Posted on 10/01/2009 6:29:50 AM PDT by NYer
Q: Our new next-door neighbors have a 14-month-old daughter. They’re Catholics, but I just found out that they still haven’t had their daughter baptized yet! When our own children were born over 30 years ago, we had them baptized when they were just a couple of weeks old. Aren’t you required to have your children baptized quickly like that any more? –Frances
A: The Church’s teaching on the necessity of baptism for salvation has not changed. Christ Himself, after His Resurrection, couldn’t have spoken more clearly about the need for baptism, when He commanded the Apostles to go forth and baptize all nations (Matt. 28: 19-20). As the Catechism teaches, “through baptism we are freed from sin and reborn as sons of God” (CCC 1213 ). It is only logical that Catholic parents should want to have their newborn children baptized as soon as possible, to free them from original sin and make them members of the Church.
As we have seen in this space so many times before, canon law follows theology. So it isn’t at all surprising to find that canon 867.1 states that parents are obliged to see that their infants are baptized within the first few weeks after birth. And the very next paragraph, canon 867.2 , adds that if the child is in danger of death, he is to be baptized immediately.
Thus it should be clear that waiting for months, or even years, to have one’s child baptized is not only not in keeping with the Church’s theological teaching, it is also contrary to canon law. It is difficult to imagine a legitimate reason why Catholic parents, who truly believe in basic tenets of our faith like original sin and God’s grace, would fail to arrange for their children to be baptized as soon as possible.
Ironically, it may be that the wonderful medical advances of the last several decades have inadvertently led many Catholic parents to lose the traditional sense of urgency about having their newborn children baptized. For centuries, the Church’s teaching about the importance of baptism for salvation dovetailed neatly with the fear of many parents that their newborn might not live very long, and so both supernatural and natural reasons tended to push parents to have their children baptized as quickly as they could. If you have ever read the biography of a medieval saint, or if done genealogical research on your own family members in centuries past, you might very well have come across an instance where someone was baptized the day after his birth, or even sooner. In fact, it isn’t necessary to dig so far back in the historical past to find examples of this: in 1927, Pope Benedict XVI himself was baptized the same day that he was born.
This practice was, of course, logically consistent with Catholic doctrine. Given the extraordinarily high rates of infant mortality in generations past, and the fear that an infant might die before original sin had been wiped from his soul, what Catholic parent wouldn’t rush a newborn child to the parish church for baptism as soon as possible?
While there still is always some risk that a child may not survive, nowadays the fear that a newborn infant might not make it is hardly so great as before, especially here in the US. At the same time, baptisms have become big family/social events, when relatives fly into town and there is often a big family get-together after the ceremony. Of course there is nothing intrinsically wrong with this; in fact, we do well to maintain our awareness of the importance of such an event by celebrating the occasion. But unfortunately, the desire to have all the family present at a child’s baptism can naturally lead to postponing the sacrament until everyone is able to make it. While parents are waiting for this or that relative to have a free weekend to travel, their new baby remains in original sin.
There are other factors which now sometimes lead parents to put off having their new child baptized. As we saw back in the June 21, 2007 column , it is standard practice these days in the US for parishes to require parents to attend an evening class (or series of classes) before their child is baptized. This is designed to ensure that the parents truly intend to raise their child in the Catholic faith—an intention that must be present if the priest is to agree to perform the baptism (c. 868.1 n. 2 ). Occasionally I have heard parents complain that they can’t have their new baby baptized until they attend this class, and that in their parish, the class is held only once a month. But in every single case, I have found that these complaining parents had made no effort whatsoever to inquire about the requirements for their infant’s baptism ahead of time. Since parents obviously are aware for months in advance that they will be having a baby, it is difficult to understand their failure to do this. Why not arrange to attend the class a month or two before the child’s expected birth-date, so that it will be possible to have the baptism soon afterwards?
Many parishes do an excellent job of publicizing the need for all parents to attend the baptism class, and class dates are announced well in advance. Others could probably do a better job of instructing their parishioners about the obligation of all parents to have their children baptized soon after birth. I have personally seen a disturbing pattern in many Catholic Hispanic communities, where children are routinely baptized when they are apparently two or three years old, if not older! If their parents had fallen away from the faith, and just recently returned to the Church, this of course would be an entirely understandable explanation for the delay. But if these families are regularly practicing Catholics, it appears that the pastor and parish catechists would do well to remind parents more forcefully and more often that by delaying their child’s baptism, they are leaving that child in original sin. If, God forbid, tragedy strikes and such a child suddenly dies, he leaves this world without the sacramental graces gained from baptism—and by his parents’ choice.
