Baptism

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srfnolen

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I have accepted this by faith but can someone tell me how original sin is removed and the spiritual gifts received at baptism when a tiny baby does not have the capacity to understand what is happening much less agree to it?
 
Catechism:

The Baptism of infants

1250 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.50 The sheer gratuitousness of the grace of salvation is particularly manifest in infant Baptism. The Church and the parents would deny a child the priceless grace of becoming a child of God were they not to confer Baptism shortly after birth.

1251 Christian parents will recognize that this practice also accords with their role as nurturers of the life that God has entrusted to them.

1252 The practice of infant Baptism is an immemorial tradition of the Church. There is explicit testimony to this practice from the second century on, and it is quite possible that, from the beginning of the apostolic preaching, when whole “households” received baptism, infants may also have been baptized.

scborromeo.org/ccc/p2s2c1a1.htm#1231
 
Tis a wonderful gift of God to a little one who has been born into a Christian Family etc The Parents and the Church bring the Child to God for this grace. Baptism is Gods work…it is it is Christ who baptizes via human hands. The Holy Trintity gives the true life to the little one. Makes him a new creation in Christ.

CCC “The sheer gratuitousness of the grace of salvation is particularly manifest in infant Baptism.”
 
Compendium issued by Pope Benedict XVI
  1. Why does the Church baptize infants?
1250

The Church baptizes infants because they are born with original sin. They need to be freed from the power of the Evil One and brought into that realm of freedom which belongs to the children of God.
  1. What is required of one who is to be baptized?
1253-1255

Everyone who is to be baptized is required to make a profession of faith. This is done personally in the case of an adult or by the parents and by the Church in the case of infants. Also the godfather or the godmother and the whole ecclesial community share the responsibility for baptismal preparation (catechumenate) as well as for the development and safeguarding of the faith and grace given at baptism.

vatican.va/archive/compendium_ccc/documents/archive_2005_compendium-ccc_en.html
 
I would just add an analogy of an infant that is written into the will of a grandfather. The inheritance is his even though he doesn’t understand it and in fact knows nothing about it. His inheritance is given into the safeguarding of his parents until the time that he is able to understand it and claim it as his own. Nevertheless, until that time, it is still his by inheritance.

As is described multiple times in the Bible, we are the children of God by adoption and as such heirs to the kingdom of God. Baptism is the adoption process. Not a perfect analogy, but I think it makes it easier to understand.
 
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