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Everett Ferguson on Early Christian Baptism Everett Ferguson, a Protestant elder, biblical scholar, and Church historian, has written what’s perhaps the definitive work on the subject, Baptism in the Early Church: History, Theology, and Liturgy in the First Five Centuries. Ferguson spends hundreds of pages carefully combing through the evidence to expose the first five hundred years’ worth of Christians thought about baptism. His findings are neatly summarized on page 854: …

The Transformative Power of Baptism Baptism is the sacrament in which believers are “reborn as sons of God” (CCC 1213) by “water and Spirit” (John 3:5). It incorporates us into the Mystical Body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:13) and makes us sharers in the mission of the Church (CCC 1213). “Just as the gestation of our first birth took place in water,” the Catechism adds, “so the water of baptism truly signifies that our birth into the divine life is given to us in the Holy Spirit” (694). This divin …

Sacraments of Grace and Strength In the weeks leading up to my reception into the Catholic Church, I prepared to not only to be baptized, but also to be confirmed. The sacrament of baptism uses water to communicate grace that takes away sin, while the sacrament of confirmation uses hands that spread oil across the forehead. This oil seals the person with the gifts of the Holy Spirit to help him live out the Catholic faith. Hebrews 6:2 alludes to this sacrament when it says how, …