A. No Salvation Outside the Church
The infallible ex cathedra definition of Pope Eugene IV (Cantate Domino, 1441) makes the Church's unchanging teaching clear:
The Holy Roman Church firmly believes, professes and teaches that one of those who are not within the Catholic Church, not only Pagans, but Jews, heretics and schismatics, can ever be partakers of eternal life, but are to go into the eternal fire 'prepared for the devil and his angels" (Mat.25:41), unless before the close of there lives they shall have entered into that Church; also that the unity of the Ecclesiastical body is such that the Church's Sacraments avail only those abiding in that Church... moreover, that no one, no matter what alms he may have given, not even if he were to shed his blood for Christ's sake, can he be saved unless he abide in the bosom and unity of the Catholic Church.
Now the Church has decreed that her dogmas are to be believed by the very words she has used to declare them. As Venerable Pope Pius IX (1846-78) declared, a dogma must be understood:
by the very sense by which it is defined...[and]... must be held to be by itself a sufficient demonstration, very sure and adapted to all the faithful. (Inter Gravissimas, 1870)
So what the Church has declared in each dogma is sufficient in itself to teach what it is we are to believe. This necessarily means that that understanding which the Church has of her sacred dogmas, and by which we must believe them, is exactly what she has once declared. This is precisely what was infallibly defined at Vatican I (Dei Filius, ch.4):
Hence, also, that understanding of its sacred dogmas must be perpetually retained, which Holy Mother Church has once declared; and there must never be recession from that meaning under the specious name of a deeper understanding.
The Church at Vatican I has made it clear that what She means to teach and define is precisely what She "has once declared," and that this declared understanding can never change. There is no meaning to these or any dogmas beyond what the words themselves state and declare. In other words, there is no "meaning" distinct from the words of the formula, for this is the VERY POINT of a dogmatic definition -to make clear, to define what She does mean and believe. Thus, the Church at Vatican I has made clear that what She means to teach and how she understands it is exactly what she "has once declared."
If dogmas had meanings distinct from and beyond the actual words of the dogmatic formula, then why would the Church teach that it is forbidden to give dogmas a new and different meaning? How can we give a meaning a different meaning? This would be absurd. Canon 3, from chapter 4 of Dei Filius resolves this question, and it does so quite definitively:
If anyone shall have said that it is possible that to the dogmas declared by the Church a meaning must sometimes be attributed according to the progress of knowledge, different from what the Church has understood and understands: let him be anathema."
Since you cannot give a "meaning" a different meaning, but can only do so to actual words, it is clear that the meaning which the Church wishes to convey in her dogmatic statements is that which the very words themselves declare. This means that all true Catholics must hold and believe that:
"nothing else is to be believed other than the words; and I hold that this absolute and unchangeable truth, which was preached by the Apostles from the earliest times, is to be understood in no other way than by the words." (Oath Against Modernism; DNZ 2147, [DS.3549-50])
This is exactly what those who allow for exceptions to these dogmas on salvation fail to do.
The following lines from the infallible ex cathedra definition of Pope Eugene IV (Cantate Domino, 1441) are stated without exception and, according to Vatican I's definition on how dogmas are to be understood, this is how we MUST understand and believe them: AS THEY ARE DECLARED where there is NO meaning BEYOND the dogmatic formula (see Vatican I, Dei Filius, chap.4 and Canon 3 from same chapter: Dnz.1800, 1818). Pope Eugene IV infallibly defined that:
a) "none of those who are not within the Catholic Church... can ever
be partakers of eternal life..."
b) "no one, not even if he were to shed his blood for Christ's sake,
can he be saved unless he abide in the bosom and unity of the Catholic
Church."
The shedding of blood for Christ's sake is not salvific for "those who are not within the Catholic Church." And if one is not baptized, he is not within the Church.
In light of what was defined at Vatican I (Dei Filius, chap.4): that we are bound to understand and believe dogmas strictly by what the Church "HAS ONCE DECLARED," and also in light of the condemnations of the Modernist hermeneutic by Pope St. Pius X, where those who held that there was a meaning to dogmas beyond the dogmatic formula used by the Church where condemned, we must hold and believe this dogma (as all dogmas) precisely as it is defined. There is no meaning nor interpretation beyond what the words themselves declare and allow. Therefore, for example, "no one" means NO ONE. Period!
If one is "not within the Catholic Church," they cannot be saved. Period!
B. Necessity of water Baptism What makes one a member of the Church in the first place? Well, along with holding the Catholic Faith in its entirety "to the last word"-Without believing the Catholic Faith no one can be saved (see Lateran Council, Canon 17: Denz. 270; Vatican I, Dei Filius, ch.3: Dnz 1791, 1793), one canNOT be within the Church without the reception of the Sacrament of Baptism. This is a solemnly defined dogma of Faith.
