Holy water

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I´m not really sure about what holy water really is. what does it do?
What do we do when we bless ourselves with holy water.
How can someone get it? asking a priest to bless the water? can we bless it? i´ve heard doctors can baptize little babies who have died before being born.

:blessyou:
 
You’ve got quite a few questions in that post, so I’ll try and answer them in order:

1.) I´m not really sure about what holy water really is. what does it do?

Holy water is what the Church calls a “sacramental”. A sacramental is a physical object which has been blessed (had a prayer said over) that God might grant special graces to those who use or keep the sacramental. In the case of holy water, the hope is that those who are touched with it might receive a renewal of the graces of baptism to help us recommit our lives to Christ.

2.) What do we do when we bless ourselves with holy water?

Normally, upon passing a font of holy water, we will dip our fingers in it and them make the Sign of the Cross (using either hand, touch your forehead, then chest, then left shoulder, then right shoulder). When we do this, we should meditate on our baptism, remembering that we have been born again in Christ, and that the baptismal water has cleansed our souls and made us a new creation.

3.) How can someone get it? Asking a priest to bless the water? can we bless it?

A priest must bless the water. In many churches there will be a small dispenser filled with holy water that the faithful may use to fill their own vessels to take home. Ask your priest or someone at your parish about this.

4.) I´ve heard doctors can baptize little babies who have died before being born.

This is true, but they do not bless the water. Holy water is not absolutely necessary for baptism, though it is normally necessary. By this I mean that baptism is supposed to take place in a church, be performed by the priest, and use blessed water. However, in cases of extreme necessity, any person can validly baptise a person with regular water by using the Trinitarian Formula “I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”, and intending to invoke the Trinity to baptise.

Hope this helps!
 
Dr. Colossus:
4.) I´ve heard doctors can baptize little babies who have died before being born.

This is true, but they do not bless the water. Holy water is not absolutely necessary for baptism, though it is normally necessary. By this I mean that baptism is supposed to take place in a church, be performed by the priest, and use blessed water. However, in cases of extreme necessity, any person can validly baptise a person with regular water by using the Trinitarian Formula “I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”, and intending to invoke the Trinity to baptise.

Hope this helps!
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I agree with what you mean, but not what you say. Yes, doctors, and anyone else for that matter, can baptise someone in grave circumstances, and yes, only a validly ordained can bless water. But you missed the wording of the original question:

“Can baptize babies who have died before they were born.”

You cannot baptise someone who has already died. To think you can do so is one of the errors of the Mormon religion. A doctor can baptise a child who was born in poor condition and is about to die, but cannot baptise if he has already died.

Josh
 
But you missed the wording of the original question:
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“Can baptize babies who have died before they were born.”
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Oh wow! Mea Maxima Culpa!!!. You cannot baptize a person once they have died. Yeesh! Don’t know how I missed that! :o
 
what would happen to the baby then? he/she never had the chance to be baptised…would he/she go to heaven?
thanks for the comments!
peace and love
 
what would happen to the baby then? he/she never had the chance to be baptised…would he/she go to heaven?
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That is a subject of debate among Catholics. The Grace of Baptism is necessary for one to enter the Beatific Vision.

We can hope that God, in His Mercy, will extent that Grace to the child as a Gift.

If there was a definitive intend of the parents to baptize the child, a baptism of desire is considered a possibility.

On the baptism of a stillborn infant; ‘baptism’ of one who is dead is not considered valid or licit. But, IIRC a baptism can be done while there is still a remnant of life within the body. As that can include a single cell, that time frame can be quite a while after ‘clinical’ death.

A child who died in childbirth would most likely benefit of a baptism. One who died in utero would most likely not.
 
One thing that the Church does make clear is that unbaptized, innocent children do not go to Hell. Hell requires personal guilt, of which a newborn does not have. Therefore, it is postulated that there is either a place of natural good where the souls go, with no suffering, but no beatific vision (think limbo), or that God extends His grace in some way to allow them into Heaven.
 
