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Water is poured on the head of an infant held over the baptismal font of a Roman Catholic church. Infant baptism [1] [2] (or paedobaptism) is the practice of baptizing infants or young children. Infant baptism is also called christening by some faith traditions. Most Christians belong to denominations that practice infant baptism.
The Roman Catholic view is that baptism is necessary for salvation and that it frees the recipient from original sin. Roman Catholic tradition teaches that unbaptized infants, not being freed from original sin, go to Limbo (Latin: limbus infantium), which is an afterlife condition distinct from Hell. This is not, however, official church dogma.
The practice of allowing young children to receive communion has fallen into disfavor in the Latin-Rite of the Catholic Church. Latin-Rite Catholics generally refrain from infant communion and instead have a special ceremony when the child receives his or her First Communion, usually around the age of seven or eight years old.
Receiving this baptism was regarded as a bar to Holy Orders, but this sprang from the person's having put off baptism until the last moment—a practice that in the fourth century became common, with people enrolling as catechumens but not being baptized for years or decades. While the practice was decried at the time, the intent of the ...
One of the earliest of the Church Fathers to enunciate clearly and unambiguously the doctrine of baptismal regeneration ("the idea that salvation happens at and by water baptism duly administered") was Cyprian (c. 200 – 258): "While he attributed all the saving energy to the grace of God, he considered the 'laver of saving water' the instrument of God that makes a person 'born again ...
A child dedication or baby presentation is an act of consecration of children to God practiced in evangelical churches, such as those of the Baptist tradition. [1] [2]Child dedication is practiced by organisations, such as the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, in which parents promise to help their child live a life free from alcohol and other drugs.
Detail from the Seven Sacraments Altarpiece by Rogier van der Weyden.In the lower left the priest is anointing an infant before it is baptized. The oil of catechumens, also known as the oil of exorcism, is the oil used in some traditional Christian churches during baptism; it is believed to strengthen the one being baptized to turn away from evil, temptation and sin.
Baptism by affusion (pouring) was allowed in exceptional circumstances in the early church, being allowed by the Didache: And concerning baptism, baptize this way: Having first said all these things, baptize into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, in living water.