Limbus, Nimbus

My immediate reaction to the news that the Roman Catholic International Theological Commission had put down the concept of Limbo, saying it reflected an "unduly restrictive view of salvation" was to rejoice that this may be the loophole that gets me into the last big party in the sky.

After all, although I have been baptised at least four, possibly five times, most were against my will, and therefore couldn't have counted (surely consent matters) and the other time probably didn't "take" either, as the devil did not leave me screaming, and the wet spot didn't raise any welts.

So I've been thinking Limbo was my best hope. Maybe God would decide I was like the virtuous pagans who lived before Jesus and couldn't have heard of him. So at least I wouldn't fry.

Now though, the Commission was saying that God could extend his Grace more than had been dreamed of ever before, and whoa, maybe He might accept the heretofore Limbo-bound to Heaven.

Then Anitra "Freethinking Christian" Freeman pointed out the silly error of my reasoning, which only wishful thinking could have blinded me to, namely that I have heard of Jesus, and have had plenty of chances to install that program, and have repeatedly clicked the back button, so there is no question that I never was a candidate for Limbo at all, and frying has always been and always will be my only option.

I can only console myself with the fact that no one has promised pizza in Heaven anyway. So what good is it?

Which brings me to what I hate about the Commission's position. I LIKED that there was a Limbo, because it made the whole situation more interesting. Baroque good. Rococo better. The more stuff there is in your theology, the more stuff I get to play with. OK, I can't get to Heaven, but tell me there's pizza there, and some of it has pineapples and ham, which I wouldn't like, and some of it has anchovies, which I would. Someone might toss some cold leftovers down to Hell. I want to dream.

The Germans are surely behind this. With their revolt against Nouns triggered by the way their own written language rubs their faces in them all the time. So they keep trying to take all of our Nouns away from us and the Things and Places and People they attached to, to leave us with nothing but a world of be without any Thing or One to do the being, or any Place to do it.

Please Ratzinger, in your quest to escape the tyrannical Nouns of your literature, don't also take away the furniture and rooms of my English imagination!


[Baroque Good? Rococo Better?]