Paul and Baptism
We remarked last time that Paul understood the Church as the Mystical Body. It started with his understanding that the Risen Christ shared his Spirit with us, and now he is in us, and we are in him. Indeed, Paul uses “in Christ” (en Chiristo) 164 times in his letters. You can hardly turn a page without finding it. Here is a short sampling:
• Romans 6.11 - “So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.”
• Romans 12:5 - “So we, though many, are one body in Christ, and individually members one of another.”
• 2 Corinthians 5:17 - “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.”
• Galatians 3:26 - “For in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.”
• Philippians 2:5 - “Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus …”
To be a Christian is to be in Christ. However, this union is more than an historical union with a figure from the past. It is more than a philosophical union with an important teacher. It is more than an idealistic union, like what binds together fellow members of a club.
Our union with Christ is a mystical and sacramental union. Both the Christian and the Church must be understood mystically and sacramentally. And that places us squarely before Baptism, because it is the fountain of this life. In the baptistery of the Lateran in Rome there is this poem, perhaps written by Pope Leo III:
Here is born in Spirit-soaked fertility
a brood destined for another City,
begotten by God’s blowing
and borne upon this torrent
by the Church their virgin mother ....
This spring is life that floods the world,
the wounds of Christ its awesome source.
Christianity is Christ’s life being lived in us. The result of baptism is to live in Christ. He is in us, and we are in him. The relationship Christ had with the Father is shared with all who become his brothers and sisters in the waters of the font. Baptism is how we are grafted into his life.
Probably the most famous passage about baptism in Paul is from Romans 6, but it seems we sometimes only remember the half of it. We remember death, mortification, burial:
“Are you unaware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were indeed buried with him through baptism into death …”
If we stop there, then Christianity seems a gloomy cloud that hangs over our lives, quashing any fun we might think to have. But, the verse continues:
“We were indeed buried with him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might live in newness of life.”
Since the cross was planted in human history, death no longer has the last word. Resurrection rescues us from the grave. This new kind of life is called “eternal.” But there is more. The life-power that can do this is already at work within us. Eternal life is already building up within us. The Old Adam is drowned in baptism for only one purpose: that a New Adam may be created in us, patterned after Christ’s own life. Indeed, it is fed by Christ’s own life.
