Let's Talk About Infant Baptism

[hyperdulia again]

let us reason, why would god welcome infants into the old covenant and not into the new?

[marielapin]

14 At length he appeared to the eleven as they were at table: and he upbraided them with their incredulity and hardness of heart, because they did not believe them who had seen him after he was risen again.

15 And he said to them: Go ye into the whole world and preach the gospel to every creature.

16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved: but he that believeth not shall he condemned.

Mark 16:16 - Jesus says to the crowd, "He who believes and is baptized will be saved." But in reference to the same people, Jesus immediately follows with "He who does not believe will be condemned." This demonstrates that one can be baptized and still not be a believer. This disproves the Protestant argument that one must be a believer to be baptized. There is nothing in the Bible about a "believer's baptism."

In this passage Christ speaks plainly and says that UNBELIEF is sufficient to incur damnation but that FAITH does NOT insure salvation unless it is accompanied by baptism. His command in John 3:5 includes all, "Unless a man be born again of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God."

If you believe the old covenant included infants, and if baptism replaces the old covenant, why would the new covenant exclude infants? Peter says the promise of the new covenant is for you and for your children.

[marielapin]

http://pweb.netcom.com/~matt1618/infant.html

[ironmonk]

hype,

yea I know infants were circumcised. that's why I followed it up with the baptism statement. God said he wanted infants to be circumcised, but believers to be baptized.

Circumcision was a must before Christ. Baptism is a must since Christ.

Baptism replaced circumcision. It's not a given that unbaptized Children make it to Heaven... we rely on the mercy of God, and we hope they do.

http://www.usccb.org/catechism/text/pt2sect2.htm#art1

The Baptism of infants

1250

Born with a fallen human nature and tainted by original sin, children also have need of the new birth in Baptism to be freed from the power of darkness and brought into the realm of the freedom of the children of God, to which all men are called.50 The sheer gratuitousness of the grace of salvation is particularly manifest in infant Baptism. The Church and the parents would deny a child the priceless grace of becoming a child of God were they not to confer Baptism shortly after birth.51

1251

Christian parents will recognize that this practice also accords with their role as nurturers of the life that God has entrusted to them.52

1252

The practice of infant Baptism is an immemorial tradition of the Church. There is explicit testimony to this practice from the second century on, and it is quite possible that, from the beginning of the apostolic preaching, when whole "households" received baptism, infants may also have been baptized.53

Faith and Baptism

1253

Baptism is the sacrament of faith.54 But faith needs the community of believers. It is only within the faith of the Church that each of the faithful can believe. The faith required for Baptism is not a perfect and mature faith, but a beginning that is called to develop. The catechumen or the godparent is asked: "What do you ask of God's Church?" The response is: "Faith!"

1254

For all the baptized, children or adults, faith must grow after Baptism. For this reason the Church celebrates each year at the Easter Vigil the renewal of baptismal promises. Preparation for Baptism leads only to the threshold of new life. Baptism is the source of that new life in Christ from which the entire Christian life springs forth.

1255

For the grace of Baptism to unfold, the parents' help is important. So too is the role of the godfather and godmother, who must be firm believers, able and ready to help the newly baptized—child or adult—on the road of Christian life.55 Their task is a truly ecclesial function (officium).56 The whole ecclesial community bears some responsibility for the development and safeguarding of the grace given at Baptism.

VI. The Necessity of Baptism

1257

The Lord himself affirms that Baptism is necessary for salvation.60 He also commands his disciples to proclaim the Gospel to all nations and to baptize them.61 Baptism is necessary for salvation for those to whom the Gospel has been proclaimed and who have had the possibility of asking for this sacrament.62 The Church does not know of any means other than Baptism that assures entry into eternal beatitude; this is why she takes care not to neglect the mission she has received from the Lord to see that all who can be baptized are "reborn of water and the Spirit." God has bound salvation to the sacrament of Baptism, but he himself is not bound by his sacraments.

