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It is the common practice of the Catholic Church and of most
Christian denominations to baptize children. Generally, in the regions
commonly considered Christian, they are the subjects of Baptism. In
recent years this traditional practice has been the object of
controversy and of particular interest on the part of theologians and
men of pastoral action. According to the theological argumentation, the
baptism of children always presents itself, in the framework of the
sacramentality of the Church, with the unquestionable features of
exceptionality, since it is a "sacrament of faith" conferred
on subjects that are materially incapable of acts of faith. From the
point of view of men of pastoral action, concerned with the personal
dispositions of the persons to be baptized, there is a tendency to
postpone the celebration of the event of salvation. In fact the concerns
of the so-called "theologians" and "pastoralists"
have common roots which it would not be possible to disentangle if the question
is left on the field of pure discussion without the
latter being conducted with exact lines of method.
Validity and legitimacy of Baptism of children
First and foremost it is clear that the validity of the Baptism of
children or its legitimacy is not questioned. This is a reality that has
been sanctioned also by other Christian denominations. See the document
"Faith and Constitution" of the "World Council of
Churches" on "Baptism—the Eucharist—Ministries"
(Baptism nn. 12-14). The discussion turns on the contrary on the
suitability or the opportuneness of the baptism of children. On this
question, in the Catholic world it is not the thought of individual—so-called—scholars
or of particular communities that is the authority. Not only in truths
but also in practice concerning the Sacraments it is ecclesial thought
that counts.
The Church could not conform to the expectations of men if these
expectations were to harm her faithfulness to the mandate of Jesus
Christ. This is equivalent to stating that it is not merely human
parameters, the fruit of intelligence or of the ways of thinking and
conceiving realities, that govern the way of acting in the Church in the
first, place. For this reason, a practice, if it is universal and
constant within the Church, could not be understood unless in relation
to the "verum" present in ecclesial vitality; which would be
reduced in the last analysis to an interpretative and practical
principle to be faithful to the Lord.
It is true that usually the line of pastoral action may seem to
depend solely on the socio-cultural situation in which the Church,
placed in given spatial and temporal co-ordinates, happens to find
herself. But, more or less indirectly, tradition in operational terms
always presupposes a way of considering the identical "mysterium".
This means that the activity of the Church must not be considered
separately from the context of the economy of salvation, but as a
historicizing of salvation, a making it present to all men. The
activity of the Church, in fact, did not develop
just anyhow, but organically, with the result of enriching and
deepening the same unique deposit of the faith. So that
typical expressions by means of which the Church has given concrete
forms to truth, which have taken on tonalities or emphases, enjoy a
right to existence, if it is not desired to falsify the balance of the
deposit of faith. It would also be the case of the traditional practice
of the baptism of children, a practice which—in spite of its
obviousness and venerability, has already on other occasions—in the
course of history—raised for theologians and pastors the question of
its suitability and opportuneness.
Methodologically, attention must be drawn here at once to the fact
that the practice of the church to baptize children, beyond disputes and
the "nonsolution" of objections or questions in the
theoretical field, has always constantly persisted and prevailed. It
would not be any use to put forward the argument that there is on the
one side the "esse", the evangelical value of Baptism, that
which the Magisterium and theology have highlighted in the course of the
centuries, interpreting the Word of God, and on the other side the "fieri",
its development in the temporality of the life (lives) of the Church;
because the "esse" and the "fieri" cannot be in
opposition but are in harmonious interpretation. The synthesis of these
two elements, according to ecclesial understanding, must aim at a growth
of the vital deepening of what the "ecclesia" has assimilated
for a long time, and not to questioning always and again what has
already been obtained. In fact to claim to go back over the whole way
again without keeping in mind .the meaning of ecclesial practice, is to
err and seriously, since understanding of ecclesial vitality is either
weakened or partly falsified or misinterpreted.
The least that can be said is that we could find ourselves up against
a case of infantilism or snobbism of the theological type.
Vitality of the Church and the life of faith
It is a question in the last analysis of grasping all the
implications of the principle of the organic development of
enrichment and deepening of the deposit of the faith. This
is equivalent to being able to assert: when it is a question of
authentic living and vital theology—that is, theology which, though
renewing itself and adapting itself to the requirements of the times,
remains, in the continuity of tradition, faithful to itself as the
science of Christian Revelation—then it is certain that the
affirmations arrived at in the investigation and the operational
practices derived from them, will be nothing but the confirmation in a
clearer, more convincing and thorough way, of what was already
professed, believed and celebrated elsewhere and in other times.
