Baptism & Being Born Again
For I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon
the
dry ground: I will pour my spirit upon thy seed, and my blessing
upon thine offspring.
Isaiah 44, 3
[H]e saved us, not because of deeds done by us in righteousness,
but in virtue of his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal
in the
Holy Spirit, which he poured out upon us richly
through Jesus Christ our Savior.
Titus 3, 5-6
Since ancient times, Catholics have rightly understood that the expression “born again” refers to water baptism. What Catholics mean by being born again is the interior transformation that is achieved upon being baptized in water and the Holy Spirit. It means much more than affirming Jesus Christ is our Lord and Savior who died for our sins and consciously deciding to accept Christ in our hearts and be his disciple. Being born again means much more than believing in who Jesus is and what he has accomplished for those who do believe in him. The expression, on the contrary, is the mental equivalent of "regeneration."
Regeneration (being “born again”) is the transformation from death to life that occurs in our souls when we first come to God and are justified through the sacrament. He washes us clean of our sins and gives us a new nature, breaking the power of sin over us so that we will no longer be its slaves but its enemies, who must combat it as part of the Christian life and our baptismal commitment (cf. Rom. 6:1–22; Eph. 6:11–17).
For
Christ also said, ‘Except ye be born again, ye shall not enter into the kingdom
of
heaven.’ Now, that it is impossible for those who have once been born to
enter into
their mothers’ wombs, is manifest to all. And how those who have
sinned and repent
shall escape their sins, is declared by Esaias the prophet,
as I wrote above; he thus
speaks: ‘Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil
of your doings from your
souls; learn to do well…And though your sins be as
scarlet, I will make them white
like wool; and though they be as crimson, I
will make them white as snow…And for
this [rite] we have learned from the
apostles this reason. Since at our birth we were
born without our own knowledge
or choice, by our parents coming together, and
were brought up in bad habits
and wicked training; in order that we may not remain
the children of necessity
and of ignorance, but may become the children of choice
and knowledge, and may
obtain in the water the remission of sins formerly
committed, there is
pronounced over him who chooses to be born again, and has
repented of his sins,
the name of God the Father and Lord of the universe; he who
leads to the layer
the person that is to be washed calling him by this name alone
And this washing
is called illumination because they who learn these things are
illuminated in
their understandings. And in the name of Jesus Christ, who was
crucified under
Pontius Pilate, and in the name of the Holy Ghost, who through the
prophets
foretold all things about Jesus, he who is illuminated is washed.”
St. Justin Martyr, First Apology, 61
(ante A.D. 165)
”
‘And dipped himself,’ says [the Scripture], ‘seven times in Jordan.’ It was not
for
nothing that Naaman of old, when suffering from leprosy, was purified upon
his
being baptized, but it served as an indication to us. For as we are lepers
in sin, we are
made clean, by means of the sacred waa.ter and the invocation of
the Lord, from our
old transgressions; being spiritually regenerated as
new-born babes, even as the
Lord has declared: ‘Except a man be born again
through water and the Spirit, he
shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.'”
St. Irenaeus, Fragment, 34
(A.D. 190)
“But
give me now your best attention, I pray you, for I wish to go back to the
fountain of life, and to view the fountain that gushes with healing. The Father
of
immortality sent the immortal Son and Word into the world, who came to man
in
order to wash him with water and the Spirit; and He, begetting us again to
incorruption of soul and body, breathed into us the breath (spirit) of life,
and
endued us with an incorruptible panoply. If, therefore, man has become
immortal,
he will also be God. And if he is made God by water and the Holy
Spirit after the
regeneration of the layer he is found to be also joint-heir
with Christ after the
resurrection from the dead. Wherefore I preach to this effect:
Come, all ye kindreds
of the nations, to the immortality of the baptism.”
St. Hippolytus, Discourse on the Holy Theophany, 8
(A.D. 217)
“[W]hen
they come to us and to the Church which is one, ought to be baptized, for
the
reason that it is a small matter to ‘lay hands on them that they may receive
the
Holy Ghost,’ unless they receive also the baptism of the Church. For then
finally, can
they be fully sanctified, and be the sons of God, if they be born
of each sacrament;
since it is written, ‘Except a man be born again of water,
and of the Spirit, he cannot
enter into the kingdom of God.’…[O]nly baptism of
the Holy Church, by divine
regeneration, for the kingdom of God, may be born of
both sacraments, because it is
written, ‘Except a man be born of water and of
the Spirit, he cannot enter into the
kingdom of God.'”
St. Cyprian of Carthage, To Stephen, 71:72
(A.D. 253)
“We
are circumcised not with a fleshly circumcision but with the circumcision of
Christ, that is, we are born again into a new man; for, being buried with Him
in His
baptism, we must die to the old man, because the regeneration of baptism
has the
force of resurrection.”
St. Hilary of Poitiers, Trinity, 9:9
(A.D. 359)
“And
with reason; for as we are all from earth and die in Adam, so being regenerated
from above of water and Spirit, in the Christ we are all quickened.”
St. Athanasius, Discourse Against the Arians, III:33
(A.D. 360)
“[T]he
birth by water and the Spirit, Himself led the way in this birth, drawing
down
upon the water, by His own baptism, the Holy Spirit; so that in all things He
became the first-born of those who are spiritually born again, and gave the
name of
brethren to those who partook in a birth like to His own by water and
the Spirit.”
St. Gregory of Nyssa, Against Eunomius, 2:8
(A.D. 382)
“The
Word recognizes three Births for us; namely, the natural birth,
that of Baptism, and that of the Resurrection…”
St. Gregory of Nazianzen, Oration on Holy Baptism, I
(A.D. 388)
“Therefore,
read that the three witnesses in baptism, the water, the blood, and the
Spirit,
are one, for if you take away one of these, the Sacrament of Baptism does not
exist. For what is water without the cross of Christ? A common element, without
any sacramental effect. Nor, again, is there the Sacrament of Regeneration
without
water: ‘For except a man be born again of water and of the Spirit, he
cannot enter
into the kingdom of God.'”
St. Ambrose, On the Mysteries, 4:20
(A.D. 391)
“It
is this one Spirit who makes it possible for an infant to be regenerated through
the agency of another’s will when that infant is brought to Baptism; and it is through
this one Spirit that the infant so presented is
reborn…’Unless a man be born again of
water and the Holy Spirit.’ The water, therefore, manifesting exteriorly the
sacrament of grace, and the Spirit effecting interiorly the benefit of grace, both
regenerate in one Christ that man who was in one Adam.”
St. Augustine, To Boniface, Epistle 98:2
(A.D. 408)
Being born again by baptism
putting the deeds of the flesh to death
Truly, truly, I say to you, Except a man be born of water
and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
John 3, 5
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