Those of you who have been following this blog know that over the summer I was put in touch with a group of people dedicated to telling the story of baby Brian Gallagher, an infant who died shortly after his birth but whose body was discovered to be apparently incorrupt 37 years after his burial. Because Brian was not baptized before he died, the story raised the question of the eternal destiny of babies who die before baptism and my work on baptism of desire.
That story has started to get attention in several Catholic media outlets, and last week I had the chance to talk about baptism of desire on Real Presence Radio; you can listen to the interview here .
Hats off also to Dr. Kody Cooper for his opinion piece about baptism of desire and infants on the Word on Fire site. The author comes to similar conclusions to my own, arguing that baptism of desire is the best theological doctrine with which to consider this tough case, even citing Cardinal Cajetan who I discuss in my book . Baptism of desire seems to me a superior approach to what the author calls the “post-conciliar view,” which means hoping that the babies will be saved while remaining agnostic about the means. This approach, it seems to me, has two serious flaws. It seems to invite hope in a kind of divine Plan B which turns out to be more effective than those means revealed to us by Jesus. Revelation, then, seems not so revealing. At the same time, precisely because whatever those means happen to be can’t be found in revelation, such hope remains necessarily vague and not particularly well-grounded.
Baptism of desire, on the other hand, identifies our grounds for hope in the Church’s sacramental practice — the practice of a sacrament instituted by Jesus Christ and declared by him to be necessary for salvation (John 3:5). I posted a brief description of my position on the question here a few weeks ago.
That said, it still seems to me that we should pray for those infants who die without baptism. In our oldest source for the theology of baptism of desire–St. Ambrose of Milan’s funeral homily for the deceased catechumen Valentinian–Ambrose makes a big deal out of the importance of the Church’s prayers for Valentinian. Those prayers, Ambrose argues, are an expression of our desire for Valentinian to share in the grace of baptism. Ambrose’s rather beautiful vision seems to imagine Valentinian’s desire, the Church’s desire, and God’s desire becoming one.
Praying for deceased infants is our way to give form and expression to our desire for their salvation, and I don’t see it undercutting what I’m arguing about baptism of desire. My argument means that we can pray with firm, well-grounded confidence. In the end, perhaps, prayers such as those Ambrose offered for Valentinian are as good for us as they are for those who have passed away. Perhaps also, in some cases, praying to and for are not mutually exclusive: because sometimes prayer isn’t a matter of cause-and-effect, but of participating in a communion of desire.
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Tony Lusvardi, S.J. 
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