Baptism and the Question of Necessity: A Critical Examination of Catholic Sacramental Theology
Baptism and the Question of Necessity: A Critical Examination of Catholic Sacramental Theology
J Neil Daniels
Abstract: This study offers a sustained critique of the Roman Catholic doctrine that water baptism is “necessary for salvation,” arguing that the modern Catholic formulation is exegetically unsupported, historically unstable, and internally incoherent. Drawing upon detailed textual analysis—including disputed passages such as Mark 16:16, John 3:5, Acts 2:38, Acts 22:16, and 1 Peter 3:21—this essay demonstrates that none of the New Testament’s baptismal references requires a sacramental interpretation, and several explicitly contradict it. Particular attention is given to the Catechism of the Catholic Church (§§1257–1261), where baptismal necessity is asserted and then immediately qualified by four expansive exceptions: baptism of blood, explicit baptism of desire, implicit baptism of desire, and the salvation of the invincibly ignorant. These categories permit the full salvific effects of baptism without the sacrament itself, thereby negating the very notion of necessity. Historically, the study traces how patristic ambiguities, Augustinian pastoral concessions, and medieval scholastic distinctions prepared the ground for this tension, which Trent attempted to resolve by elevating baptism to an instrumental cause of justification. The New Testament’s own pattern—regeneration by the Spirit, justification by faith, and baptism as the public confession of that prior reality—stands in clear contrast. The essay concludes that the evangelical understanding of baptism as sign and confession rather than sacramental cause is not only exegetically and theologically coherent but also preserves the integrity of the gospel and restores baptism to its proper biblical dignity.
Keywords: Baptismal necessity; sacramental theology; regeneration; justification; baptism of desire; baptism of blood; Council of Trent; Catechism of the Catholic Church; patristic theology; Ambrose; Augustine; evangelical theology; soteriology; ritual causality; baptismal regeneration; ex opere operato; New Testament theology; Acts of the Apostles; Pauline theology; ecclesiology; covenant signs; salvation and sacrament; Catholic–Protestant dialogue.
THESIS STATEMENT
This essay argues that the Roman Catholic doctrine of baptismal necessity is internally incoherent and biblically untenable: its asserted indispensability collapses under the weight of its own exceptions, its historical foundations reveal a tradition divided against itself, and its soteriological claims cannot be reconciled with the New Testament’s consistent teaching that salvation is grounded in the sovereign work of God and received through faith apart from sacramental mediation. By contrast, a constructive evangelical theology situates baptism as a divinely ordained sign and confession—essential for obedience and ecclesial identity, yet never the instrumental cause of regeneration or justification.
I. INTRODUCTION
Few doctrines expose more sharply the divergent soteriological architectures within Christian tradition than the Roman Catholic claim that water baptism is “necessary for salvation.” The formula, repeatedly articulated from the patristic period through the Council of Trent and into the contemporary Catechism of the Catholic Church, seems at first glance straightforward and uncompromising. One finds in Trent’s seventh session (1547) the confident assertion that baptism is the instrumental cause of justification, a view that stood in deliberate contrast to the Reformers’ emphasis on faith as the sole instrument of receiving Christ’s righteousness.[i] Catholic sacramental theology therefore frames baptism not merely as commanded obedience or ecclesial initiation but as the divinely appointed conduit through which regenerative grace flows.
Yet a closer examination reveals an internal tension that runs through every major Catholic formulation of baptismal necessity. The very sources that utter strong, sweeping claims about baptism’s indispensability also enumerate a complex array of exceptions, qualifications, and extraordinary dispensations—exceptions that allow individuals to receive the full salvific effects of baptism without undergoing the sacrament itself. The Catechism’s articulation is emblematic: it declares with solemnity that “the Church does not know of any means other than Baptism that assures entry into eternal beatitude,” only to immediately concede that martyrs, catechumens, the unevangelized, and the invincibly ignorant may nevertheless obtain eternal life without receiving the sacrament.[ii] A doctrine defined as “necessary” but routinely suspended is not a doctrine of necessity; it is, at most, a description of ordinary ecclesial expectation.
What evangelicals have long maintained—that baptism, though commanded and solemn, does not itself confer salvation—quietly reappears within the very Catholic qualifications meant to preserve sacramental necessity. These concessions are not marginal pastoral accommodations but indicators of a deeper contradiction. The structure collapses from within: a requirement that binds in theory but not in practice is no true requirement at all.
Before examining the Catholic exceptions and their theological implications, the historical development of baptismal theology must be considered. From the fluid sacramental language of the Fathers to the scholastic distinctions formalized in the medieval period, the tradition does not offer a monolithic witness to baptismal regeneration. Instead, it reveals an evolving set of instincts—sometimes sacramental, sometimes moral, sometimes pastoral—about how grace relates to ritual action. That diversity is essential to the argument that follows. It shows that the doctrine of baptismal necessity, far from being an unbroken and unanimous inheritance from the early church, is marked by internal strain from its earliest articulations. The very sources later invoked as support contain the seeds of a tension that neither Trent nor the modern Catechism has fully resolved.
II. CATHOLIC DOCTRINE OF BAPTISMAL NECESSITY
The Catholic Church teaches that baptism is the foundational sacrament of Christian initiation, conferring regeneration, the forgiveness of sins, incorporation into the Body of Christ, and the indelible character marking the soul.[iii] The Catechism, echoing Trent, declares: “The Lord himself affirms that Baptism is necessary for salvation… The Church does not know of any means other than Baptism that assures entry into eternal beatitude.”[iv] The phrase “necessary for salvation” thus bears enormous doctrinal weight. In Catholic sacramental ontology, necessity implies not a mere command but a causal relation: baptism is the God-ordained instrument by which the grace of justification is applied. The distinction between God’s universal salvific will and the sacramental economy does not negate the necessity but clarifies it; the sacrament is the established channel, the normative conduit of regenerative grace.
Yet even this early formulation contains an implicit tension. Toward the end of §1257 the Catechism adds a qualification that, while often passed over, is the fulcrum upon which the later argument will turn: “God has bound salvation to the sacrament of Baptism, but he himself is not bound by his sacraments.”[v] That sentence—likely inserted as a safeguard for divine sovereignty—functions in Catholic dogmatics as a pressure-release valve. Its unintended consequence, however, is to destabilize the very claim it is meant to preserve. A requirement that binds the creature but not the Creator is not theological necessity but procedural norm. If God may, and evidently does, regenerate apart from baptism, then baptism is not necessary in the strict sense. Its “necessity” becomes merely ordinary practice rather than indispensable instrument.