1258

The Church has always held the firm conviction that those who suffer death for the sake of the faith without having received Baptism are baptized by their death for and with Christ. This Baptism of blood, like the desire for Baptism, brings about the fruits of Baptism without being a sacrament.

1259

For catechumens who die before their Baptism, their explicit desire to receive it, together with repentance for their sins, and charity, assures them the salvation that they were not able to receive through the sacrament.

1260

"Since Christ died for all, and since all men are in fact called to one and the same destiny, which is divine, we must hold that the Holy Spirit offers to all the possibility of being made partakers, in a way known to God, of the Paschal mystery."63 Every man who is ignorant of the Gospel of Christ and of his Church, but seeks the truth and does the will of God in accordance with his understanding of it, can be saved. It may be supposed that such persons would have desired Baptism explicitly if they had known its necessity.

1261

As regards children who have died without Baptism, the Church can only entrust them to the mercy of God, as she does in her funeral rites for them. Indeed, the great mercy of God who desires that all men should be saved, and Jesus' tenderness toward children which caused him to say: "Let the children come to me, do not hinder them,"64 allow us to hope that there is a way of salvation for children who have died without Baptism. All the more urgent is the Church's call not to prevent little children coming to Christ through the gift of holy Baptism.

What the First Christians had to say about it:

Irenaeus

"He [Jesus] came to save all through himself; all, I say, who through him are reborn in God: infants, and children, and youths, and old men. Therefore he passed through every age, becoming an infant for infants, sanctifying infants; a child for children, sanctifying those who are of that age . . . [so that] he might be the perfect teacher in all things, perfect not only in respect to the setting forth of truth, perfect also in respect to relative age" (Against Heresies 2:22:4 [A.D. 189]).

"‘And [Naaman] dipped himself . . . seven times in the Jordan’ [2 Kgs. 5:14]. It was not for nothing that Naaman of old, when suffering from leprosy, was purified upon his being baptized, but [this served] as an indication to us. For as we are lepers in sin, we are made clean, by means of the sacred water and the invocation of the Lord, from our old transgressions, being spiritually regenerated as newborn babes, even as the Lord has declared: ‘Except a man be born again through water and the Spirit, he shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven’ [John 3:5]" (Fragment 34 [A.D. 190]).

Hippolytus

"Baptize first the children, and if they can speak for themselves let them do so. Otherwise, let their parents or other relatives speak for them" (The Apostolic Tradition 21:16 [A.D. 215]).

Origen

"Every soul that is born into flesh is soiled by the filth of wickedness and sin. . . . In the Church, baptism is given for the remission of sins, and, according to the usage of the Church, baptism is given even to infants. If there were nothing in infants which required the remission of sins and nothing in them pertinent to forgiveness, the grace of baptism would seem superfluous" (Homilies on Leviticus 8:3 [A.D. 248]).

"The Church received from the apostles the tradition of giving baptism even to infants. The apostles, to whom were committed the secrets of the divine sacraments, knew there are in everyone innate strains of [original] sin, which must be washed away through water and the Spirit" (Commentaries on Romans 5:9 [A.D. 248]).

Cyprian of Carthage

"As to what pertains to the case of infants: You [Fidus] said that they ought not to be baptized within the second or third day after their birth, that the old law of circumcision must be taken into consideration, and that you did not think that one should be baptized and sanctified within the eighth day after his birth. In our council it seemed to us far otherwise. No one agreed to the course which you thought should be taken. Rather, we all judge that the mercy and grace of God ought to be denied to no man born" (Letters 64:2 [A.D. 253]).

"If, in the case of the worst sinners and those who formerly sinned much against God, when afterwards they believe, the remission of their sins is granted and no one is held back from baptism and grace, how much more, then, should an infant not be held back, who, having but recently been born, has done no sin, except that, born of the flesh according to Adam, he has contracted the contagion of that old death from his first being born. For this very reason does he [an infant] approach more easily to receive the remission of sins: because the sins forgiven him are not his own but those of another" (ibid., 64:5).