In fact, Pope Eugene IV infallibly defined this himself at the Council of Florence in the Decree "Exultate Deo:"
"It is through Holy Baptism we are made members of Christ and of His body, the Church....`unless we are born of water and the Spirit, we cannot,' as Truth says, `enter the kingdom of heaven." (Denz.696)
It was defined at Trent (Session 14, ch.2) that the:
"Church exercises judgment on no one who has not first entered it through the gateway of baptism..." [and that] "by the laver of baptism where we are made members of Christ's own body." (Denz.895)
Now, in Canons 2 and 5 "On Baptism" (Denz. 858, 861) from the Council of Trent, the Church infallibly pronounced the necessity of Baptism for salvation and solemnly condemns those who allow any options to this necessity and/or who deny the necessity of water for baptism. Our Lords own words recorded in the Gospel of St John 3:5:
"NO ONE can enter the kingdom of God UNLESS he is born again of WATER and the Holy Spirit."
The Church at Trent infallibly pronounced that Our Lord meant "water" literally and that He was refering to the Sacrament of Baptism (Canons 2 & 5, "On Baptism": Dnz. 858, 861)
If anyone says that true and natural water is not necessary for baptism and thus twists into some metaphor the words of our Lord Jesus Christ: "Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit" (Jn.3:5): let him be anathema. (Canon 2)
If anyone says that baptism is optional, that is, not necessary for salvation, let him be anathema. (Canon 5)
Our Lord's words in John 3:5 are universal and stated without qualification. Thus, there can be no exceptions. Pope Leo XIII pointed this out in "Satis Cognitum" (1896):
"You ask how I prove this? From the very words of the Lord! We can make no exceptions where no distinction is made."
In his Apostolic Exhortation on the Fifth Anniversary of the Closing of Vatican II (1970), Pope Paul VI stated the ABSOLUTE necessity of (water) Baptism for salvation AND our necessity for believing this dogma:
"If we, for whatever reason, deny the absoluteness of God's Law concerning the necessity of water Baptism for salvation, or any other defined dogma, then we too excommunicate ourselves by our heresy from Paradise, the Church."
That which is absolute, by definition, means there can be NO exceptions. You are excomunicated from Paradice, the Church if you hold otherwise. So, the dogmas of no salvation outside the Church and the necessity of (water) Baptism for salvation, as infallibly defined by Councils and Popes, can be put into a simple and irrefutable formula:
No Baptism in water = no Church membership
No Church membership = no salvation
Therefore, No Baptism in water = no salvation.
Anything to the contrary to this would be what Vatican I condemned
as a “recession from that meaning which the Church HAS ONCE DECLARED.”
Your two catechumens, even though (by all appearances) they shed their blood for Christ, were not within the Church, because they were not Baptized. Therefore, they could not be saved if they were to immediately after death go to their particular judgments.
Remember what was pointed out in my last post. If a man is already a member of the Catholic Church (at least in some way) by means of his desire to receive Baptism, then the reception of the Sacrament of Baptism becomes utterly optional for membership, and thus for salvation. But Trent infallibly defined that “whoever says the Sacrament of Baptism is optional, let him be anathema.” Thus, those who propose that the desire for Baptism suffices have brought down a canonical curse upon their heads for his atrocious speculation. We cannot come up with ANY scenario, no matter how strict the circumstances, which brings in an exception to the above defined dogmas from Florence (Eugene IV) and Trent (Canons 2 & 5 On Baptism). Whoever does so would be, by definition, putting forth a meaning which goes beyond what the words of the dogmatic formula declare. This approach to dogmas, as pointed out before, was solemnly condemned at Vatican I and by Pope St. Pius X.
Therefore we are bound in conscience, bound by right reason, and bound by the Church herself, and thus God to conclude the following:
Since without the Sacrament of Baptism, "celebrated in water only" (as infallibly defined at the Council of Vienne in 1312: Denz 482), no one is within the Church, and that outside the Catholic Church there is no salvation, then without receiving Baptism in water, no one without exception can be saved.
This could also be demonstrated with a syllogism:
Infallible major premise (Popes Innocent III, Boniface VIII, Eugene IV, Pius IX):
outside the Catholic Church there is no salvation
Infallible minor premise (Councils of Valence III, Vienne, Florence, Trent):
without Baptism, "celebrated only in water" no one is within the Church
Infallible conclusion (Council of Trent):
without receiving Baptism in water, no one can be saved.