This tension becomes more apparent when one examines how Catholic theology historically attempts to reconcile universal salvific will with sacramental exclusivity. The articulation of baptismal necessity must incorporate the salvation of martyrs, catechumens, infants who die, the unevangelized who seek God, and the invincibly ignorant. Each of these categories receives the grace normally associated with baptism—regeneration, remission of sins, sanctifying grace—yet without undergoing the sacrament.[vi] Thus, in practice, the Catholic doctrine of necessity must accommodate an array of exceptions so wide that the concept of necessity is diluted beyond recognition. It becomes a term with moral force but little metaphysical weight.
Trent’s sacramental theology sought to resolve these pressures by defining baptism as the instrumental cause of justification, but the presence of exceptions—many predating Trent and others codified afterward—reveals that the Catholic tradition has never been able to apply this assertion consistently.[vii] The theological framework must oscillate between two commitments: the desire to maintain sacramental realism and the need to affirm God’s freedom to save outside of sacramental administration. The result is an unstable doctrinal synthesis in which baptism is proclaimed as necessary even while numerous exceptions undermine that necessity.
This internal tension is not a peripheral difficulty but the central crisis of the Catholic doctrine. The claim of necessity can only be sustained if the sacrament is indispensable in every instance. Once it is acknowledged—even once—that the full salvific effects may be received without water baptism, the asserted necessity becomes rhetorical rather than real. Catholic theology, in attempting to safeguard both sacramental causality and divine generosity, ends up affirming a doctrine that cannot consistently define its own terms.
III. HISTORICAL CONSIDERATIONS: FROM THE FATHERS TO TRENT
The patristic era offers rich but not uniform discussion of baptism. Writers such as Tertullian and Cyprian speak in robust sacramental terms, associating the baptismal waters with cleansing and rebirth.[viii] Others, such as Clement of Alexandria, tend toward moral and philosophical constructions of new life, linking baptism with enlightenment and ethical transformation. Augustine famously advanced a more metaphysical account, grounding baptism’s efficacy in God’s action rather than the minister’s and articulating the nascent principle of ex opere operato, later formalized in medieval scholasticism.[ix]
These early testimonies, while significant, do not yield a unanimous or airtight endorsement of baptism’s absolute necessity. Even Augustine, pressed by pastoral realities such as the death of catechumens prior to baptism, articulated provisional categories—most notably baptism of desire—through which God might grant salvation apart from the sacrament.[x] Medieval theologians would later refine these concepts, introducing distinctions between the sacramentum tantum (the outward sign), the res sacramenti (the grace conferred), and the res tantum (the final effect), thereby opening conceptual space for the grace of baptism to be received independently of the rite in exceptional cases.
By the time of the Reformation the Catholic position had crystallized in Trent’s decrees on justification and the sacraments: baptism was necessary, regenerative, and instrumental. Luther’s opposition was not primarily against baptismal language but against its causal function. Calvin’s critique was sharper: the Spirit’s regenerative work could not be tied to the moment of water application, nor could justification be made contingent upon ritual action.[xi]
It is within this historical trajectory that the contemporary Catholic doctrine must be situated. And as we shall see in later sections, the modern formulation sharpens the internal tension in ways earlier theologians likely did not foresee.
IV: EXEGETICAL ANALYSIS OF CATHOLIC PROOFTEXTS
Any doctrine claiming to rest upon apostolic authority must bear the weight of careful exegesis. The Catholic claim that baptism is intrinsically salvific—i.e., that the sacrament itself confers regeneration—rests upon a cluster of biblical texts that appear, at first reading, to establish a causal link between baptism and salvation. A closer examination, however, reveals that none of these texts requires the Catholic interpretation, and several render it exegetically implausible. The analysis provided below draws heavily upon the detailed work of H. Wayne House, whose extended treatment of these passages offers clarifying grammatical and contextual insights.[xii]
1. Mark 16:16 and the Problem of Textual Basis
The textual status of Mark 16:16 is notoriously complex. The longer ending of Mark (16:9–20) is absent from the most reliable Greek manuscripts, including Codex Vaticanus (B) and Codex Sinaiticus (א).[xiii] To base a doctrine of universal sacramental necessity upon a passage whose textual authenticity is disputed is precarious in itself. Yet even taking the verse as canonical, the structure of the saying frustrates the Catholic argument. The verse reads: “He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned.”
The decisive point concerns the asymmetry between the positive and negative clauses. As House notes, the passage “correlates condemnation only with unbelief, not with the absence of baptism.”[xiv] If baptism were an indispensable instrument of salvation, one would expect the second clause to mirror the first: he who has not believed and has not been baptized shall be condemned. But the omission of baptism in the negative clause suggests otherwise. Grammatically, the two conditions in the protasis—belief and baptism—need not bear identical causal weight. One may function as the cause, the other as the evidence.[xv] Unbelief condemns; baptism confirms. The verse, therefore, cannot sustain the Catholic doctrine of baptismal necessity.
2. John 3:5 and the Meaning of “Water and Spirit”
No passage has played a more central role in Catholic arguments for baptismal regeneration than Jesus’ statement to Nicodemus: “Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.” Catholic interpretation takes “water” to mean the sacramental waters of baptism. Yet this reading imposes later sacramental theology upon a context in which neither Nicodemus nor the early Johannine audience would have possessed such associations.
House surveys the range of proposed interpretations—including baptism, the Spirit, the Word of God, physical birth, John’s baptism, and symbolic imagery—and concludes that the strongest reading is that “water and Spirit” refers to the Old Testament imagery of cleansing and renewal, especially the life-giving waters of Isaiah 44:3 and the divine breath/wind of Ezekiel 37:9–10.[xvi] Nicodemus, as a “teacher of Israel,” should have recognized these motifs. His misunderstanding arises not because he failed to connect Jesus’ words with baptism—an anachronistic assumption—but because he interpreted Jesus’ reference to birth in purely physical terms.
The further contextual link to Proverbs 30:4 (“Who has gathered the wind in His fists? … What is His Son’s name?”) underscores the point: Jesus is describing a heavenly, Spirit-wrought renewal that only the Son can give.[xvii] The Catholic reading reduces this rich intertextual matrix to a narrow sacramental interpretation entirely foreign to the discourse. As House notes, pairing “water and Spirit” is less natural than pairing “water and wind,” both of which occur repeatedly in Old Testament depictions of divine renewal.[xviii] The passage, therefore, cannot be marshalled to support baptismal regeneration without distorting its literary and historical context.