Gregory of Nazianz

"Do you have an infant child? Allow sin no opportunity; rather, let the infant be sanctified from childhood. From his most tender age let him be consecrated by the Spirit. Do you fear the seal [of baptism] because of the weakness of nature? Oh, what a pusillanimous mother and of how little faith!" (Oration on Holy Baptism 40:7 [A.D. 388]).

"‘Well enough,’ some will say, ‘for those who ask for baptism, but what do you have to say about those who are still children, and aware neither of loss nor of grace? Shall we baptize them too?’ Certainly [i respond], if there is any pressing danger. Better that they be sanctified unaware, than that they depart unsealed and uninitiated" (ibid., 40:28).

John Chrysostom

"You see how many are the benefits of baptism, and some think its heavenly grace consists only in the remission of sins, but we have enumerated ten honors [it bestows]! For this reason we baptize even infants, though they are not defiled by [personal] sins, so that there may be given to them holiness, righteousness, adoption, inheritance, brotherhood with Christ, and that they may be his [Christ’s] members" (Baptismal Catecheses in Augustine, Against Julian 1:6:21 [A.D. 388]).

Augustine

"What the universal Church holds, not as instituted [invented] by councils but as something always held, is most correctly believed to have been handed down by apostolic authority. Since others respond for children, so that the celebration of the sacrament may be complete for them, it is certainly availing to them for their consecration, because they themselves are not able to respond" (On Baptism, Against the Donatists 4:24:31 [A.D. 400]).

"The custom of Mother Church in baptizing infants is certainly not to be scorned, nor is it to be regarded in any way as superfluous, nor is it to be believed that its tradition is anything except apostolic" (The Literal Interpretation of Genesis 10:23:39 [A.D. 408]).

"Cyprian was not issuing a new decree but was keeping to the most solid belief of the Church in order to correct some who thought that infants ought not be baptized before the eighth day after their birth. . . . He agreed with certain of his fellow bishops that a child is able to be duly baptized as soon as he is born" (Letters 166:8:23 [A.D. 412]).

"By this grace baptized infants too are ingrafted into his [Christ’s] body, infants who certainly are not yet able to imitate anyone. Christ, in whom all are made alive . . . gives also the most hidden grace of his Spirit to believers, grace which he secretly infuses even into infants. . . . It is an excellent thing that the Punic [North African] Christians call baptism salvation and the sacrament of Christ’s Body nothing else than life. Whence does this derive, except from an ancient and, as I suppose, apostolic tradition, by which the churches of Christ hold inherently that without baptism and participation at the table of the Lord it is impossible for any man to attain either to the kingdom of God or to salvation and life eternal? This is the witness of Scripture, too. . . . If anyone wonders why children born of the baptized should themselves be baptized, let him attend briefly to this. . . . The sacrament of baptism is most assuredly the sacrament of regeneration" (Forgiveness and the Just Deserts of Sin, and the Baptism of Infants 1:9:10; 1:24:34; 2:27:43 [A.D. 412]).

Council of Carthage V

"Item: It seemed good that whenever there were not found reliable witnesses who could testify that without any doubt they [abandoned children] were baptized and when the children themselves were not, on account of their tender age, able to answer concerning the giving of the sacraments to them, all such children should be baptized without scruple, lest a hesitation should deprive them of the cleansing of the sacraments. This was urged by the [North African] legates, our brethren, since they redeem many such [abandoned children] from the barbarians" (Canon 7 [A.D. 401]).

Council of Mileum II

"[W]hoever says that infants fresh from their mothers’ wombs ought not to be baptized, or say that they are indeed baptized unto the remission of sins, but that they draw nothing of the original sin of Adam, which is expiated in the bath of regeneration . . . let him be anathema [excommunicated]. Since what the apostle [Paul] says, ‘Through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so passed to all men, in whom all have sinned’ [Rom. 5:12], must not be understood otherwise than the Catholic Church spread everywhere has always understood it. For on account of this rule of faith even infants, who in themselves thus far have not been able to commit any sin, are therefore truly baptized unto the remission of sins, so that that which they have contracted from generation may be cleansed in them by regeneration" (Canon 3 [A.D. 416]).