I have heard that Bl. Mother Teresa baptized someone who everyone else thought was dead, only the person came back to life and then after died. :rolleyes: I don’t know how true this is but it hightlights the fact that we don’t know if the baby is completly dead. I read somewhere that what you could say in a case of Baptizing a baby born “dead” was: If you are living, I baptized you in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
When I miscarried my baby at 3months in the womb, I baptized him/her right away at home. The intention was if there was some life, then it was worth doing the baptism.
 
Super mom, how did you baptize your miscarried child? how would that work? i understand your reasons, but I dont get how. Please explain. YOu seem like an excellent mother who cares deeply for all your children, I hope my question doesn’t offend you.
 
QUESTION:

How much holy water can a priest bless at once?

What happens if someone drinks Holy Water?
(like what about if on a trip a bottle of water is blessed for use as Holy Water, is improperly marked, and then someone drinks it)
 
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raphaela:
Super mom, how did you baptize your miscarried child? how would that work? i understand your reasons, but I dont get how. Please explain. YOu seem like an excellent mother who cares deeply for all your children, I hope my question doesn’t offend you.
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No offence taken at all! I’m glad to share with you what happened. I was at home when the miscarriage occured. I felt the baby come out and ran to the bathroom. I held my little one in my hand as I poured running water over him/her and said the proper words. Of course I was upset and shaking and had to explain it to my children who were home when this happeded. I also called my husband who was at work. I was fine after. I wasn’t sick at all and we planned a little private funeral. Now I’m going to tell you a real, real miracle. Two months after I felt a kicking in the womb from my baby! I went for an ultasound and the baby was 5 months old !!! Yes, I had miscarried one twin. I went on to deliver this baby. ❤️ He was born on the feast of the Guardian Angels :angel1: and is 8yr old now. I probably should post this in the Miracules thread.

(What happens if someone drinks Holy Water?
(like what about if on a trip a bottle of water is blessed for use as Holy Water, is improperly marked, and then someone drinks it)

Nothing bad would happen. People drink holy water if they eat or drink anything that was given to them by someone putting a hex on them. The priest would advise them to drink holy water. It was in that book I mentioned, The Exercist of Rome, by Fr. Amorth.
 
When I was a child I was told they made holy water by boiling the hell out of it. True or false ?
 
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tom.wineman:
When I was a child I was told they made holy water by boiling the hell out of it. True or false ?
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LOL, this is an old Catholic joke. Water is make holy by a priest’s blessing.
 
Super Mom,

What a wonderful miracle you have, a walking testament! I didn’t know about the “remanent of life” thing. I am glad to have found out.

God Bless
 
holy water is water that has been blessed by a human but people belive that it is holy

at the end of the day it is just water
 
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kpnuts2k:
holy water is water that has been blessed by a human but people belive that it is holy

at the end of the day it is just water
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You are entitled to your opinion, of course. However, as Catholics we believe that blessings, like all other prayers, are efficacious. Holy water, like other sacramentals, is a mundane physical object that has been prayed over by a priest. This prayer asks God to bless the water, that those who come in contact with it might remember their baptism, and receive special Grace and strength with which to do God’s will. It’s not magic, it’s simply a physical expression of prayer. We believe that Christ Jesus, through His Incarnation, showed His followers that the physical realm is as holy as the spiritual, and that the physical can convey the Lord’s Grace as well.
 
yer and i belive that if you bless someone god does bless them but at the end of the day it still evaporates! lol:)
 
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kpnuts2k:
yer and i belive that if you bless someone god does bless them but at the end of the day it still evaporates! lol:)
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True, the physical makeup of the water is not changed.
 
In the Eastern Churches our holy water is blessed on Jan. 6th by the priest. It is a part of his gift from God to bless. He, then comes to our homes and blesses our homes. It is customary for people to also drink the water. Some people are cured of their ills from drinking it. Or, you can pour it on a diseased part of your body. (I had some spots on my arm that disappeared when I poured holy water on them. I’m not saying it was a miracle but I believe that God can work miracles. We have the example of Christ curing the man who was lame and couldn’t walk. He had no one to help him to go into the waters of Siloe. These were miraculous waters.)
 
I believe Jim said on catholic answers tonite, that you can baptize a person after death. It depends on how long, because nobody knows for sure when the soul leaves the body. If a person has been dead for a day or days, then don’t have them baptised. I think that’s what he said, but the shower was making lot of noise.
 
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