Organic development of deposit of faith
This principle of vital increase is, moreover, in direct connection
with another one that helps us to understand the continuity of ecclesial
practice in the service of the organic development of the deposit of the
faith. We are referring to the principle of the pastoral functioning
of the ways of celebrating at which the Church arrives—always
enriching herself—in the course of the centuries, "sub
ductu Spiritus Sancti". In fact it is the Holy Spirit which, in
ecclesial action, leads the Church to progressive development, to an
ever wider deepening, to become more vitally operative. In other words,
there does not exist in the critical realities of the Church a
degradation of her vitality. Without any doubt, it is possible to read,
with the eye of faith, in the present discussions on the suitability and
opportuneness of the Baptism of children, a passing of the Spirit,
provided his way of acting in the Church from the Apostles until today
is not contrasted. The theoretical discussion, in fact, if carried out
along the correct and sound methodological lines, will certainly lead to
rediscovering the intrinsic preciousness of the practice of the Baptism
of children, its value for the life of faith and of full love for
Christ-the Church.
Turning to the reality of the Baptism of children, through the
understanding that every Christian age has had of it, it is for us today
to discover and penetrate again the meaning of the "Mysterium"
of Christ-Church, which gives a meaning to all the events of history. We
mean to stress that if the baptism of children belongs to the order of
salvation and is a gift actively welcomed by the Church, it can be
known, understood and studied only as a result of accepting the whole
word of God developed and matured organically in the Church which is its
depositary. This amounts to saying that we can speak of the baptism of
children only where there exists a continual and simultaneous reference
to the whole ecclesial tissue; that is, we can speak of it where there
exists a deep connection with the Revelation carried out and made
perennial in the life of the Church. While the baptism of children is
the gift of Holy Trinity, it is at the same time the ecclesial activity
of response to the gift: the activity of faith answering God who speaks.
It is not an abstract reality, it is not the fruit of intellectualistic
or voluntaristic positions. On the contrary, it is an existential and
dialogical attitude.
It is a question, therefore, of investigating that adherence to Holy
Trinity—also in the modality of the baptism of children—is not an
affective attitude, but is to enter the perspectives of the plan of
salvation, which is a plan of efficacious signs or a sacramentary plan:
in a word, liturgical. This aspect which integrates, completes and
expresses lived faith, ecclesial life, requires greater study in
relation to the baptism of children. And this study must not and cannot
be reduced to the desire to "produce something new'" or to
discover some nicety that has escaped preceding investigations but must
extend to the aspiration to succeed—by it gift of God—in deepening
study of the divine message of salvation. This is equivalent to saying
that the study is of the word of God, transmitted and vitalized by the
Church, celebrated, put into practice, vivified and realized by a vital
attitude of worship.
The efforts that are being made nowadays to understand and study more
deeply the reality of the baptism of children, must move, therefore, in
the perennity of what Christianity has done and is doing to grasp the
"newness of the Gospel" and the magnificence inherent in the
practice of the baptism of children. With regard to this event, it is
legitimate to discuss and it is right to investigate in order to face
the truth and become more deeply aware of the vitality of such a
significant ecclesial practice. The latter will be more and more
incomprehensible the more the claim is made to study it in wrong
perspectives, such as the following three.
Three possible errors
Those errors are: Minimism, which is a tendency to stop only
at some elements among those required in order that these may be the
event of salvation, and to intensify investigation only on them,
degrading the magnificence of the event to which we have just referred,
and also breaking the balance of the parts inserted in a whole. Fragmentation,
which consists in not keeping in mind the fact that Baptism,
Confirmation and the Eucharist must be considered as a whole, in an
overall view. The subject, more than "celebrate" this or that
sacrament, unites with God in Jesus, gradually and more deeply. The
globality of the adherence and of the richness of the response to the
Father's invitation in Christ by virtue of the Spirit is pedagogically
sanctioned and emphasized in "various" rites. Particularism,
by means of which, in dealing with and in seeking to solve a problem,
only some necessities are preferably kept in mind, sometimes to the
extent of losing sight of the whole in which a detail must be
integrated. In a word it is not so much the empirical level, by means of
which the ritual element is emphasized, that is important in the baptism
of children as in the baptism of adults. It is rather the theologico-liturgical
level, through which the event of salvation is integrated in the
interpersonal relationship that man can and must have with Trinity and
will, the Church.