People who do not baptize infants are keeping the infants from Christ, and have shallow knowledge of what Christianity is about.

There are facts to Christianity that are still facts if people don't agree or not. Denying the children to become children of God through baptism is another new doctrine of man that is only a few hundred years old.

God Bless, Love in Christ & Mary

ironmonk

[Jake Huether]

Jake,

circumcision signified God's relationship with the Jews, and was mandated by God. Of course it wasn't meaningless.

If God wanted every baby born into a Christian home to be baptized, I think he would have said so.

Ummm... He did say so. I think the text was pointed out to you befor. "Go unto all nations..." Also, the fact that the Apostles baptized several HOUSEHOLDS.

Colossians 2:11-12

"In him (Christ) you were also circumcised, in the putting off of the sinful nature, not with a circumcision done by the hands of men but with the circumcision done by Christ, have been buried with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead."

This seems that a person's professed faith in Christ is required, not the faith of someone else on one's behalf.

How can you distiguish between "faith" refering to one's own faith, or "faith" of those who would stand in for an infant. St. Paul is talking to a Church, and entire group of people. So he could have meant, "...have been buried with him in baptism and raise with him through your (plural - refering to say godparents) faith."

As in, Luke 7:9 "When Jesus heard this, he was amazed at him, and turning to the crowd following him, he said, I tell you, I have not found such great faith even in Israel.

10 Then the men who had been sent returned to the house and found the servant well."

Christ in essence said, (paraphrased), "because of *your* faith, your servant will be healed.

That term "your" is playing a trick on you.

St. Paul isn't saying because of your (speaking indivicually to each person) faith, he's saying your (speaking collectively - as to a family).

God said he wanted infants to be circumcised, but believers to be baptized. 

Not so: God said he wanted infants to be circumcised, but he also wanted ADULTS to be circumcised also (of course after they professed their faith).

But God want's believers (and believers families - including infants) to be baptized!

[hyperdulia again]

bump

[Brother Adam]

"People who do not baptize infants are keeping the infants from Christ, and have shallow knowledge of what Christianity is about."

Jesus Blessed the Little Children. He didn't baptize them and never commanded that they be baptized. Baptists bring their children before the church to be dedicated before the Lord.

[Jake Huether]

He didn't baptize them and never commanded that they be baptized

He never commanded us NOT to baptize them...

[Jake Huether]

Bro.

I don't want you to take this the wrong way, but you have to admit, there is no evidence of Christ even hinting that we should NOT baptize infants. Sure there are pieces of Scriptrue that clipped and collected might lead someone to believe it wasn't true. But on the other hand, as you can see from this thread, there are pieces of Scripture that when clipped and collected serve to support the opposite.

Yet the fact remains, if you look at the early Church history infants were baptized from the very begining!

I just need to know ( you've got my curiosity peaked), why is it so hard for Baptists (protestants in general) to accept infant Baptism.

I would pose to you the idea (just my opinion - from what I've observed) that protestants in general don't dig infant Baptism (in fact they don't dig a lot of Catholic doctrine) simply because it is *Catholic*.

I would suggest that much of Protestant theology is based on the unwriten doctrin of "it's Catholic so it must be wrong". AKA the "cooties" doctrine.

And thus they build up a list of Scripture quotes and passages that *could* be taken the wrong way, and they build off them to force them to look the opposite of what Catholics *teach*, if in fact they really teach what Protestants claim they teach to begin with.

[marielapin]

Did Jesus ever personally baptize anybody specifically in the Bible? Did it ever say he turned children away? Did it ever say the apostles turned them away?

[Brother Adam]

He never commanded us NOT to baptize them...

He didn't command me not to wear a cape and jump of my garage roof (shudders at old memories) either, but I don't think he wants me to.

