Where did the idea of infant baptism in the Catholic Church come from,since it's not in the Bible?

Answer 1

The Catechism of the Catholic Church states, "Born with a fallen human nature and tainted by original sin, children also have need of the new birth in Baptism to be freed from the power of darkness and brought into the realm of the freedom of the children of God, to which all men are called."

Infant baptism is not a new thing. There are non-biblical documented sources starting in the second century telling of infant Baptism.

There are even several passages in the Bible where whole households were baptized. This would include everyone who lived there, men, women, children, and infants.

Acts 16:15, "After she and her household had been baptized"

Acts 16:33, "then he and all his family were baptized at once."

Acts 18:8, "came to believe in the Lord along with his entire household, and many of the Corinthians who heard believed and were baptized."

1 Corinthians 1:16, "I baptized the household of Stephanas"

St. Paul wrote that baptism has replaced circumcision (Col 2:11-12), and in Judaism circumcision was performed primarily on infants.

With love in Christ.

Answer 2

There are two Gospel verses in the Bible which clearly indicated Baptism. Therefore,go and teach all nations, baptizing in the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Matt 28:19 Unless a man, is born of the water and Spririt ,he can not enter the kingdom of God. John 3:5. In Mat 3:13, Mar19 and Luke 3:21 indicated that Jesus sought out John the Baptist and was baptized.

Infant baptism was thought of to be washed off the original sin by Adam. But a baby has no sin,, to confess,or repent,; nor the knowledge to accept Christ's teachings and live his life accordingly. He has to make that decision himself when he's old enough.to understand. Some theories are there that without baptism ,there is no salvation. But it's only thru true belief that leads to baptism. This applies mostly to adults.

Therefore, infant baptism is mostly the parent's choosing to symbolically dedicate the child to God. The ritual consists of total immersion in water.

There are more arguments on this topic:

www.gospelway.com/salvation/infant baptism

For some reason, infant baptism doesn't show up in the final draft although it's in my reply.

Answer 3

Correct - infant baptism was never in the bible - it was introduced by the Catholic Church (one of the 7 sacraments).

The bible teaches believers baptism. Just what Jesus did - he was baptised as an adult. This makes sense and it is rational that someone would be baptised at an age that they could understand what was going on. Baptism is meant to be a declaration of your personal faith and an act of obedience.

Being a mother of an infant who died at a young age I have always found this teaching of the catholic church abhorrent - that an unbaptised infant will go to hell. Its just simply rubbish and not in the bible - a false teaching based on keeping people in fear in my opinion. We don't need as much intervention from religious men etc as we think. God expressed His love for us completely through the cross.

As a bible believing christian my God is a God of Love and Grace

Answer 4

The Catholic Church also believes that the Bible is too complex for 'regular' people to understand and that is why they are not allowed to read it and that only the priests are allowed to read it and then explain it to their 'subordinates', this is why I am a Christian. I believe that infant baptism is just another ritual that came about when the Catholic Church was trying to control they're followers and start that control at birth.
I know I sound a little crazy but I don't have anything against Catholics (a good friend of mine is Catholic), I just don't like a religion that says that my God is not kind enough to speak to me (using the Bible) in a way that I would understand it. There's lots of stuff in the Catholic religion that does not comply with the Bible.

Answer 5

The idea came about from the Catholic idea that everyone human is born with original sin. And the only way to seek forgiveness for this original sin is by baptism. So, of course the Catholic Church would want infants to get rid of the original sin as soon as possible.

Answer 6

The closest the Catholic church has ever gotten to finding a Bible verse to support infant baptism would be Matthew 19: 14, but to apply that verse for baptism is, at best, a long stretch...

The doctrine of infant baptism was only approved in writing in the Decree for the Armenians, Exultate Deo of Pope Eugene IV, during the Council of Florence. A follow-up to this, which included the anathemizing of doctrines such as the "uselessness of infant baptism," was decreed in the Council of Trent. Do note that the doctrines against infant baptism, the ones they have anathemized, come from those who are more credible than those who supported infant baptism.

The Catholic church is pretty much forced to do infant baptism because of their concept of original sin. To them, this sin can only be removed through baptism, and any person with this sin is condemned to hell (?, anyone who understands the penalties better, please correct me on this). Unfortunately, this is contradictory to the concept of God...

Take for instance the book of Job. The three friends of Job immediately condemned him for his "hidden sin," because they believed that such suffering can only come from sin. In a sense, they based their judgment on a belief that God is but an enforcer of a system of good and evil, which appears to be greater than Him. To say that God must condemn all with original sin, even those who do not have the ability to understand and act upon their original sin, is in the same vein as the three friends of Job.

God is not the enforcer of a system of good and evil; God is good, and what is not of Him is evil. Christ emphasized the point that God is the rule, not bound by the rule, in these verses...

"But if you had known what this means, 'I desire mercy and not sacrifice,' you would not have condemned the guiltless. For the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath." - Matthew 12: 7-8

As God is one of mercy, and His verdicts are righteous and just, we can thus be assured that God will judge those who do not receive baptism because they cannot choose to do so appropriately and justly. Who are we to decide what God's judgment should be?

Answer 7

Well Christ does do baptisms but in the Bible he's baptizing adults.

We baptize infants because of the notion of original sin, IE just being human born of a woman from sex means you come into this world in sin. That was handed down to us courtesy of St Augustine. He led a wild youth of sex, alcohol and partying. Then he converted and found a way to kill everyone else's fun. He was so disgusted with his early life he pondered the human condition and "invented" the idea of original sin. Cept we got one over on him because baptism is now a big ceremony and an excuse to put your baby in one of those cute white gowns and get pictures.

Answer 8

Infant baptism has its foundation solely in the church fathers. It was a initiation from birth to lock the people into a tradition for life.

Answer 9

there are very likely pagan roots to infant baptism. I cannot find anything concrete , but I have done some research on other Catholic rituals and beliefs and most of them are rooted in paganism- Catholicism is basically paganism with a thin thin veil of Christianity- basically names changed- there is nothing about infant baptism and nothing about much of what is taught and practiced in catholicism in the Bible.

Answer 10

You're right. Adult baptism is there but not for infants.

I would guess it would come partly from good marketing; catch them while you can, it's not like they've got a choice. Haha.... and the old-fashioned fear of dying before baptism making a person inelegable for burial in holy ground and destined to Hell, for sure!

In short it's one of those things that people have added on (probably during the early days) that has now become so entrenched in the mythology, that people forget to question it.