Lines of pastoral action
Wishing to summarize from a historical of view the two main lines of
pastoral action that refer to the Baptism of children, it would be
necessary to recall the one that aims at conferring the sacrament on
those who offer sufficient guarantees of personal dispositions, and the
other which is concerned chiefly with its celebration. They are two
extreme cases, two trends which seem dictated solely by practical
reasons of adaptation to concrete situations: the more or less intense
Christianization of the environment. Thus an apostolate concerned mainly
with the personal dispositions of the persons to be baptized is
conditioned by the sociological situation of the Church as a minority;
seeks to find its theological justification in the close relationship
existing between faith and sacrament, to such an extent as to consider
Baptism mostly as "sacramentum fidei". And, viceversa, the
practice of Baptism conferred "quamprimum", though depending
on the historical situation of the "faith of a community", has
its roots in the theological vision of Baptism considered principally as
an "instrument of salvation" whose efficacy is "ex opere
operato".
Going on to consider the roots of the present discussion on the
Baptism of children which are found in the polemics kindled by Karl
Barth, this discussion should already be considerably redimensioned.
Barth's positions would be plausible, if at all, only within his
theological system. It is not honest to deduce from heterodox premises
consequences of heteropraxis. Nor is it wise to borrow conclusions
originating in a matrix completely "sui generis" and apply
them in other situations. In the Catholic field, at least as regards
theoretical discussion, acquired data are fixed within precise limits.
From the historical point of view, the authors prove almost
unanimously the very ancient origin of the traditional baptismal
practice; and in any case the Baptism of children, which is not in any
way the fruit of a late and degenerating process of evolution, is proved
as a legitimate and historically justified custom. From the theological
point of view it is justified with the classical terms of Augustinian
thought and of the declarations of the Council of Trent, as an event
carried out in the faith of the Church. In fact it is a particularly
expressive sign of the anticipating grace of God and of the universality
of his plan of salvation. There still remains today, according to a
fringe of theologians, the task of studying and investigating what deep
theological view is at the origin of the pastoral practice itself.
However, the legitimacy of the Baptism of children leaves open, it is
true, the problem of the suitability and opportuneness of its
administration. This is said to be connected with the deep change of the
opportuneness of the Baptism of children.
Now it would be possible to discuss the pros and cons "sine
die" on the theoretical plane. However, to keep the discussion far
from landing up at something exotic or extemporaneous, we would like to
recall what we wrote above and to add a further series of reflections,
still in the sphere of method and what is more, pastoral method.
First of all it should be considered that on the pastoral plane the
exacerbating of problems that can concern the ecclesial structures, is
in bad taste and already harmful from the outset.
Supposing that the intention is not to exacerbate, but to weigh up
and take seriously into consideration the problem of the baptism of
children, then it will have to be agreed that, from a point of view of
professional ethics, the pastor must create the conditions typical and
characteristic of a Christian setting in order that the baptism of
children may be celebrated. Therefore the pastor must first endeavour to
create the typical ground in order that the practice may continue
according to the criteria of the Church. Nor is the Pastor justified in
imitating or transplanting solutions of other countries or of
other local churches "sic et simpliciter", even if, in his
judgment, the conditions are similar, without having first pondered all
the themes and all the possibilities in agreement with his bishop, and
bishop, according to the wise norms of "overall pastoral
care", in agreement with his confrères in the episcopate according
to those typical regional territorial divisions created recently and
strengthened after the Second Vatican Council.
Then, too, there is clear proof of lack of aggiornamento, that
is, of lack of qualification in the matter, on the part of those
theologians and those pastors who approve and admit the validity and
legitimacy of the baptism of children in theory (otherwise they would be
outside the Catholic world) but in practice justify and support,
sometimes rashly, sometimes with apparent prudence, the practice of
delaying Baptism for children, to such an extent as to fall into
contradiction and create a dichotomy between "esse" and "fieri".