3. Acts 2:38 and the Grammar of εἰς
Acts 2:38 is frequently cited as the locus classicus for baptismal regeneration: “Repent, and let each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for (εἰς) the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.” Catholic interpreters argue that the preposition εἰς indicates purpose—“in order to obtain the forgiveness of sins.” Yet Greek usage allows for a broader semantic range. J. R. Mantey and A. T. Robertson, among others, note that εἰς can signify cause—“because of”—as in Matthew 12:41: “They repented because of (εἰς) the preaching of Jonah.”[xix]
However, as House acknowledges, translating εἰς causally here creates difficulties, since it would imply that repentance itself is “because of forgiveness,” thereby inverting Luke’s consistent theology that repentance precedes forgiveness.[xx] A better solution involves recognizing the shift in number between the verbs: “repent” is second person plural, while “be baptized” is third person singular (“each of you”).[xxi] The phrase “for the forgiveness of your sins” agrees syntactically with the plural “repent,” not with the singular “be baptized.” The sense is thus: “You (plural) repent for the forgiveness of your sins, and let each of you (singular) be baptized.”
The narrative of Cornelius in Acts 10–11 confirms this interpretation. The Holy Spirit fell upon his household prior to baptism, demonstrating that the forgiveness of sins and reception of the Spirit are not bound to water baptism (Acts 10:44–48). Peter, in recounting the event in Acts 11:15–18, does not even mention baptism, focusing entirely on belief (Acts 11:15–18). This narrative sequence—faith, Spirit, baptism—stands in natural tension with Catholic sacramental causality.
4. Acts 22:16 and the Syntax of Washing
Paul recounts Ananias’ exhortation: “Now why do you delay? Arise, and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on His name.” Catholic interpreters attempt to conflate the two imperatives—“be baptized and wash away your sins”—into a single sacramental act. Yet as House observes, the Greek text contains two distinct clauses, each with its own imperative and modifying participle.[xxii] The phrase “calling on His name” governs the washing, not the baptism. It functions precisely as in Joel 2:32 and Romans 10:13, where calling on the Lord is the act by which salvation is received. Baptism, therefore, is the outward confession of that inward appeal, not the instrumental cause of forgiveness.
5. Romans 6, Galatians 3, Colossians 2, and 1 Corinthians 12
Paul’s references to being “baptized into Christ” (Rom 6:3; Gal 3:27) are frequently interpreted as evidence that water baptism effects union with Christ. Yet these passages employ baptism metaphorically to represent the believer’s identification with Christ’s death and resurrection. House notes that 1 Corinthians 12:13 includes not only baptism but “drinking” of the Spirit—neither of which are literal sacramental acts in that context.[xxiii] The emphasis is mystical, not ritualistic. To literalize the metaphor is to misconstrue Paul’s conceptual framework.
6. Titus 3:5 and the “Washing of Regeneration”
Titus 3:5 speaks of salvation “by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit.” Catholic interpreters equate “washing” with baptism. But the text does not specify a ritual. House points out that the phrase may be appositional: “the washing of regeneration, even the renewing of the Holy Spirit.”[xxiv] In Ezekiel 36:25–27 water imagery symbolizes spiritual renewal without reference to a sacrament. To read baptism into Titus 3:5 is unnecessary and contextually forced.
7. 1 Peter 3:21: Baptism as Appeal, Not Instrument
Finally, 1 Peter 3:21 declares, “Baptism now saves you.” Detached from its qualifying clauses, the verse appears to support baptismal regeneration. But Peter’s next words clarify his meaning: “not the removal of dirt from the flesh, but an appeal to God for a good conscience.” As House emphasizes, the Greek pronoun “which” (ὃ) refers not to the ark but to the water, establishing a typological correspondence between the floodwaters and Christian baptism.[xxv] Yet the salvific function lies not in the water but in the believer’s appeal (ἐπερώτημα) to God. David Hill interprets the word as a covenantal response—an assent to live righteously.[xxvi] Thus baptism saves as confession, not as instrument.
Taken together, these passages demonstrate a consistent pattern: the New Testament does not attribute regenerative power to water baptism. Rather, baptism functions as the outward sign and covenantal declaration of the inward work of the Spirit. Catholic prooftexts, when read in their literary and grammatical contexts, fail to establish the claimed sacramental causality.
V: THE INTERNAL INCOHERENCE OF ROME’S DOCTRINE OF BAPTISMAL NECESSITY
The Catholic doctrine of baptismal necessity presents itself with a kind of formal boldness: water baptism is declared “necessary for salvation,” and the grace of regeneration, forgiveness, and incorporation into Christ is said to be mediated instrumentally through the sacrament. Yet when the internal architecture of this claim is examined—especially as articulated in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (§§1257–1261)—the structure proves unable to sustain its own weight. A doctrine that purports to be universal in scope and absolute in force is immediately surrounded by a constellation of exceptions so extensive that the term “necessity” becomes equivocal. The very same paragraphs that insist no one enters eternal life without baptism proceed to exempt entire classes of unbaptized persons from that requirement. This is not mere pastoral latitude; it is conceptual instability.[xxvii]
The Catechism identifies four categories of persons who may obtain salvation without receiving the sacrament: (1) those who die as martyrs, (2) catechumens who intend to receive baptism but die before doing so, (3) persons who “would have desired baptism” if they had known of its necessity, and (4) the invincibly ignorant who nevertheless seek God sincerely. Each of these groups is said to receive the salvific effects of baptism—regeneration, remission of sins, sanctifying grace—without undergoing the rite itself.[xxviii] These exceptions are not peripheral accommodations but integral to Catholic soteriology, invoked repeatedly to harmonize God’s universal salvific will with the sacramental economy. Yet the very existence of these categories, far from safeguarding divine freedom, erases the asserted necessity of baptism. If the salvific effects can be bestowed without water, then water is not necessary in any meaningful theological sense.
