The Paschal mystery and the 'ordo baptismi parvulorum'

Abstract

Any attempt to treat about the paschal mystery and baptism cannot but take into account the various interventions of God in the history of the salvation of mankind. For, according to the designs of God, Christ was to be the mediator between sinful and redeemed humanity, the bridge over which mankind was to pass from death to life, from a state of bondage to that of the freedom of the children of God. It was Christ and his life's work - the paschal mystery: his passion, death and resurrection - which all the Old Testament salvific events prefigured and prepared for, and it is from the selfsame paschal mystery of Christ that salvation and sanctification derive their meaning, value and efficacy for all time.