This is outside true theology. There exists, in fact, and unfortunately
not only for the case of the Baptism of children, a kind of
"dichotomy" in some theologians and pastors. The latter, when
reasoning theoretically, when asserting on the intellectual plane, are
in agreement with the tenets of the Church. But when it comes to
practice, they act or make people act, as if everything were the reverse
of what they profess.
Thus for the baptism of children its non-suitability or non-opportuneness
is advocated in such a way, in practice, as to give rise to serious
suspicions that they find it advantageous to assert the truth in words
but then to demolish it in practice. Sometimes, too, it is claimed to
justify it with enquiries or surveys of the sociological or some other
type: things which are all useful but so relative and contingent that
they—most certainly—cannot say the last word. All the more so in
that these methods can always be manoeuvred or preconstructed according
to the intention of the collector and are bound up with the
"ground" on which they are applied. This "ground"
could be so falsified by bad catechesis or the lack of it that it would
not give rise to any result except that of becoming aware of the
necessity of catechizing, or even of preevangelizing.
It remains therefore an unalterable necessity to integrate the
baptism of children in the wide framework of the opening of present-day
sacramental theory in order not to debase or distort the dynamism of
this event of salvation: taking into account, obviously, the
methodological lines to which we have referred up to now. To this we
would like to add that, as always happens, the apostolate must find a
justification in the theological field, so that a falsified theology is
always accompanied by an unbalanced apostolate. This is so even if it is
inevitably true that the sound and perennial apostolate may not yet be
consciously aware of what the theology on which it is based is like.
This is the case of the baptism of children, the practice of which
already reveals in itself a way in which the Church, in the course of
the centuries, has thought fit to interpret and put into practice her
fidelity to the Lord's mandate. Today, in fact, people are becoming
consciously aware of this and other truths, which constitute the
substratum underlying the necessity of baptizing also children.
Vatican II aided by theological understanding
It is true, certainly, that points of theological discussion also
exist today. This legitimate discussion cannot stop the practice but
should aim only at deeper study of the theological hinterland of the
practice itself. It is, in fact, this deeper theological study that will
make the apostolate of the baptism of children necessarily become more
exacting. For this reason it should be recalled that the observations
that can, and we repeat, must be made, cannot aim in the slightest at
denying or underestimating the pastoral duty of the Church to go towards
all and to welcome all those who present themselves and ask to
participate in her signs of salvation. It is a question on the contrary
of shedding better light on some aspects of the sacramental reality of
the baptism of children, in order to guide pastoral reflection and help
it to emerge from some blind-alleys or from some contradictions in which
it happens to fall.
Now it is the very emphases contained in the documents of the Second
Vatican Council that help us to end the errors which it is sometimes
difficult not to make. In fact, it is true that Baptism is the event
through which men participate in Christ's paschal mystery (SC 6;
LG 7; UR 22; AG 14), are incorporated into the
Church, the new priestly, prophetic and royal people (LG 10. 11.
14. 31; SC 14; AA 3; AG 6. 15; PO 5), the
event which marks the beginning of the new life in the Spirit of Christ,
aiming entirely at worship and at the commitment of testimony (SC
14; AG 10. 11. 33. 40. 44; AA 3). Consequently,
this means that it will no longer be a question of justifying the
practice of the baptism of children as an isolated fact, or of affirming
its necessity primarily or solely with a view to purification from
original sin. It will be a question of clarifying the very meaning of
Baptism in relation to the great theologico-liturgical lines, the
achievement of the theology of this century, sanctioned and adopted by
the official Magisterium of the Holy Church of God, solemnly supported
by the Second Vatican Council. These mark on the one hand a return to
the ancient sources, and on the other hand a sign of the presence of the
Spirit in the Church.
It seems to us, in fact, that in this way "research" will
find the right way which keeps it far from a repetition of commonplaces,
deprived of vitality, announcements and practical results, and far also
from continual and inorganic innovations which would disturb the
perennity and authenticity of research itself. Consequently the
collateral pastoral practice takes on more and more the tonality and
characteristic of ecclesial practice. Just from the constant and lasting
practice of baptizing children, must be gathered, in harmony with the
points stressed by the Second Vatican Council, the necessity inherent in
the Church of integrating children in the new life in the Spirit of
Christ, constituting as they do an important stage in the development of
the Christian community. And this is far from being a utilitarian view.
It is, on the contrary, a critical reality in order to put into practice
the Saviour's will, which the Church tries to carry out.
