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FSSP Finland
 Pyhän Pietarin pappisveljeskunnanSuomen apostolaatti
Isä Benjamin Durham FSSP fssp-nland@sanctis.netNewsletter 2009/02 April 5th, 2009
I
n the Early Church, Lent was seen as preparation towards Easter. For thecatechumens, this penitential season was a long spiritual preparation for Bap-tism, which they would receive in the long Easter Night. Through Baptism, thedarkness of the world fades into the joyful Light of Christ that shines in thehearts of the faithful. According to the testimony of Saint Ambrose, this is also the meaning of thewords that we nd at the beginning of Holy Mass:
Introibo ad altare Dei. Ad
 Deum qui laeticat juventutem meam
. Those who had been baptised and con-rmed would go from the baptismal fonts towards the altar, where they wouldparticipate in the Divine Eucharist with the condence given to them by thegrace of their rebirth. “This people who had been cleansed,” says Saint Ambrose,“and vested in the rich garments of grace, goes to the altar of Jesus Christ saying:I shall go to the altar of God, I shall go to God who rejoices in my youth.”When we enter a church and, particularly when we participate in the HolySacrice of Mass, we are reminded of the grace of our baptism, the grace of ourcommon Christian vocation. Whatever our age, we have the joy of our baptism, of our spiritual youth which lls us with immense joy as we go to the altar of God toreceive the Body and Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ.For many centuries, these same words have been placed on the lips of thepriest and the people as they go to the altar of God, conscious of the ineffable giftsthat they have received from Almighty God in order that they may participate inthe victory of Christ over the world.In Christ Our Lord,
Fr. Benjamin Durham, FSSP 
Coming into the Light of God during Lent
Baptism in the Early Church
B
aptism was usually given during the night before Easter Sunday but the bap-tismal ceremonies actually began at the opening of Lent. This was certainlythe case in the fourth century, a time in which there are many testimonies of thepractice of the Early Church. The candidates were enrolled at that time and be-gan their immediate preparation for the sacrament, whereas, up until taking thisstep, they had been simple catechumens. From the time of their enrollment atthe beginning of Lent, the candidates constituted a new group, the photizomenoi,
 
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those who are coming into the light. The ceremonies of these forty days form awhole, of which our Ritual makes a single ceremony. A brief look at these ancientrites is not without its importance. As we have mentioned, the preparation for baptism was introduced by the riteof enrollment, which we nd described in this way by Etheria in her account of her pilgrimage: “Whoever wishes to give in his name does so on the eve of Lent;and a priest notes down all the names. The next day, the opening of Lent, the dayon which the eight weeks begin, in the middle of the principal church, that is,the church of the Martyrium, a seat is placed for the bishop, and one by one, thecandidates are led up to him. If they are men, they come with their godfathers;if women, with their godmothers. Then the bishop questions the neighbours of each person who comes in, saying: ‘Does he lead a good life? Does he respect hisparents? Is he given to drunkenness or lying?’ If the candidate is pronounced be-yond reproach by all those who are thus questioned in the presence of witnesses,with his own hand the bishop notes down the person’s name. But if the candidateis accused of failing in any point, the bishop tells him to go out, saying: ‘Let himamend his life and when he has amended it, let him come to Baptism.’”The rite described by Etheria is that of Jerusalem, and is analogous to thatof Antioch, thus described by Theodore of Mopsuestia: “Whoever desires to cometo Holy Baptism, let him present himself to the Church of God... A man who isdelegated for the duty of enrollment writes down your name in the Book of theChurch, and also that of the witness. As in a trial, the person who is accused muststand up, so you are to hold out your arms in the attitude of one who prays, andto keep your eyes cast down. For the same reason, you are to take off your outergarment and to be barefoot, standing on haircloth.”The literal meaning of these rites is obvious, -- what interests us is the in-terpretation given to them by the Fathers. The examination which precedes theinscription in which the claims of the candidate are discussed, signies for Theo-dore of Mopsuestia that at this moment Satan “tries to argue against us, underthe pretext that we have no right to escape from his domination. He says thatwe belong to him because we are descended from the head of our race. We musthasten to go before the judge to establish