Transcript

Water is wonderful.

Water washes away dirt and refreshes us.

It also brings us together for enjoyment.

Water makes life on Earth possible.

Even so, water can bring about not only life but also death.

A flood of water kills and destroys.

Water has many different effects significant for our life on a natural level and on a supernatural level.

Jesus Christ says, Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God.

In this episode, we will explore how God uses water to signify and effect the wonder of being born by water and the Holy Spirit in the sacrament of baptism.

If your hands are dirty, don't you wash them so that dirt and things you can't even see go away?

The sacrament of baptism washes not just our body but our soul in one definitive act.

Baptismal water washes us.

The spiritual power of baptism is so great that this sacrament removes all sin, all original sin, and all personal sins.

Think of how the Israelites went through the Red Sea in the Exodus.

They gained their freedom from slavery by going through that Red Sea.

The Red Sea parted, and they walked on dry ground with the water miraculously formed as a wall on their right and on their left.

After the Israelites passed, the waters returned and destroyed all Pharaoh's chariots and charioteers.

Not a single one escaped.

In the waters of baptism, all spiritual enemies are destroyed in the soul cleansed by holy baptism.

In baptism, though, don't we need to atone for our sins somehow?

No. St. Thomas Aquinas teaches water not only cleanses; it also refreshes.

By refreshing, it signifies the remission of the debt of punishment, just as by cleansing it signifies the washing away of guilt.

Baptism both forgives sin and refreshes us so that there's no punishment for our sins due to Jesus Christ.

Even though sin and its punishments are removed, we do continue to suffer from sin.

Why?

St. Thomas names three reasons.

First, baptism unites us in the Church to Christ Himself, the head of the Church.

By baptism, we become the body of Christ while full of grace and truth.

During His life on Earth, Christ had a body that could and did suffer.

We Christians receive Christ's own grace and truth in our souls by baptism, but like Christ, we too have bodies that can and do suffer.

Our life is to be alive completely in Christ, joint heirs with Him so that we may be glorified with Him.

Our suffering after baptism makes us like Christ in sharing His suffering.

Second, our suffering after baptism trains us to win the crown of victory.

Christ wants us to be winners with Him, and so He trains us through struggle.

In other words, He allows us to have concupiscence.

Concupiscence is a tendency to evil.

By relying on Christ's grace, we can daily conquer our concupiscence and be crowned victors on the last day.

Third, our suffering after baptism keeps our attention focused on the glory of eternal life.

If we lived only for this life on Earth, we would be the most pitiable of all.

Our suffering after baptism prompts us to look beyond this life for life forever in the resurrection of the body.

Now, just as water is poured, so baptism infuses or pours grace in the virtues in the soul.

We receive grace upon grace.

The baptized are incorporated into Christ, becoming His body, the Church, and sharing His own life.

We then become enlightened, becoming the light of the world in Christ, who says, I am the light of the world.

An ancient term for the newly baptized is the enlightened.

In baptism, we also become fruitful, abounding in good works that give life and enjoyment to the world.

Now, do even babies receive grace and the virtues when they are baptized?

Yes, they do.

St. Thomas knows that some early Christians were confused about this, for they didn't understand the difference between a habit and an act.

A habit is a stable disposition that is difficult to change and is ordered to acts.

Acts are particular deeds that can be done out of the underlying habit.

For example, when we are sleeping, we stop committing good and bad acts, but we don't lose our good and bad moral dispositions, our virtues and vices.

When a baby is reborn at baptism, the baby's soul gains virtuous habits, especially faith, but without the ability to act on them yet.

When the baby grows up, then the child can make acts of faith and worship God and Church.

This teaching can help us understand the power of the cross in our life.

All the Church's sacraments derive their power from the Passion of Christ on the cross.

Christ suffered and died for us.

After Christ's death, a soldier pierced the side of Jesus, and immediately blood and water flowed out.

Commenting on St. John's Gospel, St. Thomas says that by the Passion of Christ, we acquire a complete cleansing from our sins and stains.

The water and blood that flowed from Christ's side makes us think of baptism and the Eucharist.

In conclusion, water is wonderful, and the most wonderful water of all is the water of baptism.

It washes away all sins, it gives us the new life of grace, it refreshes us by taking away all punishment due to sin, and it unites us to enjoy God together in Christ's body, the Church.

Baptized only once, we enter into the wonders of the sacramental life, which culminates in the most holy Eucharist, nourishing us as we journey to our heavenly home.

By being born of water and the Spirit, we can enter the Kingdom of God.

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