[hyperdulia again]

why would God exclude infants from the new covenant?

if baptism meant what protestants think it does, then there is no reason to baptise infants, but baptism isn't symbolic. it isnn't confirmation of one's faith. it is the start of the christian life, it is snatching a person from the jaws of hell.

Edited July 23, 2003 by hyperdulia again

[Chrysologus]

Jesus didn't baptize anybody that we know of.

The fact is that the Bible doesn't say explicitely either way, so if you're a non-Catholic who believes in sola scriptura, then I don't see how you can justify attacking infant baptism, even if your own community doesn't practice it. On the other hand, sacred tradition is much more explicit about infant baptism: it is universally accepted by the church fathers. Consequently Catholics, and most Protestants, baptize babies. Could it really be that 90% of Christendom has it so wrong for so long?

[Jake Huether]

He never told me that green peas were good for me either. But they are.

So, what's your point?

My point is just that: there's a lot that Christ "didn't" tell us in the Bible. In fact, St. John goes on to tell us at the end of his Gospel that if everything Jesus did was recorded in a book, there wouldn't be room on the entire earth to house them!

So, since Jesus didn't tell us specifically to do it or not, why do you choose to NOT do so? What was the compelling evidence that spoke to you and told you that baptism of infants can be compared to jumping off a roof, instead of eating green peas?

My evidence is the Church. We know that Christ explained it to the Apostles, whether it was written or not, because the Apostles did it! And the successors of the Apostles did it too! The early Church did it for several centuries uninterupted (oh, I'm sure there were scuffles - I'm talking major dissagreements).

[mustbenothing]

Though a Reformed Christian, I also affirm the doctrine of infant baptism.

(mulls) This seems that a person's professed faith in Christ is required, not the faith of someone else on one's behalf.

(Me) Colossians 2:11-12

11 In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the circumcision of Christ,

12 having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God, who raised him from the dead.

"You were circumcised... having been buried with him in baptism." In other words, they were circumcised by being baptized. This proves that, in Paul's thought, the covenantal significance of circumcision is completely replaced by baptism.

By the parallel just explained, the argument you make here against infant baptism would also work against infant circumcision. However, we all know that children were circumcised on account of their parent's faith. Therefore, this must be a bad argument.

(marielapin) In this passage Christ speaks plainly and says that UNBELIEF is sufficient to incur damnation but that FAITH does NOT insure salvation unless it is accompanied by baptism.

(Me) I would say that we should be careful to distinguish between "cannots" and the ordinary course of salvation. The thief on the cross was not baptized, but was in paradise with Christ. Therefore, on account of a number of Biblical passages, we can say that baptism is an essential part of the ordinary conversion/salvation process. However, exceptions are possible.

(Jake Huether) mmm... He did say so. I think the text was pointed out to you befor. "Go unto all nations..." Also, the fact that the Apostles baptized several HOUSEHOLDS.

(Me) The Acts 16 case of Lydia is a perfect illustration, because she was the only member of her household who had faith, and yet the entire household was baptized. This clearly shows that entire households enter the New Covenant, just as in the Old Covenant. The same is true of the jailer, whose story is also found in Acts 16.

Acts 16:14-15

14 One who heard us was a woman named Lydia, from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple goods, who was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul.

15 And after she was baptized, and her household as well, she urged us, saying, "If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay." And she prevailed upon us.

Acts 16:30-34

30 Then he brought them out and said, "Sirs, what must I do to be saved?"

31 And they said, "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household."

32 And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house.

33 And he took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds; and he was baptized at once, he and all his family.

34 Then he brought them up into his house and set food before them. And he rejoiced along with his entire household that he had believed in God.

Another key text that I don't think has been raised is 1 Corinthians 7:14, which explicitly states that the entire household enters the covenant by the faith of one.

1 Corinthians 7:14

For the unbelieving husband is made holy because of his wife, and the unbelieving wife is made holy because of her husband. Otherwise your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy.

