Is Baptism a “private” or an “ecclesial” event?
Baptism, Chrismation and Eucharist is initiation and the entry into the church. All these sacraments are connected to our Lord Jesus Christ and they are part of the mystery of Christ which is the church, the gathering, the Eucharist.
From early on, the Sacraments were divided into many pieces, but there was no idea of several sacraments. Everything was the mystery of Christ as we know, but later the Church divided them.
In the beginning we will see where the official Church stands on this Sacrament, is it “private” and/or “ecclesial”; is it connected to the Eucharist and how is this reflected in Serbian Orthodox Christians. In my case, we need to briefly say a few words about the Sacrament itself and answer a few simple questions, like: where does putting someone into water come from; what is the major significance of this; what kind of the baptism was among the Jews; is there any continuity between Judaism and Christianity and what are the fundamental differences – if any?
Going through the Old Testament we can see that there were a lot of different pardons and that these pardons’ were connected with ritual purity. The Jews had a theory of purity and impurity and these had to do with the purpose of religion itself: oral tradition, and a God who was considered distant; the result of which was the idea of mediation. In their eyes this mediation was mediation between sacred and profane. Baptism developed around this. Profane, as not being fit for God, and sacred, is sacred space. Impurity was something you came into contact with and then these things made you impure. This was not only a moral or ethical thing but also an objective thing – if you touch something you are impure. When a Jew was impure, he/she was incapable of have a relationship with God, so this was excommunication. All of these laws could be found in the Old Testament book of Leviticus.
Now then, what shall we do with the person who was impure, how would we get him/her back? First he/she was questioned and then forgiveness was administered with the water rite. Later in Judaism, we find a new water rite which followed into the New Testament. This new water was an initiation rite or the right of entrance, which was different from impersonal cleansing of the forgiveness rites. The practice advanced with instruction and circumcision for males and the water rite of passage for both males and females. All this created some kind of rivalry between Judaism and Christianity.
Now that we briefly touched baptism in the Old Testament we will continue into New.
St. John the Baptist was the first link between this old rite of purification and the new Christian baptism. The baptism that St. John was performing was from the foundation different. He was baptizing his fellow Jews for the remission of sins – similar to baptism today. Just because these people were Jews, this baptism clearly did not have any seemingly direct connection to old ritual impurity. It was ultimately the new elements of confession, repentance and remission of the sins – that epitomized true Christian baptism. In Orthodox Church we call St. John the “forerunner”, but we can freely call him “forerunner of baptism” as well.
When Christ was baptized it was something very different, because in this baptism God revealed Christ as His Son. From that moment the old baptism which John the Baptist was performing ended – the new promise was discovered. This Christian baptism was a new beginning (a second birth) and it was an extension of the great works of creation from the Old Testament – the great acts of God that became real and fulfilled.
There are many references in the New Testament about Christian baptism: being baptized in the name of Father, Son and Holy Spirit – this was a kernel of the early baptism of the Church and it was separated into several parts. The first part was a short catechism; secondly: acceptance of the word of God or rather confession of the faith; thirdly was immersion into water with the Trinitarian invocation; the fourth element was the placing on of hands (this was kernel of the later practice of Chrism); and last was Eucharist (the breaking of the bread). All this was performed only once a year during the great annual celebration of the Easter, because the Easter Liturgy was predominantly a baptismal liturgy. By the 3rd century we see an enormous development of the catechetical writings from Justin Martyr, Tertullian, St. John the Chrysostom and etc., these writings were instructions for Catechumens. In addition we see other features of baptism, for example oil and Chrism, which later were developed and became part of it – all this, were very early elements of baptism.
Incorporating the catechumens into the Eucharist was an early idea of the Church, but slowly other baptismal opportunities were established. During Easter all the people were baptized and being united together into the body of Christ. The whole congregation was there to witness this – but as I said earlier other days were established for baptism, like today we can be baptized on week day, not just on a feast day.
The baptism separated from this old tradition, that is, being the part of the Eucharist, somewhere around early 11th century. Between the 12th and 15th century we see complete autonomy of, not just the Sacrament of the Baptism, but all the Sacraments from the Eucharist. The much known controversy of “Filioque” which was proposed by west in Council of Lyon (15thy century), also included a suggestion of only seven Sacraments. The Orthodox Church rejected this council but historically adopted the idea of seven Sacraments.