our claims and to show that we did notbelong to Satan from the beginning, but to God Who made us to His Own image.”Of course, we can compare this scene, as Theodore does, to the temptation of OurLord in which Satan “tries to lead Christ astray by his wiles and temptations.”Even the attitude of the candidate is symbolic: he is clad only in his tunic and isbarefoot, “to show the slavery in which the devil holds him captive and to arousethe pity of the judge.”Theodore’s interpretation brings out one of the themes of baptismal theology – the conict with Satan. The baptismal rites constitute a drama in which thecandidate, who up to this time has belonged to the demon, strives to escape hispower. This drama begins with the enrollment and is not concluded, as we shallsee, until the actual baptism. We notice that Theodore relates the trial whichthe candidate undergoes, on the one hand, to the temptation of Adam, on theother hand to that of Christ. This parallelism of the scene of Paradise and that of Baptism, with that from the life of Christ in between, will appear all through thecourse of the baptismal catechesis. We also notice that the Gospel of the Tempta-
 
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tion is found in the Roman liturgy on the rst Sunday of Lent, and this should beinterpreted in the light of the fact that this was the Sunday of enrollment.The symbolism of the actual enrollment is given to us by Saint Gregory of Nyssa: “Give me your names so that I may write them down in ink. But the LordHimself wil engrave them on incorruptible tablets, writing them with His ownnger, as He once wrote the Law of the Hebrews.” The visible writing in theregister of the Church is the gure of the writing of the names of the elect on thetablets of Heaven. For Gregory, this inscription is a gure of our inscription in theChurch of Heaven. Our sponsors will take great care to teach us, strangers as weare to this city, everything concerning life in this city, so that we may accustomourselves to it. We cannot but feel as we step into a church, that we step out of the profane and into the sacred, that we leave the world for another world, thatwe step out of time in order to enjoy a real contact with eternity. As those who arebaptised, whose soul is beautifully transgured and transformed, we do not stepinto this church like a stranger passing by – we have a right of citizenship, weknow that we belong here through our illumination, our baptism which gave ussuch a right. In the end, we know that it is in the Church that we belong and thatthe sacred temples here on Earth are but the gures of the Heavenly Jerusalem.On the rst Sunday of Lent, the candidates were examined and enrolled andthe forty days that followed were a time of retreat. “From this day on,” writesSaint Cyril of Jerusalem, “turn away from every wicked occupation; speak no un-betting words but raise the eyes of your soul and contemplate the angelic choirsand the Lord of the universe seated on His throne, with His Son at His righthand and the Spirit beside Him.” This preparation consists on the one hand instengthening faith against the attacks of error: this is the purpose of the Lentencatecheses. And, on the other, it is a time of purication in which “the rust of thesoul should be removed so that only true metal will remain.”During this time, the catechumens come to church every day, at the hour of Prime. Etheria tells us: “The custom here (that is, in Jerusalem) is that thosewho are going to be baptised come every day during Lent, and rst they are ex-orcised by the clerics. The exorcisms are the expression of the conict which isbeing waged between Christ and Satan around the faithful soul. The devil makesa supreme effort to keep the soul in his power. The rite of exorcism itself has forits precise purpose to free the soul little by little from the power that the demonhas exercised over it. Saint Cyril writes: “Receive the exorcisms eagerly, whetherthey be insufations or imprecations, for this is salutary for you. Consider thatyou are gold that has been adulterated and falsied. We are looking for pure gold.But as gold cannot be puried of its alloys without re, so the soul cannot be puri-ed without exorcisms, which are divine words, chosen from the Holy Scriptures. As goldsmiths, blowing on the re, cause the gold to separate from the ore, so theexorcisms put fear to ight by the Spirit of God, and cause the soul to rise up inthe body as if in its ore, putting to ight the enemy, the demon, and leaving onlyhope of life everlasting.” After the exorcism every morning came the catechesis: “Then,” writes Eth-eria, “they place a chair in the Martyrium for the Bishop, and all those who areto be baptised sit in a circle around him, both men and women, and their god-fathers and godmothers, and also all those who wish to hear, provided they are
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