Q: Some Evangelical friends were recently quizzing me on the Catholic understanding of baptism. They were especially asking about Jesus’ baptism, and whether this indicates Jesus had some sin or sins of which he needed to repent. They had the same question regarding infant baptism, as infants would seem to neither be able to understand the rite, nor have any sins to “wash away” in the first place. (Indiana)
A: Looking at the second part of your question first, I’m sure in your dialogues with your Evangelical friends you are already familiar with one of the main scriptural justifications for infant baptism in the book of Acts, which describe whole households being baptized, which presumably included infants and young children (See Acts 16:33).
Catholics also believe that sacraments function in a primarily objective way, in the sense that they are not dependent on the emotional state or perfect understanding of the one receiving them in order to “work.”
But to dig a little deeper, although of course infants are not capable of committing any sins themselves, there are still many benefits for a baptized infant. Like all of humanity (save Our Lord and His Blessed Mother) infants are bound by original sin — that is, the first sin committed by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, which radically wounded humanity’s fundamental relationship with its Creator.
As we read in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, “Baptism, by imparting the life of Christ’s grace, erases original sin and turns a man back toward God” (CCC 405). So for infants innocent of any personal sins, baptism still has the great benefit of freeing them from the ultimate consequence of original sin, meaning that a baptized infant becomes able to receive the inheritance of eternal life with God in heaven. Baptism also eases some of the other consequences of original sin — such as the inclination to evil called “concupiscence” — by giving the baptized the grace to resist temptation.
Perhaps more profoundly, the church teaches that baptism unites us more closely to Christ, and is a way of personally sharing in his Passion, Death and Resurrection. St. Paul writes in his letter to the Romans: “We were indeed buried with him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might live in newness of life. For if we have grown into union with him through a death like his, we shall also be united with him in the resurrection” (Rom 6:4-5). And in a marvelous way, through this closer configurement to Christ, we attain a relationship to God in Christ that goes beyond our original identity as mere creatures; that is, we become adopted sons and daughters of God (See CCC 537).
On a practical level, through Catholic baptism, infants become official members of the Catholic Church, which among other things qualifies them to receive the other sacraments. As the Code of Canon Law tells us: “By baptism one is incorporated into the Church of Christ and constituted a person in it, with the duties and the rights which, in accordance with each one’s status, are proper to [Catholic] Christians” (Canon 96).
Turning to the baptism of Jesus, Jesus was of course sinless and did not need baptism in the same way that you or I do. But as the Catechism explains: “The baptism of Jesus is on his part the acceptance and inauguration of his mission as God’s suffering Servant. He allows himself to be numbered among sinners; he is already ‘the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.’ Already he is anticipating the ‘baptism’ of his bloody death. Already he is coming to ‘fulfill all righteousness,’ that is, he is submitting himself entirely to his Father’s will: out of love he consents to this baptism of death for the remission of our sins” (CCC 536).
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