The instability becomes even more pronounced when the historical sources invoked to defend baptismal necessity are permitted to speak in full. The same patristic witnesses often cited as champions of sacramental realism simultaneously granted the possibility of salvation apart from the rite. Ambrose’s funeral oration for Valentinian II—who died without baptism—explicitly affirms that “as he desired it, he has attained it… His pious desire has absolved him,” thereby grounding the salvific effect not in sacramental causality but in interior disposition.[xxix] Augustine is no less explicit: “Not only suffering for the sake of Christ can replace that which is lacking in Baptism, but also faith and conversion of the heart,” provided circumstances prevent the administration of the sacrament.[xxx] These concessions were not marginal pastoral improvisations; they became the conceptual soil from which medieval and Tridentine categories such as votum baptismi (the desire for baptism) emerged. Trent itself codified this trajectory when it declared that justification is possible “without the washing unto regeneration or the desire for the same,” a formulation that transforms baptismal necessity into something conditional and dispensable.[xxxi] A sacrament whose effects can be received without the sacrament ceases, by definition, to be necessary.
1. Baptism of Blood and the Redefinition of Necessity
The first exception is the ancient doctrine known as baptism of blood, applied to martyrs who die for Christ without receiving water baptism. The Catechism affirms that “the Church has always held that those who suffer death for the sake of the faith without having received Baptism are baptized by their death with Christ.”[xxxii] This teaching, rooted in early Christian reverence for martyrdom, is pastorally understandable. Yet the moment it is granted that a person may receive the regenerative and justificatory effects of baptism without the sacrament, the doctrine of necessity evaporates. A necessary condition is one without which the effect cannot occur. But if martyrs receive the effect without the condition, the condition is not necessary.
Historically, the doctrine arose precisely because the early church recognized that the sacrament could not be administered in every circumstance and that God’s grace could not be constrained by human limitations. But this pastoral impulse—sound in itself—directly contradicts the claim that baptism is an indispensable instrument of regeneration. It is impossible to maintain both simultaneously.
2. Explicit Baptism of Desire: Catechumens and the Limits of Sacramental Economy
The second exception involves catechumens who die prior to baptism but who intended to receive it. The Catechism declares that such individuals “are assured of salvation even though they were not able to receive the sacrament.”[xxxiii] This is, again, compelled by pastoral reality. The early church faced precisely these situations, especially during persecution. Augustine himself, though a staunch advocate of baptismal efficacy, conceded that desire for baptism could suffice when death intervened.[xxxiv]
Yet this concession introduces a theological disjunction. If the desire for baptism suffices for salvation, what becomes of the sacramental principle? Desire is an interior disposition. Baptism, according to Catholic doctrine, is an outward act performed upon the body that conveys grace ex opere operato—“by the work worked,” independent of the recipient’s subjective state.[xxxv] But the doctrine of baptismal desire shifts the causal locus from the sacrament performed to the disposition of the heart. It is, in effect, a return to the very principle of fides apprehendens Christum—faith apprehending Christ—that animated the Reformers. The Catholic attempt to preserve sacramental causality while allowing an interior act to function equivalently produces conceptual instability.
3. Implicit Baptism of Desire: The Hypothetical Willingness of the Unevangelized
The third category extends this reasoning even further. According to §1260, those who have never heard the gospel but “would have desired Baptism if they had known its necessity” may likewise obtain salvation.[xxxvi] At this point, the sacramental logic dissolves into counterfactual speculation. One is now dealing with hypothetical desires—acts of the will the person never performed, directed toward a sacrament they never encountered. The effect of baptism is granted through a disposition that is merely imputed, not actual.
This renders the sacrament otiose. If hypothetical desire can substitute for the actual rite, the rite cannot be necessary in any strict sense. A requirement that can be fulfilled by a counterfactual intention is no requirement at all. Indeed, the Catholic position now hinges upon a principle that is far more aligned with the evangelical doctrine of salvation by grace through faith, apart from works or rituals, than with the sacramental mechanics of Trent.
4. The Invincibly Ignorant: A Final Collapse of Sacramental Necessity
The fourth category is the broadest: those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the gospel, yet “seek God with a sincere heart” and strive to do His will according to their knowledge.[xxxvii] In their case, the Catechism explicitly affirms that they may obtain eternal salvation. Here the sacrament is neither received, desired, nor even known. The grace normally associated with baptism is granted, not on the basis of sacramental union, nor on explicit intention, nor even on hypothetical desire, but on the grounds of sincerity and moral responsiveness to general revelation.
This moves the Catholic position decisively outside the sphere of sacramental theology and into a theological framework far closer to the inclusivism found in modern ecumenical Protestantism. Whatever one thinks of that inclusivism, it is categorically incompatible with the claim that baptism is necessary for salvation.
5. The Problem Summarized: A Necessity That Is Not Necessary
The Catholic response to this tension is predictable: “Baptism is necessary because God has bound salvation to the sacrament, but He Himself is not bound by it.”[xxxviii] Yet this statement nullifies itself. If God is not bound by the sacrament—and routinely saves without it—then baptism is not necessary for salvation. It is a norm, not a requirement.
In logical terms, a necessary condition is one whose absence entails the absence of the effect. If salvation can occur without baptism, then baptism is not necessary. The Catholic definition of necessity becomes purely rhetorical, stripped of any actual theological force.
One might object that necessity is qualified, that is, that the sacrament is necessary for those who can receive it. But this formulation collapses under scrutiny. Every evangelical tradition likewise teaches that those who can receive baptism should receive it. That is not the issue. The question is whether baptism is salvifically indispensable. On this point, Catholicism, by acknowledging the salvation of the unbaptized in multiple categories, effectively concedes the Baptist position.[xxxix]
Even more striking is the manner in which the Catholic exceptions implicitly abandon the sacramental ontology upon which the doctrine of necessity is said to rest. Classical Catholic theology insists that baptism confers grace ex opere operato—by the work worked, independent of the recipient’s subjective disposition. Yet baptism of desire, by Catholic admission, operates ex opere operantis, deriving its efficacy entirely from the inward posture of the individual.[xl] It remits original sin, forgives all actual sins, and bestows sanctifying grace—precisely the effects attributed to sacramental baptism—yet does so without water, without ritual, and without the sacramental mechanism said to be indispensable. This admission is theologically decisive: the Catholic framework now contains two fundamentally incompatible accounts of how regeneration occurs—one tied to the sacramental act, and another tied purely to interior contrition and faith.
