Dear Catholic Exchange:
I've a Baptist friend who believes that Catholics (a) re-baptize and (b) that extreme unction is rebaptism. Would you please briefly address those points that I may forward the data to him for his consideration? If mentioning conditional baptism, please explain the correct meaning of that for his benefit.
Danny
Danny:
Catholics believe in “one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.” So they actually take great care not to rebaptize if the first baptism was valid (which it typically is). A valid baptism requires water flowing over the skin and the Trinitarian formula (“I baptize you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”). The assumption is that the intention of the baptizer who does this is the same as the intention of the Church. So the vast majority of Christian baptisms are regarded as valid. Ocassionally you will have somebody who was baptized in a Oneness Church where they only baptize in the name of Jesus. Or else you will have somebody baptized in the Mormon or Jehovah Witness tradition, where it is clear that the intention behind the baptism is something other than the Church's intention (polytheism in the case of Mormons, or rejection of the deity of Jesus and the Spirit in the case of JW's). In that case, the Church will not “re-baptize” but baptize (since the first “baptism” was no baptism at all). Finally, there will be cases (such as with me) of people who were baptised in circumstance where it was not possible to tell if the baptism was valid or not (my then-girlfriend baptized me).
In such cases, the Church will “conditionally baptize” using the formula, “If you have not been baptized, then I baptize you in the name of… etc.”
“Extreme unction” has nothing whatever to do with baptism. It is simply the old name for what the Church now commonly refers to as the Anointing of the Sick. You can read all about it in the Catechism.
Hope that helps!
Mark Shea
Senior Content Editor
Catholic Exchange
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