston who assumed that invincible ignorance and the baptism of desire were exceptions to the literal interpretation of the dogma extra ecclesiam nulla salus, and of course, to Fr.Leonard Feeney.
Cardinal Cushing and the Jesuits are believed to have tried to include this error in Vatican Council II but were blocked.Invincible ignorance etc in itself is no problem when it is mentioned in the text as long as one does not assume that it is an exception to the dogma.No text in Vatican Council II claims that it is an exception or that we known these cases personally.
However they did manage to create confusion. It seems, to priests today, that Ad Gentes 7 contradicts itself (if one assumes we know cases in Heaven) and Lumen Gentium 16 contradicts Ad Gentes 7 and the centuries old interpretation of the dogma.
Fr.Hans Kung repeated the Cushing Error after Vatican Council II.It seems as if Fr.Hans Kung had built his entire theological edifice on the Richard Cushing Error.
He began writing a series of books on how there is salvation in general for Buddhists, Protestants...and that the infallibilioty of the pope ex cathedra was contradicted with invincible ignorance etc being 'explicit' exceptions to extra ecclesiam nulla salus.So he rejected the dogmas on infallibility and salvation.
Over time Pontifical Universities, cardinals and bishops, even the SSPX seminaries, would be infected with this error which emerged in the 1940's, years before Vatican Council II, in the Heresy Case not of Fr.Leonard Feeney but the Archbishop and Jesuits in the Archdiocese of Boston.They assumed that there were explicit exceptions to a de fide teaching.They also seemed to misinterpret the Letter as did the secular media in Boston and then the rest of the world.
-Lionel Andrades
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Therefore, all must be converted to Him, made known by the Church's preaching, and all must be incorporated into Him by baptism and into the Church which is His body. For Christ Himself "by stressing in express language the necessity of faith and baptism (cf. Mark 16:16; John 3:5), at the same time confirmed the necessity of the Church, into which men enter by baptism, as by a door.-Ad Gentes 7,Vatican Council II.
Nostra Aetate does not contradict Ad Gentes 7
http://eucharistandmission.blogspot.it/2012/05/nostra-aetate-does-not-contradict-ad.html#links
Therefore, all must be converted to Him, made known by the Church's preaching, and all must be incorporated into Him by baptism and into the Church which is His body. For Christ Himself "by stressing in express language the necessity of faith and baptism (cf. Mark 16:16; John 3:5), at the same time confirmed the necessity of the Church, into which men enter by baptism, as by a door.-Ad Gentes 7,Vatican Council II.
Nostra Aetate does not contradict Ad Gentes 7
http://eucharistandmission.blogspot.it/2012/05/nostra-aetate-does-not-contradict-ad.html#links
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Father Faber on the Salvation of Non-Catholics:
"If the Precious Blood had been shed, and yet we had no priesthood, no Sacraments, no jurisdiction, no sacramentals, no mystical life of the visible unity of the Church– life, so it seems, would be almost intolerable. This is the condition of those outside the Church; and certainly as we grow older, as our experience widens, as our knowledge of ourselves deepens, as our acquaintance with mankind increases, the less hopeful do our ideas become regarding the salvation of those outside the Roman Church. We make the most we can of the uncovenanted mercies of God, of the invisible soul of the Church, of the doctrine of invincible ignorance, of the easiness of making acts of contrition, and of the visible moral goodness among men; and yet what are these but straws in our own estimation, if our own chances of salvation had to lean their weight upon them? They wear out, or they break down. They are fearfully counterweighted by other considerations. We have to draw on our imaginations in order to fill up the picture. They are but theories at best, theories unhelpful except to console those who are forward to be deceived for the sake of those they love–theories often very fatal by keeping our charity in check and interfering with that restlessness of converting love in season and out of season, and that impetuous agony of prayer, upon which God may have made the salvation of our friends depend. (The Precious Blood, page 77)"
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