| Letter#43 Baptism:
Confirmation
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| My dear Mr. Isaacs: |
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| In writing to
you a few days ago regarding the divinity of Christ, I stressed His personal excellence;
and the principle of supernatural love He taught and insisted upon with positive authority
such as God alone could rightly assume to exercise. Thus Christ's law of love gave mankind
a new, an elevated standard of social relationship and responsibility. In this letter I purpose to begin to deal with the sacramental system Christ instituted to safeguard the spiritual welfare of man from the cradle to the grave, and thence on to eternal glory; and to explain two of the sacraments. The inauguration of this sacramental system meant the end of the Mosaic mandates through which God was served and man's spiritual welfare advanced in the Old Law, with the exception of the Ten Commandments. To these Ten Eternal Mandates Christ gave a higher meaning than was given them in Israel. The sacramental system is composed of seven visible, natural acts, outward signs, ceremonial forms, called sacraments. These sacraments are Baptism, Confirmation, Holy Eucharist, Penance, Extreme Unction, Holy Orders, and Matrimony. They confer what the Church calls supernatural grace; which is a free gift of God, as it does not belong by right to the nature of man. It is bestowed upon man with a view to leading him to eternal life. It has an intrinsic, soul-inhering, supernatural quality. This gift comes to man through the merits of Christ. It enables man, individually, to be a "partaker in the divine nature of Christ." These sacraments are the means by which the earthly ministrations of Christ are continued in the world until the end of time. Baptism, which I said something about in my letter on original sin, comes first in the list of sacraments. It is the Christian initiatory rite, without which none of the other sacraments can be received. Its primary purpose is to wash away the stain of original sin, thus restoring man to the supernatural status with God that the sin of Adam had deprived him of. It makes man a citizen of the supernatural order, as naturalization makes him a citizen of the U.S.A. Baptism also cleanses the soul of actual sin. There ought not to be any objection on the part of Jews to accepting the principle set forth in the sacrament of baptism, as ablutions were common to Mosaic Judaism. Before the Church of Christ began to function, in the year 33 of our calendar, circumcision was the God-instituted means of being naturalized in Israel. By it man became, individually, a son of the covenant of Abraham. Circumcision, like baptism, was a sacred sign of faith. Such world famous theologians as St. Augustine and St. Thomas of Aquin teach that circumcision was a sacrament; that it wiped out the stain of original sin by virtue of belief in the coming of the Christ whom Abraham, Moses, and the prophets foretold. Baptism by immersion preceded the ceremony of circumcision of converts (proselytes of righteousness), who, when they stepped out of the water, were each considered by the Rabbis to be "as if he were a little child just born." Mikwa is the name of the ritual of purification, baptism by immersion in running water, to which high priests, women at childbirth or after menstruation, etc. were obliged to submit. While circumcision is the general practice of Jews today, and baptisms as well among the Orthodox Jews, the spiritual efficacy they had of yore ended with the institution of baptism as a sacrament. The institution by Christ of baptism as a sacrament was in itself a declaration of His divinity, as no mere man, no matter how great he may be, could legitimately assume to institute a sacrament that would take the place of the circumcision rite and baptisms of the Old Law. Who, but God, could institute a new process of acquiring citizenship in His kingdom? I have before me a copy of the "Christian and Jews," a book received from the Editor, Rabbi Isaac Landman, in which Rabbi Abram Simon of Washington, founder of the Synagogue Council of America, says, what Rabbi Landman and other Rabbis have said, though in different language, that
It struck me as rather strange, or perhaps I should say
narrow-visioned, to make such an anti-Christian statement in "A Symposium for Better
Understanding" between Jews and Christians. The religion of Jesus is the Christian
religion as the very name tells us, and not "Paulinism" as modern Rabbis usually
dub it. Though no one did a more profound service in defining the relationship of the Old
Law to the New Law than did St. Paul, he was not "the real founder of
Christianity," as "Vallentine's Jewish Encyclopedia" says (p. 505).
The question of baptism is dealt with first because it
is the door to the Kingdom of God. It is the sacrament that cleanses the soul; it is the
means of incorporation into the Body of Christ, "for all of you who are baptized unto
Christ, have put on Christ" (Gal. 3:27). It is proof of the divinity of
Christ. |
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