Another, more abstract factor that may cause some new parents to wrongly conclude that there is no need to rush to baptize their child, is the fallout from the fairly recent theological statement from the Vatican concerning Limbo . In 2007, many media outlets wrongly declared that Pope Benedict XVI had “done away with Limbo.” Even the most sincere journalist could perhaps be forgiven for being confused about what the statement actually meant! In its 2000-year existence, the Catholic Church has never made a definitive, authoritative statement explaining exactly what happens to infants who died before being baptized. Since they themselves are completely innocent, it seems absurd to conclude that God damns them to hell; although no less a theologian than St. Augustine really did reach this conclusion 1600 years ago, it was, understandably, not a position subsequently embraced officially by the entire Church. At the same time, the Church teaches that baptism is necessary to enter Heaven, since we must first be wiped clean of original sin and made children of God before we can be with Him there. It is thus a quandary with which theologians long have had to grapple, and the conclusion that there must be some third place (dubbed “Limbo”) was reached as a result. In Limbo, they said, the souls of unbaptized children enjoy some degree of happiness, but they are deprived of the Beatific Vision of God because they are still in original sin. This is not a teaching that can be found anywhere in revelation; rather, it is a logical conclusion of the Church’s teaching on baptism.
In the mid-2000’s, the International Theological Commission (ITC)—a team of theologians chosen from all over the world by the Pope to serve together as a joint committee of experts—was tasked with studying the issue of what happens to infants who die without the grace of baptism. The issue was not merely a theoretical, academic one: questions have been raised repeatedly about the fate of those millions upon millions of children who are killed by abortion. And what about those embryos which are created through in-vitro fertilization, and later discarded in the lab as superfluous? The Church needed to examine the issue more closely.
In their report—which was approved by the Pope—the ITC provided no magic answer to this difficult theological question. It reiterated traditional Catholic teaching when it asserted that “the necessity of the sacrament of Baptism is proclaimed and professed as integral to the Christian faith understanding” (66 ), and it did a beautiful job of tracing the historical development of the belief in Limbo, the existence of which “is not a dogmatic definition” (38 ). The ITC emphasized that there is no need for such a place necessarily to exist at all, since “God can therefore give the grace of Baptism without the sacrament being conferred” (82 ) if He so wishes. In other words, God is not bound by the sacraments; He can, if He so wishes, freely allow the soul of an unbaptized infant into His presence in Heaven. Thus the ITC stressed the need for hope and trust in the mercy of God, since “the point of departure for considering the destiny of these children should be the salvific will of God” (41 ).
This report could too easily be misinterpreted as saying that there is no need to baptize our children, since God will allow them into Heaven anyway. But the report definitely does not exonerate parents whose children die without baptism, when the parents have not made an effort to have the baby baptized promptly. Thus it cannot be used as an excuse for failing to have a newborn infant baptized as quickly as the parents reasonably can.
True, there are tragic situations where a newborn dies unexpectedly in the first few hours or days of his birth; if the parents had been planning to have him baptized soon, it is certainly difficult to fault them for not being fast enough! But it is a very different matter when a child of several months, or even years, dies without having been baptized, solely through the negligence of his parents. New parents need to keep in mind—and to be reminded—of the incredible spiritual responsibility they bear toward their newborn children, who must depend on their parents to ensure that they are relieved of the burden of original sin so that they may someday see God face to face.
Offer (or find) the kids a ride.
“The baby being circumcised did not have the capacity to understand the Covenant. What if later on he rejected God?”
Indeed, what if he later rejected God? Would he then be excused from the conditional curses of the covenant? Or was he bound by them whether he believed or not? Were only the circumcised carried away into captivity?
“In the Acts of the Apostles you find stories of entire households being baptised. Those households almost certainly contained infants, or toddlers.”
Yes, households and families were baptized, but you are still assuming that these households included infants or toddlers. The Scripture is not explicit about this, which I guess is why people are still debating it!
I know an older woman who was “saved” but she has never been baptized because she has a thing about being submerged in water. Of course she’s not Catholic. I always found that odd. Her pastor is okay with it.
I get that same answer from non-Catholics. I also hear “I’m forgiven for all of my sins before I commit them”.
Did you even read what I posted? I never said “if only I have done everything right!” Please don’t put incorrect words in my mouth. I said it depends on God’s Grace alone. Period. I could not have been more clear.
By the way, I’m female. Feel free to look at my profile. :0)
That just seems a tad bit rude and pointless.
First of all, samiam1972 is a SHE (and a perpetually pregnant she at that).