Are there reasons for the non-appropriateness of baptism for
children?
If it were necessary to suggest motives that militate on the pastoral
plane for the non-suitability of the baptism of children, it should be
said that there are fundamentally two. First, the experience that a
large number of baptized children do not subsequently receive, in actual
fact, sufficient instruction and education in the Christian faith; then,
the motivations which lead many parents to ask for the baptism of their
children are far from the real sacramental nature of Baptism. It is a
question, radically, of a problem of adequate and appropriate catechesis
of adults, that is, of creating the suitable ground for maintaining the
practice in force in the Church. We are certain that, in practice, there
will be unity in the apostolate of the universal Church. This apostolate
of the baptism of children must move on concrete lines in order to
create the ideal ground for the continuity and perennity of the practice
of the baptism of children. Then the apostolate will have to vivify some
key points, to which we wish to draw attention,
Faith and baptism of children
Today, too, stress is rightly laid on the inseparable bond that links
the faith to every sacrament. As a result of this the real attitude of
faith is considered as belonging to the "truth" of the
sacrament itself. This holds good also for the baptism of children which
is celebrated in the faith of the Church. Now it is clear that the faith
of the Church is necessary and sufficient to constitute the sacrament in
its objective plane, but that it cannot properly replace, unless in an
inchoative way, the faith of the candidate, which has it's place on the
subjective plane of personal acceptance of the salvific sign. The
sacrament is not just a gift of God, but also man's response to the
gift. Now the child (and like him also anyone who is physically an adult
and psychically a child) is a person. As such he is able to enter upon a
multi-personal relationship with the divine Persons and with the
faithful of the Church. He is a person capable of receiving the gift of
faith, which is made to him by Holy Trinity through the Church. He is
capable of it in a "childish" way and therefore actual
personal acceptance of the reality signified by the Baptism celebrated
is pressed for in the person of the child (as moreover in that of the
adult).
From the pastoral point of view the matter becomes a very important
one from a double standpoint. The first one, faith, that of the Church,
involved for the baptism not only of the child but of the adult, must be
made visible by the real and concrete faith in and by the local
Ecclesial Community in which the person to be baptized is integrated and
lives. In the case of the baptism of children it must be present and
made visible also in the family "domestic church" which
accepts the child. The second standpoint is that of the human reality
which surrounds the child, that is, the educative capacities of the
parents and the whole set of conditioners of his human and Christian
development. These realities must be aimed and directed at the dynamism
of the child's education in the faith of the Church, and so the faith of
the parents, together with the faith and the commitment of education to
the faith of the ecclesial community, plays a very important role in the
dynamism of Baptism. It is not actually a "sine qua non" role
or an irreplaceable role "in absoluto". It is a question, on
the contrary, of approaching the apostolate as an apostolate of
initiation, deepening growth and maturing of faith, which is an
essential part of Christian experience. Catechesis, not only in
preparation for the celebration but also following it, would regain the
whole truth. New tonalities would colour the Lenten itinerary, in which
the whole Church is invited to go back over and relive the stages of one’s
own catechumenate (whether it was really carried out in personal life
as an actual preparation for the celebration of Baptism, or whether
it was postponed or shortened or replaced or neglected) in order to
mature every year in the reality of Baptism-Confirmation-Eucharist,
until the age of full stature in Christ. This annual Lenten
catechumenate as a whole puts to the test the Christian
"depth" of communities and families. This periodic
catechumenal experience would allow also children and the young to
rediscover the reality of the Baptism-Confirmation vocation to the
faith. Also the penitential dimension of Christian life, a requirement
for conversion, could be lived in its authenticity in this pastoral
perspective. This, though admitting a variety of formulas for different
circumstances, is fundamentally the most convincing pastoral line on the
methodological plane. Among other things, it leaves room for the correct
understanding of the practice of the celebration of the sacrament of
penance itself in children. This celebration—if carried out as the
Church teaches us—would be a privileged moment for the maturing of the
individual towards sacramentary and ecclesial realities.