[ReformationNow]

Mark 16:16 - Jesus says to the crowd, "He who believes and is baptized will be saved." But in reference to the same people, Jesus immediately follows with "He who does not believe will be condemned." This demonstrates that one can be baptized and still not be a believer. This disproves the Protestant argument that one must be a believer to be baptized. There is nothing in the Bible about a "believer's baptism."

Actually, it doesn't. Protestants believe that only those who PROFESS belief are to be baptized. Can a person make a false profession? Sure. Does this in any way prove 'believer's baptism invalid'? No. It decidedly does not. This is merely faulty logic on display.

[ReformationNow]

"People who do not baptize infants are keeping the infants from Christ, and have shallow knowledge of what Christianity is about."

Jesus Blessed the Little Children. He didn't baptize them and never commanded that they be baptized. Baptists bring their children before the church to be dedicated before the Lord.

Jesus never baptized anyone.

[Katholikos]

circumcision signified God's relationship with the Jews, and was mandated by God. Of course it wasn't meaningless.

Baptism replaced circumcision as a rite of initiation. Circumcision signifies entrance into the People of God, called Israel, under the Old Covenent. It makes a male child (or adult) a Jew. Baptism (among other things) signifies entrance into the People of God, called the New Israel or the Catholic Church, under the New Covenant. It makes a child (or adult) a Catholic Christian, a member of God's family. Sixteen centuries later, the first Protestant appeared. Those Protestants who baptize their children (and that is the majority) make them Christian.

If God wanted every baby born into a Christian home to be baptized, I think he would have said so.

Three points:

(1) There is absolutely no evidence that the Bible is the inspired Word of God other than the declaration of the Catholic Church, which you reject. The most you can say is, "I believe it because I believe it." I accept the word of the Church founded by Christ and believe the Bible because the Church , which speaks for God, declares that these 73 writings -- and no others -- are the inspired Word of God. Like St. Augustine (354-430 A.D.), "For my part, I should not believe the gospel except as moved by the authority of the Catholic Church," (Letter to Mani).

There is no "inspired" table of contents. You accept the table of contents of the NT decreed by the Catholic Church and the table of contents of the OT decreed by Martin Luther. I accept the Church's decree for both the OT and NT and reject Luther's. Martin Luther did not speak for God -- the Church founded by Christ speaks for Him. Christ and His Church are one and the same (see, for example, Acts 9:1-5). When you persecute the Church, you are persecuting Christ Himself. When you reject the Church, you are rejecting Christ Himself (Lk 10:16).

(2) The NT is not an instruction book for Christianity. That's apparent to anyone who reads it objectively.

(3) The Catholic Church received the Revelation of God through the Apostles. She speaks for God (who hears you hears me, Lk 10:16), and she says babies are to be baptized.

God did speak through His Church -- you just aren't listening.

Ave Cor Mariae

P.S. Don't you want the book "95 Reasons for Becoming or Remaining Catholic" written by the ex-Presbyterian pastor? I haven't received your address. You can order it from http://www.chnetwork.org, if you prefer.

[Katholikos]

Jesus Blessed the Little Children. He didn't baptize them and never commanded that they be baptized. Baptists bring their children before the church to be dedicated before the Lord.

Now there's a New Testament practice for you!

Please give us the NT citation where a Christian ever "brought his child(ren) before the church to have them dedicated before the Lord." By whom? The Protestant minister! There were no "ministers" --only priests -- until the 16th century. Yep, that's biblical all right. Baptists follow the Bible only, right?

The New Testament is not an instruction book for Christianity, as Protestants have tried to twist it.

The New Testament is a written record of the first 100 years or so of the spiritual life of the newborn Catholic Church, the New Israel.

The Catholic Church is nearly four centuries older than the NT or the Bible.

The Catholic Church is not based on the NT -- rather, the NT is based on the organic, living, teaching Catholic Church.

JMJ Jay

Ex-Southern Baptist, ex-agnostic, ex-atheist, ecstatic to be Catholic!

[cmotherofpirl]

Jesus never baptized anyone.

How do you know?