www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Faith & Theology Original Sin and infant baptism

I've noticed that when Orthodox refer to Our Lady's Immaculate Conception dogma they deny original sin being a stain at all. However, when defending infant baptism they admit to original sin leaving a lack of purity upon the soul (wouldn't this be a type of "stain"?) in order to justify baptizing infants. Could someone explain why there is such a discrepancy?

We know from Sacred Scripture that baptism is for the "remission of sins" (Acts 2:38). I had always assumed that this is one of the many effects of baptism and that remission of sins must be included or it isn't a proper baptism. Why should infants be baptized if they have no sin (either inherited or actual) to be "remitted"? This appears to say that infant baptism fails to meet one of the biblical purposes of baptism and is "null and void."

Also, if as the Orthodox affirm, infants who die unbaptized are automatically saved, why should they be baptized at all? Thanks!

In Christ,

Adam

P.S. Was there ever a tradition in the East of postoning baptism until the child was above seven or eight years old? I vaugely remember reading that somewhere, once.

Dear Adam,

I am going to let some of the more focused and theologically astute brethren handle most of this post. Theology, if not termed and written correctly can present may a problem for both the poster and those reading it.

Now for the last part of your post, one that I am well versed to answer, being from my historical background. In the early church up to and including the time of Saint John Chrysostom, adults and young people took three years of cathecetical training before they were received into the church at the Liturgy on Holy Saturday morning (This liturgy is still referred in some circles as the baptismal liturgy). With the Pax Romana, smaller and smaller children and infants were allowed to receive the three fold sacraments of Chrisitian initiation. One of the Church Councils (I can't tell you which one of hand), allowed this to become a norm of the church. I also know from experience at least from some coming from the outlying areas of Greece and Cyprus, that children are brought for baptism between the ages of 7-10. I had to do one a number of years back, and when I questioned why they waited until then, they stated it is a custom on ther island.

So here you have at least the practice portion of your post answered. As for the theology, I would prefer someone else take a stab at it that doesn't have to stop answer the phone every few minutes.

I hope this helps answer at least a small part of your question.

In IC XC,
Father Anthony+

Adam,

While it is eminently true that baptism forgives sins, it is equally true that the Eastern understanding of Original Sin is ontologically different from that of the West. For the East, Original Sin is reflected in the world. That is, it is the condition into which we are born rather than a "stain" on the soul.

The primary effects of baptism as taught by East and West are 1) forgiveness of sins, 2) a joining to the Church and, thereby, to the death and resurrection of Jesus and 3) a restoration of the image of God and communion with Him. For an infant the forgiveness of sins is not relevant since infants have not sinned. For someone with the capacity for sin then this aspect comes into play.

I hope this helps.

Fr. Deacon Edward

What about older infants and toddlers?

I remember an Orthodox Priest telling me that young children can sin -- in fact he has heard the confession of three year olds.

He also mentioned that when a toddler or infant refuses Holy Communion, he does not force it, because that can do more damage. (1) The child may develop problems with receiving Holy Communion if he is forced to receive. (2) The child may be indicating that he is not prepared to receive at that moment. God only knows.

I remember when I was only about 28 to 30 months old that I did commit a sin, and when I made my full life confession, the priest did comment that it was a good think that I did not die in early childhood. I was a terror because I was partially deaf and was misunderstood a lot, so I had a lot of anger.

From "The First Created Man" by an Orthodox Saint, St. Simeon the New Theologian (11th Century):

"Ever since the first-created Adam los his garment of holiness by sin . . . and thus became corruptible and mortal, all people, Adam's descendants, share in the ancestral sin from their very conception and birth. The one who is born in this way, even though he has not committed any sin of his own, is still sinful through the ancestral sin."

Thank you all for this information. It was helpful.

In Christ,

Adam

Dear Catholic Orthodox,

Original Sin is ultimately, I believe, about the corruption of our nature that we inherit from Adam.

Thus, we are born without the Grace we should have had if only Adam did not sin.

We are born with Grace, to be sure, but not with the fullness of Grace again as a result of Original Sin.

Thus, Baptism is truly the laver of regeneration for us. It destroys actual sin if we are at the age of reason and beyond. It transfigures us and makes members of the Body of Christ.

The "indelible mark" of Baptism or the Baptismal character that cannot be changed relates to the mark that Roman soldiers received as a sign that they belonged to the emperor.

So Baptism submits our fallen nature to the Lordship of Christ, making us one with Him and initiating us into His Deifying Life and Body via Theosis in the Holy Spirit to the glory of God the Father.

Alex

I've always heard of the effects of the Fall as an absence and not a stain. We are born without the relationship with God that existed at one time. A relationship of full communion with God. Christ came to bridge this gap, and it is up to us to be willing to follow him and come to God. The absence is what makes us prone to sin as we grow in accountability to God.

