Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/91970
Title: Confirmation : its relation to baptism
Authors: Vella, Stephen (1993)
Keywords: Baptism -- Catholic Church
Confirmation -- Catholic Church
Sacraments -- Catholic Church
Initiation rites -- Religious aspects -- Catholic Church
Issue Date: 1993
Citation: Vella, S. (1993). Confirmation : its relation to baptism (Bachelor’s dissertation).
Abstract: Rebirth from water and the spirit and the reception of the Holy spirit as two aspects of Christian initiation that are grounded in the mysteries of Easter and Pentecost respectively. This thought is echoed in all the rituals, at least from the Third century onwards; this does not mean however that it is always easy to say where one aspect begins and the other ends. In the West, we can find the clearest picture of Two Stages, for the gift of the Spirit was celebrated after the Baptismal bath. Initially, the gift was given by a laying on of the bishop's hands in imitation of the Acts of the Apostles, as seen in Tertullian and Hippolytus. These two rites - the anointing and the sealing - would eventually be combined into one with the perfumed chrism then signifying in a symbolic way that membership in Christ means participation in the good odor that Christ spreads abroad. The Latin Churches thus celebrated baptism and 'confirmation' as two distinct, successive actions; the word confirmation made its first indubitable appearance in Fifth Century Gaul. By that time, the practice of reserving the second part of the initiation to the bishop was already widespread and therefore it was also separated from the first in time whenever a priest presided at baptism. This discipline was to remain the norm in the West. In the Syrian East, the chrismation possessing the contractory meaning preceded baptism. The action proclaimed, as it were, the intention of bestowing baptism and the gift of the Spirit at the same time and in a single ritual that included an imposition of the bishop's hand on the initiates while they were still in the water [...].
Description: B.A.RELIGIOUS STUD.
URI: https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/91970
Appears in Collections:Dissertations - FacThe - 1968-2010

Files in This Item:
File Description SizeFormat 
BARELIGIOUSSTUD_Vella, Stephen_1993.PDF
  Restricted Access
3.61 MBAdobe PDFView/Open Request a copy


Items in OAR@UM are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.