6. The Irony: The Catholic Appeals Become Baptist Arguments
The irony is difficult to miss. When Catholic theologians defend baptism of desire or the salvation of the invincibly ignorant, they inevitably appeal to God’s mercy, the priority of faith, or the disposition of the heart—all principles that stand at the center of the evangelical doctrine of salvation.[xli] At precisely the point where sacramental necessity is most in jeopardy, Catholic theology abandons the sacramental mechanism and relies on the very soteriological principles it elsewhere critiques. The argument returns, perhaps unwittingly, to what the New Testament itself asserts: God saves through the work of Christ and the agency of the Spirit, not through ritual mediation. Baptism, therefore, may be deeply significant, profoundly symbolic, and ecclesially indispensable, but it is not necessary as a means of salvation. In defending the exceptions, the Catholic apologist becomes a functional Baptist. The moment he argues that God regenerates apart from water baptism, he has surrendered the sacramental claim.
VI: A BIBLICAL THEOLOGY OF SALVATION APART FROM RITUAL CAUSALITY
If Rome’s doctrine of baptismal necessity falters at the level of internal consistency, it collapses entirely when set alongside the New Testament’s comprehensive witness to salvation. Scripture consistently distinguishes between the saving act of God and the outward ordinances through which that salvation is confessed. The apostolic proclamation does not locate regeneration, justification, or the impartation of spiritual life in the moment of water application. Rather, these graces are attributed without qualification to the sovereign work of the Spirit, the completed work of Christ, and the believer’s reception of that grace by faith (Rom 1–8; Eph 2:1–10). The New Testament consistently distinguishes between the saving act of God and the ecclesial sign that bears witness to that act. This distinction is not incidental. It is woven into the warp and woof of apostolic proclamation and instruction, from Jesus’ words in the Gospels to Paul’s extended theological exposition in Romans and Galatians. Baptism occupies a vital place in the life of the church as the believer’s public confession of faith, but it never occupies the causal role assigned to it by Catholic sacramental theology.
At the heart of the biblical teaching stands a simple but profound truth: God saves through the sovereign action of the Spirit, received by faith, grounded in the finished work of Christ, apart from ritual mediation. Baptism is the believer’s embodied confession of that salvation; it is not its cause. To reverse that order is to invert the New Testament’s soteriological architecture.
1. Regeneration as the Monergistic Work of the Spirit
At the center of the biblical testimony stands the New Testament conception of the new birth. John declares that those who receive Christ do so because they “were born… of God,” not “of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man” (John 1:12–13). “The New Testament consistently portrays the new birth as a work of God’s Spirit that enables and accompanies genuine faith. Paul’s language in Titus 3:5 reinforces this structure: salvation comes “not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit.” Nothing in the passage identifies this washing with the sacrament of baptism; the imagery draws more naturally upon Ezekiel’s promises of cleansing and renewal (Eze 36:25–27; cf. Titus 3:5). When Jesus speaks to Nicodemus of being “born of water and Spirit,” the immediate Old Testament background—especially Isaiah 44 and Ezekiel 36–37—renders a sacramental interpretation unnecessary and historically improbable.
2. Faith as the Instrument of Justification
This theological pattern is carried forward in Paul’s doctrine of justification. The doctrine of justification by faith alone is not a Protestant invention but the explicit teaching of the apostolic witness. Paul uniformly attributes justification to faith, grounded in the substitutionary death and resurrection of Christ, apart from works or ordinances. Romans 3:21–26 is paradigmatic: God justifies the one who has faith in Jesus, with no mention of baptism. Paul does not introduce baptism until Romans 6, after he has concluded his sustained argument concerning justification in chapters 3–5; even then, baptism appears as the believer’s identification with Christ’s death and resurrection—a symbolic and ethical union, not a causal mechanism. Not one Pauline text identifies baptism as the instrument of justification. Paul’s entire argument depends on maintaining a conceptual and chronological distinction between faith and any subsequent confession or sign.
Galatians is even more forceful. The Galatian crisis concerned whether Gentile believers must adopt Jewish ritual practices—circumcision, observance of days, and similar ordinances—to complete or secure their justification. Paul’s answer was unequivocal: “By the works of the Law no flesh will be justified” (Gal 2:16). The logic applies equally to any rite, including baptism, if that rite is treated as a causal instrument in justification. It is striking that in Galatians—a letter deeply concerned with signs and ceremonies—Paul never suggests that baptism functions as a requirement for salvation. Instead, baptism in Galatians 3:27 signifies incorporation into Christ and the breaking down of ethnic barriers. It does not operate as a sacramental conduit.
3. The Narrative Pattern of Conversion in Acts
The Book of Acts preserves multiple conversion accounts providing a narrative complement to Paul’s doctrinal exposition. Across multiple conversion accounts, a consistent pattern emerges: the gospel is preached, faith is exercised, the Holy Spirit is received, and baptism follows as the public confession of the inward reality (Acts 2:37–41; 8:12–17). The household of Cornelius is decisive. The Spirit falls upon the Gentiles “while Peter was still speaking”—that is, prior to baptism—compelling Peter to acknowledge that God had granted them repentance leading to life (Acts 10:44–48). When Peter recounts the event to the Jerusalem elders, he highlights precisely this sequence: the Spirit was given in response to belief, not baptism (Acts 11:15–18). Baptism, then, is administered not as a means to obtain the Spirit’s regenerating work but as the visible testimony of what the Spirit has already accomplished. This order is entirely incompatible with the Catholic assertion that baptism is the instrumental cause of regeneration.
This sequence cannot be harmonized with Catholic sacramental causality without doing violence to the text. Catholic theologians have sometimes appealed to Acts 8, where the Samaritans receive the Spirit through the laying on of apostolic hands. But in that narrative the issue is apostolic authentication of the Samaritan mission, not a theological claim that baptism itself confers the Spirit. The normative Lukan pattern remains: the Spirit precedes baptism.
4. Abraham as the Paradigm of Salvation Apart from Ritual
Paul’s appeal to Abraham in Romans 4 is decisive. Abraham “believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness” (Rom 4:3). Paul then adds the chronological clarification that demolishes any attempt to ground justification in a sacramental act: Abraham’s righteousness was imputed “while he was yet uncircumcised” (Rom 4:10). Circumcision—the Old Testament covenant sign—was a seal of the righteousness he had already received. The parallel to baptism is unmistakable. If Abraham, the father of all who believe, was justified apart from the covenant sign, then the new covenant sign likewise cannot be the cause of justification. Put more broadly, if the covenant sign in the Old Testament did not convey justifying grace but rather sealed a righteousness already received, then the new covenant sign cannot properly be assigned a more potent causal role than its predecessor.