In the beginning, infant baptism was the key controversy for separation – was the baptism of infants in error? No, because even in apostolic times there were infant baptisms. The circumstances surrounding and leading to the disappearance of adult baptism, truly helped cause the separation. What this means is that normally everyone was Christian in the empire, therefore you would not have any adult baptism any more. So, this whole evolution of the baptism from catechumens, etc. lost its meaning because those steps no longer existed, even though this took several hundred years to develop. Secondly, it was very hard to fit all those people in Church on Pascha. For that reason the Church instituted or shall we say allowed baptism on other days. Understanding group baptism, it was easy to institute individual baptism down the road. This might, however, be wrong, as our whole mentality changed. Today we have baptisms which are totally individualistic, something like “my sacrament”; but we are forgetting that we are incorporated in the body of Christ, which is the local Eucharistic assembly.
The main problem here is that the same conditions do not exist today, which caused all these separations. The circumstances that led to this separation of baptism from Eucharist do not exist anymore. The main problem today is the mentality. We have an individualistic mentality, which is the culture today. This is much harder to overcome. In some way, the Holy Sacraments turn out to be our private event and they were not the matter for the whole Church anymore, therefore they are no longer a celebration of the entrance into the Body of Christ.
The baptismal experience is the fundamental Christian experience, the primary condition for the whole of Christian life. Everything in the Church has its origin and context in baptism, for everything in the Church originates and lives by the resurrection of Christ. Thus, following baptism comes "the seal of the gift of the Holy Spirit," the mystery (sacrament) of chrismation which is man's personal experience of Pentecost. And the completion and fulfillment of these fundamental Christian mysteries comes in the mystery of Holy Communion with God in the divine liturgy of the Church.
Only persons who are committed to Christ, in the Orthodox Church, through baptism and chrismation, may offer and receive the holy Eucharist in the Orthodox Church. The holy Eucharist is Holy Communion. As such it is not just a "means of sanctification" for individual believers, a means through which private persons gain "communion" with God according to their own private consciences, beliefs and practices. It is rather, the all-embracing act of Holy Communion of many persons, having the same faith, the same hope and the same baptism. It is the corporate act of many persons having one mind, one heart, one mouth in the service of one God and Lord, in one Christ and one Holy Spirit.
For Serbian Orthodox Christians, the Holy Sacrament of the Baptism has for many years been an isolated matter of the family, separated from the whole congregation of the Church. Earlier I spoke about how group baptism in the Church was separated into individual baptism. This happened to us, since we were under Turkish occupation many years and the people were under persecution, so there was a fear to gather together in church. During these 600 years, there was a mentality of hiding and there were no more great gatherings; baptisms were even not allowed in Churches. From this, for so many years, Serbians established “house Churches” were the people/infants were baptized. After the Turkish occupation, Serbians were under communist regimes. During these years the Orthodox Church was prosecuted as well, without remorse. Any Church Sacrament became a private Sacrament and only trusted friends and/or relatives were present, but again not in the Church but in someone house, barn, basement etc. The perfect example perhaps would be my godfather, who was in the communist party for financial reasons, but on the other hand celebrated his Slava (the Serbian saint day, his was St. Stephan) somewhere at an undisclosed location, near his house – this, at that time, was very hard for me to understand!
On December 1, 1990 a great leader among the Serbian Bishops arose to be the next Patriarch of the Church. As a bishop of Ras and Prizren +Pavle built numerous new churches and helped the reconstruction of old ones. He spent a lot of time in traveling (mostly by foot and/or bus) and meeting with people of his eparchy. He also wrote books and gave lectures in Church music and Church Slavonic; for that reason, after 33 years in Kosovo, Pavle was elected the Patriarch of Serbia. Pavle was the most loving Patriarch (the walking saint as he was known by the people). The fall of the communist regime and having +Pavle as the Head of our Church awakened all Serbians, not just in Serbia but Serbians around the world. Serbians in Serbia now attend regularly all Church services. Orthodoxy is taught in all schools There is even now a return to group baptism as well and it is usually performed after the Liturgy, so that everyone could witness (just like in ancient history). Many Serbians who were hiding and had fear for their lives are now very proud Serbian Orthodox people.