Episode 77: Year B – Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord
In today’s episode, we reflect on several details found in the readings for this upcoming Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord, Year B, that are relevant for doing apologetics. We’ve already had the opportunity to reflect on some of them for the Solemnity of the Ascension, Year A in episode 26 of the Sunday Catholic Word. The others, however, do not overlap with Year A due to the optional second reading from Ephesians 4:1-13 and a different Gospel, taken from Mark 16:15-20
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Hey everyone,
Welcome to The Sunday Catholic Word, a podcast where we reflect on the upcoming Sunday Mass readings and pick out the details that are relevant for explaining and defending our Catholic faith.
I’m Karlo Broussard, staff apologist and speaker for Catholic Answers, and the host for this podcast.
In today’s episode, we’re going to reflect on several details found in the readings for this upcoming Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord, Year B, that are relevant for doing apologetics. We’ve already had the opportunity to reflect on some of them for the Solemnity of the Ascension, Year A in episode 26 of the Sunday Catholic Word. The others, however, do not overlap with Year A due to the optional second reading from Ephesians 4:1-13 and a different Gospel, taken from Mark 16:15-20. The topic that comes to the fore for the optional second reading is Sola Scriptura. The Sacrament of Baptism is front and center for the Gospel.
Let’s start with a brief overview of the details found in the first reading, taken from Acts 1:1-11. The highlight worthy detail is Luke’s report that Jesus appeared to the disciples “for forty days’ (v.3). As I pointed out in episode 26, this detail is apologetically important because it refutes the hallucination theory, a theory that suggests the early Christians didn’t actually see the risen Jesus but merely hallucinated.
But Jesus appears to the disciples for forty days and we can assume that he did different things with these disciples for each of the days. The hallucination theory would have us believe that the disciples to whom Jesus allegedly appeared all hallucinated the different things at the same time for each of the days. That simply doesn’t fit the common experience of hallucinations, which are normally restricted to the individual and not the same for multiple peoples.
The second detail is Jesus’ report promise that the disciples would be “baptized with the Holy Spirit” (v.6). Again, as I explained in episode 26 of the Sunday Catholic Word, the “baptism of the Holy Spirit” need not be restricted to an experience of the Spirit and His outward manifestations, like speaking in tongues. At least for us as Catholics, it primarily refers to the Sacrament of Confirmation.
The second reading for this upcoming Solemnity, taken from Ephesians 1:17-23, reveals to us the early Christian belief that Jesus is God. The details that support such a claim is Paul’s teaching that Jesus “sits at the right hand” of the Father and that Jesus has a “name above every name.” For details on why these details support the claim that Jesus is God, check out episode 26 of the podcast.
Now, lest we repeat the same stuff as last year’s solemnity, let’s reflect on the optional second reading for this year’s Solemnity, which is taken from Ephesians 4:1-13. The verses I want to focus on are verses 11-13. Paul writes,
And he gave some as apostles, others as prophets,
others as evangelists, others as pastors and teachers,
to equip the holy ones for the work of ministry,
for building up the body of Christ,
until we all attain to the unity of faith
and knowledge of the Son of God, to mature to manhood,
to the extent of the full stature of Christ.
Notice that Paul says the different ministries of the church are ordered to leading man to “mature manhood” (v.13). The Greek word for mature is teleois, which means complete or perfect.
Now, this is apologetically significant because it can be used discussions with Protestants about Sola Scriptura, the doctrine that Scripture is our sole infallible rule of faith. Protestants often appeal to 2 Timothy 3:16-17 for biblical support of this belief. There Paul says, “
All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
That Paul says Scripture is profitable to make man “complete,” so it’s argued, proves that Scripture is all a Christian needs to know which good works he needs to perform to achieve Christian perfection. The Greek word for “complete” is artios, which means just that: completeness or perfection.
But Sola Scriptura no more follows from this passage than sola Ecclesia (Church alone) follows from Paul’s statement that the ministries of the Church lead to “complete,” or “mature,” manhood. That the ministries of the Church can make a man complete doesn’t mean the ministries of the Church is all we need to achieve such perfection.
Similarly, just because the Scriptures can help a man become complete or perfect doesn’t mean there aren’t other things needed to achieve such perfection, as evidenced by Ephesians 4:13.
Okay, let’s now turn to our Gospel reading, again, taken from Mark 16:15-20. Jesus said to his disciples,
“Go into the whole world
and proclaim the gospel to every creature.
Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved;
whoever does not believe will be condemned.
These signs will accompany those who believe:
in my name they will drive out demons,
they will speak new languages.
They will pick up serpents with their hands,
and if they drink any deadly thing, it will not harm them.
They will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.”
So then the Lord Jesus, after he spoke to them,
was taken up into heaven
and took his seat at the right hand of God.
But they went forth and preached everywhere,
while the Lord worked with them
and confirmed the word through accompanying signs.
The Catechism teaches that infant baptism is an “immemorial tradition of the Church,” (1252) and that the Church baptizes infants “for the remission of sins even tiny infants who have not committed personal sin” (403).
But some Protestants, such as the late Norman Geisler and Ralph MacKenzie in their book Roman Catholics and Evangelicals (pg. 481), object that this belief contradicts Mark 16:16, part of our Gospel reading, where Jesus says, “He who believes and is baptized will be saved.” These Protestants see this as clear evidence that baptism is to be given only to those who have professed faith in Christ. This is why it’s sometimes called a “believer’s baptism.”