Catholic exegesis sometimes counters by noting that Abraham was an Old Testament figure and that Christian baptism operates in a different theological economy. But Paul’s entire argument depends on Abraham’s experience as paradigmatic. Abraham is the model precisely because he illustrates the universal principle of justification by faith without ritual. To detach baptism from circumcision at this point is to cut the apostolic argument at its root.
5. Baptism as Covenant Confession Rather than Saving Rite
The New Testament consistently casts baptism as the believer’s visible and ecclesial confession of faith, not as an isolated ritual but as the believer’s embodied act of confession before the covenant community. It is the means by which the convert is publicly identified as belonging to Christ and to the community of the redeemed. This is precisely how baptism functioned in the earliest Christian communities, where it served as the first public act of discipleship.[xlii] Yet nowhere does the New Testament bind the saving act of God to the moment of water application. The soteriological effect—union with Christ, regeneration by the Spirit, forgiveness of sins—precedes the rite and is merely manifested through it.
Peter’s qualification in 1 Peter 3:21 is emblematic: baptism saves “not as the removal of dirt from the flesh, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience.” The adjective “not… but” construction (οὐ…ἀλλά) sharply distinguishes between the outward act and the inward reality. The salvation signified is the result of the believer’s turning to God, not the ritual’s inherent power. This distinction is pivotal. Catholic theology locates baptism’s efficacy in the sacramental action itself (ex opere operato), while the apostolic witness locates salvation in the believer’s direct encounter with God through Christ, to which baptism bears external witness. The saving element is not the water but the faith-act expressed in baptism. Catholic theology reverses this relationship by making the outward act the instrumental cause.
6. Summary: The Scriptural Witness Affirms the Evangelical Position
Taken together, the New Testament presents a uniform pattern a every genre—Gospels, Acts, Pauline epistles, Petrine epistles: God saves through the sovereign work of the Spirit, received by faith in the crucified and risen Christ, apart from sacramental administration. Baptism is the believer’s obedient confession of grace already received (Eph 2:8–10). It is an ordinance of profound symbolic and ecclesial significance—public, solemn, indispensable for discipleship—but it is never the instrument by which God imparts saving grace. To reverse this order is to invert the logic of the gospel and obscure the gracious character of the divine initiative; to transform the sign into the cause is to misread the entire narrative, theological, and ecclesial movement of the New Testament. The Catholic doctrine of sacramental necessity cannot be reconciled with the biblical witness without redefining necessity into non-necessity and sacramental causality into symbolic confession. The evangelical view, by contrast, harmonizes fully with both the doctrinal and narrative contours of the New Testament.
VII: A CONSTRUCTIVE EVANGELICAL THEOLOGY OF BAPTISM—SIGN, SEAL, AND CONFESSION
The failure of the Catholic doctrine to sustain its own claim of necessity, combined with the clear biblical witness to salvation by grace through faith apart from ritual mediation, does not diminish the importance of baptism. Rather, it restores baptism to its proper theological dignity. Evangelical theology—far from neglecting the sacrament—places baptism within the dynamic life of the church as an act of obedient confession, covenantal incorporation, and visible participation in the gospel. Properly understood, baptism is both theologically rich and pastorally vital, but its power derives from the gospel it proclaims, not from any inherent efficacy in the water or the ritual itself.
1. Baptism as the Visible Word
Augustine famously described the sacraments as verba visibilia—“visible words.”[xliii] The phrase is often cited by Catholic theologians, yet in its original context Augustine was not articulating a mechanistic sacramental ontology but the idea that baptism communicates visually what the Word communicates verbally. The sacrament, therefore, presupposes the gospel; it does not displace or supplement it. An evangelical theology of baptism stands comfortably within Augustine’s image while avoiding the later medieval development of ex opere operato, which transformed visible words into instrumental causes.
In this framework, baptism functions analogously to a public oath. The believer, having been regenerated by the Spirit and justified by faith, is now summoned to confess Christ openly (Rom 10:9–10). Baptism is that confession, enacted before the community of faith, marking one’s entrance into the visible church. Its power lies in the gospel it signifies.
2. Baptism and Union with Christ
Paul’s references to baptism in Romans 6:3–4, Galatians 3:27, and Colossians 2:11–12 are often marshaled in support of baptismal regeneration. Yet when read in context, these passages underscore baptism’s symbolic function. In Romans, Paul’s concern is ethical transformation: the believer, having died with Christ, must now walk in newness of life. Baptism visually enacts this participation in Christ’s death and resurrection. It is an outward dramatization of an inward reality. To make baptism the cause of union rather than its sign reverses Paul’s logic and collapses symbol into substance.
This distinction is crucial. The evangelical argument is not that baptism is “merely symbolic” in the reductive modern sense, but that its symbolism is covenantal, declarative, and ecclesial. In Scripture, symbols are not trivial; they are the appointed means by which God binds His people to Himself and to one another. Circumcision, Passover, the sacrificial system, and the covenant meals of Israel all functioned symbolically, yet each bore profound theological significance. Baptism stands within this biblical tradition.
3. Baptism and Ecclesial Identity
The New Testament consistently connects baptism with the believer’s incorporation into the church. Peter’s Pentecost sermon culminates in a call to “be baptized” (Acts 2:38), and the narrative immediately notes that “those who received his word were baptized” and were added to the church (Acts 2:41–42). Baptism is the rite of entry into the visible community, not the means of spiritual regeneration. In the early church, the unbaptized believer was an anomaly not because baptism was regenerative but because baptism was the expected public confession of faith.[xliv] To refuse baptism was to refuse Christ’s command and to remain outside the covenant community.
Here the evangelical and early Christian perspectives align more closely than is often recognized. The early church did not conceive of an unbaptized Christian because faith was publicly confessed through baptism immediately upon conversion. That historical reality should not be misread as sacramental causality. The proximity of conversion and baptism reflects the urgency of confession, not the mechanism of salvation.
4. Baptism, the Gospel, and Pastoral Care
The Catholic doctrine of sacramental necessity, even with its exceptions, introduces pastoral ambiguities that the New Testament avoids. If the salvific efficacy of baptism depends upon the sacrament itself, how does one address the believer who receives baptism perfunctorily, without understanding or faith? How does one treat the child baptized in infancy whose later life bears no marks of repentance? Catholic sacramental theology—despite its claims of objectivity—creates deeper pastoral uncertainties than it resolves.