Secondly, it is considered the norm, especially on the Religion Forum, to ping a person if you are going to use their name.
I wonder how many of the YOPIOS crowd have ever actually considered how the passage below fits into their solely intellectual approach to Salvation:
31 And when the Son of man shall come in his majesty, and all the angels with him, then shall he sit upon the seat of his majesty. 32 And all nations shall be gathered together before him, and he shall separate them one from another, as the shepherd separateth the sheep from the goats: 33 And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on his left. 34 Then shall the king say to them that shall be on his right hand: Come, ye blessed of my Father, possess you the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 35 For I was hungry, and you gave me to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave me to drink; I was a stranger, and you took me in:
36 Naked, and you covered me: sick, and you visited me: I was in prison, and you came to me. 37 Then shall the just answer him, saying: Lord, when did we see thee hungry, and fed thee; thirsty, and gave thee drink? 38 And when did we see thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and covered thee? 39 Or when did we see thee sick or in prison, and came to thee? 40 And the king answering, shall say to them: Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to me.
41 Then he shall say to them also that shall be on his left hand: Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry, and you gave me not to eat: I was thirsty, and you gave me not to drink. 43 I was a stranger, and you took me not in: naked, and you covered me not: sick and in prison, and you did not visit me. 44 Then they also shall answer him, saying: Lord, when did we see thee hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to thee? 45 Then he shall answer them, saying: Amen I say to you, as long as you did it not to one of these least, neither did you do it to me.
46 And these shall go into everlasting punishment: but the just, into life everlasting.
-- Matthew 25:31-46
For the record, I find it amusing that so many on this thread want to make this issue about the Catholic Church and fail to realize that the rejection of infant Baptism puts them at odds with nearly all of mainline Protestantism.
I find this especially amusing when I consider that just a few weeks ago some of these same FReepers were arguing that aborted babies are definitely damned to Hell because they've never been Baptized.
We are told that it is proper to bring infants to Jesus Christ and that is EXACTLY what Baptism is:
15 And they brought unto him also infants, that he might touch them. Which when the disciples saw, they rebuked them.
16 But Jesus, calling them together, said: Suffer children to come to me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God. 17 Amen, I say to you: Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a child, shall not enter into it.
-- Luke 18:15-17
“But a Catholic is obligated to baptise the baby. It is a matter of spiritual care-taking.
It is the spiritual parallel to feeding, bathing, clothing, and loving the child. In fact, it is the expression of it.”
What of Catholics who have their babies baptized simply because they feel it’s an obligation or tradition, and don’t contribute to the child’s spiritual upbringing in any significant way after that? I know “Catholics” who baptized their children, but that was one of the rare instances the kids ever saw the inside of a church. How does the baptism of those children amount to anything?
The YOPIOS crowd will NEVER understand this. As far as they are concerned if a person says they accept Christ they are saved and NOTHING can undo that. If the words, "I accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior" EVER passed the lips of Hitler, then he is in Heaven laughing at his millions of victims who never uttered the phrase.
Mad Dawg put it perfectly yesterday:
Also, just as the rule is that one must always exploit any ambiguity of expression to put one's opponent in the worst possible light (the goal not being truth but rather rhetorical domination) so one must use the extravagant and metaphorical language of praise as though it were the academically precise language of a theological treatise.
The errors here are legion and, alas, I am busy.
What parent would deny their children the grace of God at the earliest possible convenience? What parent wouldn't pray for his children? If you pray, why wouldn't you baptize? And if baptism were only a sign, what devoted parent would resist joyfully making it?
They have, at the very least, taken the single most important step. The child's soul has been cleansed of original sin and imbued with graces.
I don't understand why the original poster didn't understand that there are more religions represented here on FR than Catholicism. The original post makes it sound like they assume FR is an "only Catholic" site. There are many definitions of "Baptism".
Can you show me where it says that in the Bible?
Once saved, always saved? Where is that in the Bible?
“I wonder how many of the YOPIOS crowd have ever actually considered how the passage below fits into their solely intellectual approach to Salvation:”
The passage you quote clearly refers to the White Throne judgment after the second resurrection. Those who are saved by Grace will already be sitting in thrones of judgment over the nations as well, will they not? Why do you suggest they will be subject to this judgment as well?
Did you toss out John 3:3-5?
“A baptism in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is a sacrament that brings grace from God at his behest. The very act is a demonstration of faith.”
Yes but a demonstration of whose faith? Certainly not the infant’s, so you must mean the faith of the parents. So you think that through your faith you can impart God’s grace to someone without their involvement?
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