DAY 308
CHALLENGE
“The only legitimate way to baptize is immersion.”
DEFENSE
There is more than one mode by which baptism can be performed.
Different groups of Christians have baptized using three methods: imimmersion (dunking), affusion (pouring), and aspersion (sprinkling).
There is misinformation in some circles about which the Catholic Church uses, with the claim being that it uses sprinkling and not immersion. However, Catholics do not use sprinkling, and they do use immersion. In fact, the Church acknowledges immersion as the most expressive way of administering baptism.
The Catechism states: “Baptism is performed in the most expressive way by triple immersion in the baptismal water. However, from ancient times it has also been able to be conferred by pouring the water three times over the candidate’s head” (CCC 1239).
The New Testament does not identify any particular mode for baptism. If it did, there would be no controversy. As it is, the New Testament is silent on the question, which is why biblical arguments tend to turn on small details (see Day 267).
The reason the New Testament doesn’t discuss the question is that it was written for a Christian audience, and—as Christians—its first readers had already been baptized. There was no need for the sacred authors to spend time explaining how the rite is performed. They expected the audience to look to the practice of the Church on this question.
When we do that, we find that the assumption there must be only one way of administering baptism is false. The first reference we have with any degree of detail about how baptism was performed is found in the Didache. Though not part of the New Testament, this was a first-century document. It serves as our earliest witness to the mode of baptism, and it reveals that it was performed in different ways, stating: “Baptize into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, in living [i.e., running] water. But if you have not living water, baptize in other water; and if you cannot in cold, in warm. But if you have not either, pour out water three times upon the head in the name of the Father and Son and Holy Spirit” (Didache 7).