Evangelical theology, by contrast, grounds assurance in Christ’s finished work and the believer’s faith-union with Him. Baptism strengthens assurance by providing an outward, embodied confirmation of the inward reality, but it does not create that reality. It is a means of grace in the sense that obedience always enriches faith, but not in the sense of sacramental causation. The distinction preserves both the dignity of baptism and the purity of the gospel.
5. Baptism as Obedience Rather Than Prerequisite
Perhaps the most decisive difference between the Catholic and evangelical positions concerns the relationship between obedience and salvation. In Catholic sacramental theology, baptism is the threshold through which divine grace flows. It is thus both a gift of God and a condition to be fulfilled. Evangelical theology insists that salvation must be received apart from any condition other than faith, for otherwise grace is no longer grace (Rom 11:6). Baptism, therefore, cannot be a prerequisite to receiving forgiveness; it is the believer’s obedient response to forgiveness already granted.
This distinction has profound theological implications. If baptism is prerequisite, then grace is, in some measure, contingent upon human action. If baptism is responsive, then grace remains free and unconditioned. In Scripture, obedience always follows salvation—it never constitutes it. The order is unyielding: God acts, the believer responds. To invert this order is to undermine the very logic of redemption.
6. Baptism in the Life of the Church
Within the life of the church, baptism retains its proper role as the solemn entry into the community of faith. It is a confession before witnesses, a participation in the communal life of the body, and a public declaration of allegiance to Christ. Its ecclesial function cannot be overstated. Yet its salvific function must not be overstated. When baptism is made the instrument of regeneration, the church becomes the administrator of salvation rather than the herald of it. Evangelical theology, following the New Testament, assigns to the church the task of proclaiming the gospel and administering baptism as the expression of that gospel—not as the means of its bestowal.
7. A Synthesis: The Evangelical Position as Biblically and Theologically Coherent
The evangelical position, far from minimizing baptism, situates it within the broader structure of biblical soteriology. Baptism is necessary for obedience, not for salvation; essential for discipleship, not for regeneration. It is a covenant sign that points beyond itself to the saving work of the Triune God. Its value is immense, but its role is declarative, not causal.
In this way, the evangelical view preserves the integrity of the gospel, honors the continuity of biblical symbolism, and avoids the internal contradictions that plague the Catholic formulation. Baptism’s glory remains untarnished precisely because it is not burdened with the impossible task of accomplishing what only the Spirit can perform.
VII: CONCLUSION — THE CATHOLIC DOCTRINE AND ITS UNRAVELING
The Catholic doctrine of baptismal necessity, when examined with historical patience, exegetical precision, and theological clarity, proves unable to sustain its own internal logic. Its formal claim is bold: baptism is necessary for salvation. Its underlying structure, however, is fissured by qualifications and exceptions that undermine that very claim. The Catechism’s assertion that “the Church does not know of any means other than Baptism that assures entry into eternal beatitude” sounds decisive until one turns the page and encounters an entire series of exceptions—martyrs, catechumens, the unevangelized, the invincibly ignorant—all of whom, according to Rome, may obtain eternal life without water baptism and without incurring any deficit in the grace provided by the sacrament.[xlv]
A doctrine that affirms both necessity and non-necessity is a doctrine in conceptual crisis. The attempt to resolve the tension by distinguishing between the sacramental economy and the divine freedom—“God has bound salvation to the sacrament, but He Himself is not bound by His sacraments”—solves nothing. It merely reframes the contradiction. If God saves without baptism (as Catholic theology openly acknowledges in four expansive categories), then baptism is not necessary. It is an ordinary expectation, not a salvific requirement. But ordinary expectation is precisely what the evangelical tradition has always affirmed: baptism is commanded, solemn, and integral to discipleship, but regeneration is the Spirit’s work, not the water’s.
Roman Catholic theologians have sought to preserve sacramental integrity by appealing to desire, martyrdom, or a general orientation toward the good. Yet these appeals shift the causal focus away from the sacrament itself toward interior dispositions or divine prerogative. That shift, however subtle, marks a departure from the Tridentine framework in which baptism is the instrumental cause of justification. A hypothetical desire for baptism cannot be the instrumental cause of justification. Nor can moral sincerity. Nor can the mere fact of dying for Christ. When these factors are granted equal or greater salvific significance than the sacrament, the sacramental logic collapses.
Moreover, the appeal to exceptions places Catholic theology in a position that is far nearer to evangelical soteriology than is often admitted. When Catholics assert that God saves apart from baptism, they adopt the evangelical principle—salvation is grounded in divine grace, received by faith, and applied sovereignly by the Spirit rather than through ritual mediation. This is not a small concession. It is the abandonment of the entire logic of sacramental necessity. A Catholic may insist that baptism remains “ordinary,” but the theological weight has already shifted decisively: the cause of salvation is no longer tied to the sacrament. Once the salvific effect is severed from the ritual, the ritual cannot be necessary.
The New Testament’s testimony reinforces this conclusion at every point. Christ declares the new birth to be the sovereign work of the Spirit (John 3:5–8). Paul locates justification in the believer’s faith, grounded in the blood of Christ, apart from works or rituals (Rom 3:21–26). The narrative of Cornelius reveals the Spirit descending prior to baptism (Acts 10:44–48), while Abraham’s justification apart from circumcision (Rom 4:9–12) provides the paradigmatic structure for understanding any covenant sign, including baptism. Peter explicitly denies that the saving element in baptism is the water itself, locating salvation instead in the believer’s appeal to God (1 Pet 3:21). The biblical material is not ambiguous. It consistently assigns baptism a declarative, symbolic, and ecclesial function—never a regenerative or justificatory one.
Evangelical theology, far from diminishing baptism, restores it to its biblical contours. Baptism is the public confession of faith, the embodied entrance into the visible community, and the sign of one’s union with Christ. It is the believer’s first act of obedience, not the source of spiritual life. Baptism stands beside the preached Word, not above it; it reflects the gospel, but it does not generate the gospel’s effects. In this respect, the evangelical position preserves both the integrity of Christian proclamation and the dignity of baptism itself.