If belief must precede baptism, and infants can’t profess belief since they can’t reason yet, it follows that infants can’t be baptized. To do so would be to go against the instruction of Jesus.
I address this objection in my book Meeting the Protestant Challenge: How to Answer 50 Biblical Objections to Catholic Beliefs. I’m going to share a few of those responses here. For the remaining responses, you can check out the book.
Here’s our first response: Jesus doesn’t say that belief precedes baptism. He simply makes belief a condition for salvation along with baptism.
Nowhere in Scripture does Jesus say, “He who believes first, and then is baptized, will be saved.” He simply made belief and baptism two conditions for salvation, without stipulating the order.
For an adult, of course, faith will come first because faith is what leads him to the waters of baptism (CCC 1262). But for an infant who is baptized, the faith of the parents and of the Church suffices. As St. Thomas Aquinas teaches in his Summa Theologiae III:68:9, the faith of the parents, and indeed the whole Church, “profits the child through the operation of the Holy Ghost,” because the child, before the use of reason, “believes not by himself but by others.” This being the case, the child receives salvation “not by [his] own act, but by the act of the Church.”
This doesn’t mean that the infant won’t have to personally make an act of faith in Christ as he or she comes to the age of reason. Such a profession will be necessary on condition that the child comes to know the truth of God’s revelation. But as an infant, the faith of the parents and the Church suffices, thus meeting both of Jesus’ conditions for salvation: belief and baptism.
Our second response follows from the first: the idea that the faith of the parents and the Church suffices to meet the faith condition is consistent with Jesus’ practice of administering blessings on behalf of the faith of others.
Consider, first of all, how Jesus instructs his disciples, “Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them; for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 19:14). Jesus is not opposed to children being members of his kingdom.
And Mark’s version indicates that these probably were little children unable to make an act of faith, since Mark says that Jesus “took them in his arms and blessed them, laying his hands upon them” (Mark 10:16). The act of giving our children over to Christ in baptism, even though they can’t make an act of faith, is consistent with Jesus’ desire for children to be brought to him.
Furthermore, there are examples in the Bible where Jesus administers blessings specifically on behalf of the faith of the parents. Take Jesus’ decision to raise Jairus’s daughter from the dead (Mark 5:22-23, 35-43). The young girl made no profession of faith in Christ, yet Jesus still performed the miracle. And we can infer that it was on behalf of Jairus’s faith, because Jesus tells Jairus, “Do not fear, only believe” (v.36). That Jesus then performed the miracle tells us that Jairus did believe, and Jesus performed the miracle as a result.
Similarly, in Mark 9:14-27 Jesus exorcizes a demon-possessed boy in response to his father’s request, even though the boy had no faith. Mark makes explicit that Jesus performed the exorcism in response to the father’s faith: “Jesus said to him… ‘All things are possible to him who believes.’ Immediately the father of the child cried out and said, ‘I believe; help my unbelief!’” (vv.23-24). If a parent’s faith sufficed for Jesus to physically raise a girl from the dead and free a boy from demonic possession, then it’s reasonable to conclude that a parent’s faith can suffice for a child under the age of reason to receive the blessings of baptism.
We can also take into account the household baptisms mentioned in Scripture. For example, when the Philippian jailer asks Paul what he must do to be saved (Acts 16:30), Paul responds, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household” (v.31). We’re then told that Paul spoke the “word of the Lord” to the jailer and his household that evening, after which they were all baptized (vv.32-33). Notice that the jailer’s faith was sufficient to bring the blessing of baptism upon his entire family, members of which may have been children under the age of reason.
The idea of salvation being brought to the Philippian jailer and his household is reminiscent of Peter’s words on Pentecost: “Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you and to your children.” Children, no matter how old, can be recipients of the gift of the Spirit in baptism on behalf of the faith of the parents.
Other examples of household baptisms administered on behalf of the faith of the parent are Lydia’s household (Acts 16:15) and the household of Stephanas (1 Cor. 1:16). It’s true that we don’t know for sure that these households had children under the age of reason. Nevertheless, blessings still come upon these households on behalf of the faith of the parents.
Although our two responses here don’t involve any positive evidence for infant baptism, they are sufficient to diffuse the challenge under consideration. For the positive evidence from both scripture and early Christian testimony, you’re going to have to get my book.
Conclusion
Well, my friends, that does it for this episode of the Sunday Catholic Word. The readings for this upcoming Solemnity of the Ascension, Year B provides us with a plethora of apologetical material. There’s stuff here for
• Making a case for the bodily resurrection of Jesus,
• The Sacrament of Confirmation,
• Jesus’ Divinity,
• Sola Scriptura, and
• The Sacrament of Baptism
As always, thank you for subscribing to the podcast. And please be sure to tell your friends about it and invite them to subscribe as well at sundaycatholicword.com. You might also want to check out the other great podcasts in our Catholic Answers podcast network: Cy Kellet’s Catholic Answers Focus, Trent Horn’s The Counsel of Trent, Joe Heschmeyer’s Shameless Popery, and Jimmy Akin’s A Daily Defense, all of which can be found at catholic.com.
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I hope you have a blessed Solemnity of the Ascension, Year B. Until next time, God Bless!