Ecclesiology and baptism of children
In the last analysis: it is the whole Church which must become aware
today that it must take its place at the side of every member of the
faithful to accompany him in the path of faith and Christian
responsibility that encompasses his whole existence. The practice of
baptizing children is not just a practice which is solved in an isolated
way. Like all sacramentary practices, it is fundamentally a problem of
the Church, a problem of constructing the Church. It is impossible to
conceive an apostolate of the baptism of children that does not have
repercussions on every catechetical activity of a parish; on preparation
for Confirmation, for the Eucharist, for the Sacrament of Marriage; or
on the family apostolate, on special group movements within the local
community, etc. It is a question, therefore, of strengthening at all
levels processes of the maturing of faith, of awareness of one's daily
conversion, of membership of the Church, and so on. In its deep
theological structure, Baptism is not only preceded, but rather followed
by a Christian life in continual evangelizing and catechizing aimed at
strengthening the processes which we have mentioned.
Sacramental action not only constitutes the ultimate goal at which
the apostolic work of the Church aims, but is also the foundation of its
very existence as a community of salvation. It is in the sacraments that
God builds his Church, making it the communion of faith and love with
God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit and with men. And it is again in the
sacraments that the Church responds as a community to God's gift in
faith and in worship. In this context one understands that it is the
Church, as community of salvation, that ensures to man a real meeting
with God, by inserting him in Christ's paschal mystery.
This means that even before being the fruit of a personal search,
salvation is a gift, a loving meeting that the Church obtains for us
objectively and efficaciously from God, by means of the
salvific-sacramentary events left by Christ to the Church by virtue of
the Spirit. It is the Church, the people of worship, which celebrates in
the individual, and the individual in the Church, the event of the sacrament.
The axiom holds good: The sacrament "fit in Ecclesia, pro
Ecclesia, cum Ecclesia". The validity and the authenticity of the
sacraments depend, fundamentally, on the fact that if the sacrament
exists, it exists because it is an act of the Church, community
of salvation, and not so much because it is an act of an individual or
several individuals who celebrate it. Personal dispositions are
involved: in an optimal view, in the greatest of ways; in a
normal view, at least with that "minimum" required in order
that there may be an action carried out by men.
The optimal view, at which it is right and necessary to aim, is in
practice, both on the theological and on the pastoral plane, a goal
towards which we must strive with all our might.
The normal view is that which must be kept in mind, without
ambiguity, in the apostolate. In fact, the sacraments are an ecclesial
fact of such a kind that the normal view and the optimal one are jointly
present either in their exercise and unfolding or in their implicit
realization, not only because the sacraments are celebrated in, by, and
with the Church, but also because the Church herself is generated by the
sacraments. The Church as community of salvation is the great
fundamental instrument of God's salvific gesture, which therefore
precedes and founds the salvation of individuals as it also and
concomitantly follows the salvation of individuals.
Baptism of children a reality of worship
Let it be added that the event of baptism is an event in which the
Lord Jesus "acts" personally in the person to be baptized and
"accomplishes" salvation in him. In this the Father of Jesus,
and he is also our Father, has the concrete initiative of
"entering" the existence of the man in order to give it new
value. In this the Holy Spirit becomes "possessor" of the man
redeemed by Christ in order be able to say in a renewed way "Abba—Father".
No Catholic questions that, simultaneously and concomitantly with the
reality-event, the gift of divine life in the member of the faithful
must become shared more radically, more vitally, and in continuous
progress. However, one must not fail to recall that ontological priority
is to be attributed to the divine action that carries out the plan of
salvation, in such a way that the subject of Baptism obeys the mandate
of rendering real and full praise to the Holy Trinity.
All things considered, in the tendency to postpone the baptism of
children a vein of anthropocentrism is concealed which is not completely
justified with the criteria of Revelation. There should emerge,
on the contrary, the line of a Christocentrism in which also rightful
anthropological requirements would have value. On the other hand it is
not just the perspective of sanctification (descending dimension)
present in Baptism which must be strengthened. This dimension
accentuates in a marked way the effort of conversion that the subject
should "de facto" profess, by professing not only noetic and
intellectual but operative and dynamic faith. This dimension, which can
also be correct, is nevertheless a partial one.
In today's openings of sacramentary theory, the dimension of worship
(ascendent dimension) has rightly been restored—following the example
of antiquity. This re-emphasized dimension of worship, balanced
with the other one of sanctification, gives theological
reflection a possibility of broad development in relation to a correct
evaluation of the community dimension of the sacraments; making them be
understood not only as a point of arrival but even more a source and
starting point for a significance in terms of worship of the whole of
Christian life in the body of the priestly people which is the Church.
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