The Catholic doctrine, by contrast, burdens baptism with a salvific role it does not possess, and then attempts to alleviate the pastoral consequences of that burden by introducing exceptions that erode the doctrine’s foundation. The result is a system that cannot consistently define its own terms. Either baptism is necessary, or it is not. If it is necessary, then the exceptions are heretical. If the exceptions are true, then baptism is not necessary. Catholic theology attempts to hold both positions simultaneously, but it cannot. Theology, like logic, demands a choice.
The evangelical position, grounded in Scripture and consistent in its theological architecture, recognizes baptism as an essential act of obedience but not an instrument of salvation. In doing so, it upholds the gospel’s radical simplicity: salvation is the gift of God, received by faith, secured by Christ’s finished work, and applied by the Holy Spirit. To this salvation baptism bears witness—as water to washing, as burial to death, as rising to life—but baptism is never the fountain from which that life flows.
In the end, the Catholic doctrine of baptismal necessity unravels by the force of its own concessions, its exegetical inadequacy, and its internal theological contradictions. The evangelical account, by contrast, stands in harmony with Scripture, preserves the purity of the gospel, and restores baptism to its rightful, glorious place as the believer’s confession of the grace already received. That confession, embodied and public, speaks with the clarity of the apostolic message itself: “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved” (Acts 16:31).
[i] Council of Trent, Decree on Justification, Session 6 (1547), in The Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, trans. H. J. Schroeder (Rockford, IL: TAN Books, 1978), 30–32.
[ii] Catechism of the Catholic Church, §1257, on baptismal necessity and its stated exceptions.
[iii] Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2nd ed. (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1997), §§1213–1216.
[iv] Ibid., §1257.
[v] Ibid.
[vi] Catechism of the Catholic Church, §§1258–1261, the four major exception categories.
[vii] See Trent, De Baptismo; also evidence of pre-Tridentine exceptions in patristic and medieval sources.
[viii] Tertullian, On Baptism 1–2.
[ix] Augustine, On the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, and the Baptism of Infants I.34–36.
[x] Augustine, City of God XIII.7.
[xi] John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion IV.15–16, ed. John T. McNeill, trans. Ford Lewis Battles (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1960), 2:1325–55.
[xii] H. Wayne House, “Baptism for the Forgiveness of Sins (Part 1),” CRI Statement DB055‐1; and “Baptism for the Forgiveness of Sins (Part 2): Sign, Seal, or Means of Grace?,” CRI Statement DB055‐2. Both are available as PDF downloads from
[xiii] Bruce M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, 2nd ed. (Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 1994), 102–106.
[xiv] House, “Baptism for the Forgiveness of Sins (Part 1).”
[xv] Ibid.
[xvi] Ibid.; see also the extended discussion in House, “Baptism for the Forgiveness of Sins (Part 2).”
[xvii] House, “Baptism for the Forgiveness of Sins (Part 1).”
[xviii] Ibid.
[xix] A. T. Robertson, A Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of Historical Research (Nashville: Broadman, 1934), 593–94; J. R. Mantey, “The Causal Use of Eis,” Journal of Biblical Literature 70 (1951): 45–48.
[xx] House, “Baptism for the Forgiveness of Sins (Part 1).”
[xxi] Ibid.
[xxii] House, “Baptism for the Forgiveness of Sins (Part 2).”
[xxiii] Ibid.
[xxiv] Ibid.
[xxv] Ibid.
[xxvi] David Hill, Greek Words and Hebrew Meanings: Studies in the Semantics of Soteriological Terms (Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1967), 168–70.
[xxvii] Catechism of the Catholic Church, §§1257–1261.
[xxviii] Ibid., §§1258–1261.
[xxix] Ambrose, De obitu Valentiniani II.51, 53.
[xxx] Augustine, De baptismo contra Donatistas IV.22.29.
[xxxi] Council of Trent, Decree on Justification, ch. 4 (Denzinger 796).
[xxxii] Catechism of the Catholic Church, §1258.
[xxxiii] Ibid., §1259.
[xxxiv] Augustine, City of God XIII.7.
[xxxv] Catechism of the Catholic Church, §1128. Cf. E. J. Kilmartin, “Ex Opere Operato,” in New Catholic Encyclopedia, 17 vols., ed. W. J. McDonald (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America, 1967–1979), 5:501–502. See additionally C. O’Neil, ‘‘The Role of the Recipient and Sacramental Signification,’’ Thomist 21 (1958) 257–301, 508–540.
[xxxvi] Ibid., §1260.
[xxxvii] Ibid., §1260–1261.
[xxxviii] Ibid., §1257.
[xxxix] For which, see Millard J. Erickson, Christian Theology, 3rd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2013), 1016–32; James Leo Garrett, Jr., Systematic Theology: Biblical, Systematic, and Historical, 2 vols. (1990, 1995; reprint, Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2014), 2:549–87; Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2020), 1180–81, 1195–1219; Adam Harwood, Christian Theology: Biblical, Historical, Systematic (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Academic, 2022), 682–93; Augustus H. Strong, Systematic Theology (Valley Forge, PA: Judson, 1907), 931–59. Also important is Thomas R. Schreiner and Shawn D. Wright, eds., Believer’s Baptism: Sign of the New Covenant in Christ (Nashville, TN: B&H Academic, 2006). Finally, see Thomas J. Nettles, “Baptist View: Baptism as a Symbol of Christ’s Saving Work,” in Understanding Four Views of Baptism, John H. Armstrong, ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2007), 25–58.
[xl] Ludwig Ott, Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, 357–58, on ex opere operantis in baptism of desire. By way of comparison, see Justin S. Holcomb and David A. Johnson, eds., Christian Theologies of the Sacraments: A Comparative Introduction (New York: New York University, 2017). For an excellent introduction to the Reformed theology of the sacraments, see Michael S. Horton, People and Place: A Covenant Ecclesiology (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2008), 99–113. Also helpful is Leonard J. Vander Zee, Christ, Baptism and the Lord’s Supper: Recovering the Sacraments for Evangelical Worship (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2004).
[xli] Augustine, City of God XIII.7, on divine freedom in salvation apart from sacramental administration.
[xlii] Everett Ferguson, Baptism in the Early Church: History, Theology, and Liturgy in the First Five Centuries (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009), passim.
[xliii] Augustine, Tractates on the Gospel of John 80.3, in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series, vol. 7, ed. Philip Schaff.
[xliv] See Ferguson, Baptism in the Early Church, 166–200.
[xlv] Catechism of the Catholic Church, §§1257–1261.
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