My understanding is that the Orthodox Church does not baptize infants and/or small children to save them from condemnation. A God who would condemn a small child for such a thing in my opinion would not be worthy of our worship. The church baptizes them to bring them in to full membership of the community, and it communes them from the time they enter in to the church.

Andrew

Dear Father Anthony:

Father Bless!

I thought that in the Early Church that whole families were baptized, including infants. I was under the impression that Augustine and others in the 4th century were not baptized as infants so as not to soil their baptismal garments by the sins of youth. Was the practice of not baptizing children also a reflection on the numbers of people who did not remain faithful during the persecutions?

Please clarify. Thanks.

Respectfully yours in Christ,
Elizabeth

The following are excerpts from a Vatican document "Instruction On Infant Baptism", promulgated by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, with authorization from Pope John Paul II, 20 October, 1980:

Both in the East and in the West the practice of baptizing infants is considered a rule of immemorial tradition. Origen, and later St. Augustine, considered it a "tradition received from the Apostles." [Origen, In Romanis, V, 9; PG 14, 1047; cf. St. Augustine, De Genesi ad litteram, X, 23, 39: PL 34, 426; De peccatorum meritis et remissione et de baptismo parvulorum ad Marcellinum, I, 26, 39: PL 44, 131. In fact, three passages of the Acts of the Apostles (16:15, 16:33, 18:8) speak of the baptism of a whole household or family.]

When the first direct evidence of infant Baptism appears in the second century, it is never presented as an innovation. St. Irenaeus, in particular, considers it a matter of course that the baptized should include "infants and small children" as well as adolescents, young adults and older people. [Adv. Haereses II, 22, 4: PG 7, 784; Harvey I, 330. Many inscriptions from as early as the second century give little children the title of "children of God," a title give only to the baptized, or explicitly mention that they were baptized: cf., for example, Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum, 9727, 9801, 9817; E. Diehl, Inscriptiones Latinae Christianae Veteres (Berlin 1961), nos. 1523(3), 4429A.]

The oldest known ritual, describing at the start of the third century the Apostolic Tradition, contains the following rule: "First baptize the children. Those of them who can speak for themselves should do so. The parents or someone of their family should speak for the others." [La Tradition apostolique de Saint Hippolyte, edited and translated by B. Botte, Munster, Aschendorff, 1963 (Liturgiewissenschafliche Quellen und Forschungen 39), p. 44.)

At a Synod of African Bishops, St. Cyprian stated that "God's mercy and grace should not be refused to anyone born," and the Synod, recalling that "all human beings" are "equal," whatever be "their size or age," declared it lawful to baptize children "by the second or third day after their birth." [Epist. LXIV, Cyprianus et coeteri collegae, qui in concilio adfuerunt numero LXVI. Fido fratri: PL 3, 1013-1019; ed. Hartel, (CSEL 3), pp. 717-721. This practice was particularly strong in the Church in Africa, in spite of the position taken by Tertullian, who advised that baptism of children should be delayed in view of the innocence associated with their age and the fear of possible lapses in young adulthood. Cf. De baptismo, XVIII, 3-XIX, 1: PL 1, 1220-1222; De anima, 39-41: PL 2, 719ff.]

Admittedly there was a certain decline in the practice of infant Baptism during the fourth century. At that time even adults postponed their Christian initiation out of apprehension about future sins and fear of public penance, and many parents put off the Baptism of their children for the same reasons. But it must also be noted that Fathers and Doctors such as Basil, Gregory of Nyssa, Ambrose, John Chrysostom, Jerome and Augustine, who were themselves baptized as adults on account of this state of affairs, vigorously reacted against such negligence and begged adults not to postpone Baptism since it is necessary for salvation. [Cf. St. Basil, Homilia XIII exhortatoria ad sanctum baptisma: PG 424- 436; St. Gregory of Nyssa, Adversus eos qui differunt baptismum oratio: PG 46, 424; St. Augustine, In Ioannem Tractatus XIII, 7: PL 35, 1496; CCL 36, p. 134.]
Several of them insisted that Baptism should be administered to infants. [Cf. St. Ambrose, De Abraham, II, 11, 81-84: PL 14, 495-497: CSEL 32, 1, pp. 632-635; St. John Chrysostom, Catechesis, III, 5-6, ed. A. Wenger, SC 50, pp. 153-154; St. Jerome, Epist. 107, 6; PL 22, 873, ed. J. Labourt (Bude), vol. 5, pp. 151-152. However, while Gregory of Nazianzus urged mothers to have their children baptized at the earliest possible age, he was content to fix that age as the first three years; cf. Oratio XL in sanctum baptisma, 17 and 28: PL 380 and 399.]

The full text of the document quoted above may be found at: http://www.cin.org/docs/infbapt.html