I am not too sure if I am clear on why we baptise at birth. I know it’s in the bible. But why do we do it at birth?
Is it because of original sin?
The reason I am asking is that some protestants are asking me about weather or not children who are before the age of reason, that are not baptised, are absolved from original sin?
I am therefore wondering if a parent can actually be responsible for a child’s salvation or non salvation if that unbaptised child dies before the age of reason?
Is it because of original sin?
Yes to some extent, but that is not the only reason.
The reason I am asking is that some protestants are asking me about weather or not children who are before the age of reason, that are not baptised, are absolved from original sin?
No, unless God has some other way that we don’t know about.
I am therefore wondering if a parent can actually be responsible for a child’s salvation or non salvation if that unbaptised child dies before the age of reason?
Yes, to the extent that the parent know of their responsibility.
We are conceived with original sin on our souls because Adam sinned as the representative of the human race not as an individual. His sin was a sin of pride manifesting itself in an act of disobedience. Every human born in the ordinary course of nature, except the blessed virgin alone, is from the first moment of existence (conception) “in the state of sin”. It is through Baptism that original sin is normally washed away.
Therefore the Church strongly encourages parents to have their children baptized as soon as possible. For our Lord states “Unless a man be born again of water and the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.” (Jn 5:3) In Matt 19:14 , Jesus say’s “Suffer the little children, and forbid them not to come to me; for the kingdom of heaven is for such;…” Just as the old law required parents to present their children on the eighth day in the temple for circumcision, the baptism of the old testament, we are required to present our children in the Church, for the baptism of the new testament. It is through Baptism that we are brought into the universal society of the saints. Baptism and the remission of original sin is so important to eternal salvation that the Church clearly teaches that in necessity (danger of death) ANYONE can baptize.
Christ’s redemptive merits are not actually applied to a new-born child until, in baptism, he is incorporated with Christ. Being born without grace and subject to the universal effects of the fall of Adam, he is born a citizen of the natural kingdom only. That means that until it’s rebirth in baptism, the child is subjected to and influenced by Satan! This is again the reason the church say’s that children should be baptized as soon as possible, to put them beyond Satan’s power.
On the subject of children who die with out baptism the church is silent for the most part. Some of the fathers have addressed the issue but their opinions are not in unified or infallible teaching. The Council of Florence (1439) stated “the souls of those who depart this life, either in actual mortal sin or in original sin only, go down at once into hell, there however to suffer disparate penalties.” Pope Pius V in 1567, condemned writings that said that an “unbaptised child will hate God.” Pope Pius VI In 1794 condemned errors by the Erantian synod that rejected that “the lower regions in which the souls of those dying in original sin alone are punished with the pain of loss without the pain of fire…”
However without any ecclesiastical authority, it is accepted that unbaptised children are deprived of the beatific vision of God, but it is most probable that the state of unbaptised children in the next world is one of peace and natural happiness.
The following must be clearly understood; that the child who dies without baptism is definitely excluded from the kingdom of heaven, based on Scripture. They are not in some middle state between heaven and hell. We are made to be united with God as our final end. Failure to reach this end, either by our own fault or by someone else’s fault, results in the eternal loss of union with God!
