Why Lowering the Age of Confirmation Makes Sense

“...The graces bestowed by this sacrament are necessary...”

I agree. Earlier is better. My daughters in this Diocese had to wait until 10th grade and that age group definitely needs the graces earlier in high school in this day and age.

The new Bishop had confirmation in Latin for the Latin Mass community last fall. This is an excellent sign. I did not go, but read that this was done.

I agree with you, cothrige, but unfortunately, MANY people, including Catholics throw up the “but they don’t UNDERSTAND” argument. I was only trying to respond to that inevitability.

You are correct, of course, that “understanding” is not necessary for the reception of the sacraments. I would be perfectly OK with lowering the ages all the way down to newborn. It is most imperative that the graces not be withheld.

Regards,

I would be perfectly OK with lowering the ages all the way down to newborn. It is most imperative that the graces not be withheld.

The majority of Eastern Catholic Churches administer the sacraments of initiation at the same time. Only the Latin Church has doled them out over a period of years. . The "don't understand" argument is quite ridiculous. We all remember that question in our Baltimore Catechism: "What is a Sacrament?" R: A Sacrament is an outward sign instituted by Christ to give grace. (although mine said 'conveys grace'). We need those graces to stay on course throughout our life.

The majority of Eastern Catholic Churches administer the sacraments of initiation at the same time. Only the Latin Church has doled them out over a period of years. . The "don't understand" argument is quite ridiculous. We all remember that question in our Baltimore Catechism: "What is a Sacrament?" R: A Sacrament is an outward sign instituted by Christ to give grace. (although mine said 'conveys grace'). We need those graces to stay on course throughout our life.

I believe that the Eastern method in this case is a very good indicator of the validity and ancientness of this practice. The Latin practice is obviously the aberrant one and so needs to be amended. There simply isn't any good reason to continue with it, beyond making sure many people are deprived of God's graces just when they are confronted by many obstacles which create a need for it.

I must admit, though, that I have no memory of the Baltimore Catechism, having been reared in the Anglican tradition. The phrase which always returns to my ear is, therefore, the standard one there, along the lines of "an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace." If parsed carefully it might betray its anti-Catholic bias just a bit, but it flows rather nicely, doesn't it? That is one thing that was always good in the older Anglican rites and services, the English. I still pine for the last response of the Sursum Corda as used in the traditional Anglican Mass. After the priest's call to lift up our hearts our reply was "It is meet and right so to do." You just can't improve on that. We have never come close in the English of the Catholic liturgy. I think we should have just lifted the entire section from the BCP, including the "And with thy spirit" and the priest's continuation which speaks of "our bounden duty." It is all so really good, but, oh well . . .

“Grace, a central concept in Christian theology, refers to God’s granting salvation not in reward for the moral worth of the human but as a free and undeserved gift of love, as opposed to any notion that salvation can be earned by human effort apart from God’s help.

The Old Testament contains important themes related to God’s undeserved love for his people, Israel. The chief architect of the early Christian church’s theology of grace, however, was Saint Paul: charis, the Greek word for “grace” is infrequent in the non-Pauline writings of the New Testament. For Paul, grace means the free gift of salvation by which God liberates humans from sin and frees them from death “through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus” (Romans 3:24). Paul deliberately sets grace in contrast to all human efforts to achieve favor with God.

Medieval Christianity and much Roman Catholic theology has treated grace as a divine power that enters a person and, in cooperation with the person’s own will, transforms him or her into someone who loves God and is loved by God. This grace is transmitted especially, perhaps exclusively, through the church’s sacraments (the “means of grace”); and it allows some room for human merit because the one who receives grace must also cooperate with it in the process of transformation.

Protestant theologians have insisted that grace is given where God wills and is not conditional on a person’s receptivity. Thus the sacraments are signs of grace, but do not impart it, and salvation depends entirely on God, not at all on human will a theme close to the idea of predestination. This grace is not a power that transforms a person; it is a love that receives a person directly into God’s favor.”

Grolier Encyclopedia of Knowledge, 1991

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