In Defense of the Sacrament of Confirmation

Something I wrote while studying theology, fighting for a lost cause.

Some Catholic theologians are advocating for restoring the unity and order of the Sacraments of Initiation: of Baptism, Confirmation and the Eucharist, as they were in the early Church. Some bishops are allowing for confirmation to be administered before first communion, and some scholars would like for communion to be administered to infants after baptism. Such advocacy is often focused on changing the longstanding practice of administering the sacrament of confirmation to adolescents as they profess their faith. But listening to all these arguments has convinced me that the sacrament of confirmation should be administered to adolescents as they profess their faith. I’ll try to explain.

The usual arguments often rely upon a canon from the Council of Trent on the Sacrament of Confirmation, which people interpret as anathematizing the belief that confirmation is a ritual in which adolescence profess the faith into which they were baptized as infants. However, if we read the canon carefully and consider the context, it is easy to conclude that the intentions of the Council of Trent are being distorted.

The Council of Trent was responding to the errors of Martin Luther, who argued that there were only two sacraments: Baptism and Eucharist. However, the Lutherans maintained, for obvious practical reasons, a ceremony whereby catechized adolescents professed their faith before the Church. They did not consider this ceremony to be a sacrament, but merely a kind of catechism and profession of faith.

Thus, responding to the Lutheran teaching on Confirmation, the Council of Trent declared: “If any one saith, that the confirmation of those who have been baptized is an idle ceremony, and not rather a true and proper sacrament; or that of old it was nothing more than a kind of catechism, whereby they who were near adolescence gave an account of their faith in the face of the Church; let him be anathema.” (Session 7, On Confirmation, Canon 1)

Now, considering this historical context, and reading this canon carefully, let us ask ourselves, what is this canon actually saying? I think there are two options: 

1. Confirmation is not a ceremony whereby adolescents profess their faith, or 

2. Confirmation is not merely a ceremony whereby adolescents profess their faith. 

Those two statements sound very similar, but their meanings are very different, almost complete opposites. I believe the intention of the Council of Trent was to teach option 2, but many theologians are assuming that the Council taught option 1.

The Council of Trent was not addressing the modern controversy about restoring the unity and order of the sacraments of initiation, but rather the protestant controversy about the number and nature of true and proper sacraments. The Council is taking for granted that confirmation should be administered to adolescents professing their faith. Think about it, if the Council was condemning the practice of confirming adolescents professing their faith, why did the Church continue to do so for centuries afterward? Did the Church ignore the Council? 

Let’s consider a hypothetical scenario: A protestant group declares that Baptism is the only true and proper sacrament, and argues that the Eucharist is nothing more than a memorial of the last supper, while continuing to practice a ritual involving the sharing of bread and wine. A Council of the Church could truly and rightly declare: “If anyone says that the Eucharist is not a true and proper sacrament, but is nothing more than an idle ceremony involving bread and wine that memorializes the Last Supper, let him be anathema.”

And moreover, wouldn’t it be strange, if 500 years later, a mass of theologians began citing this canon to advocate for changing the traditional practice of using bread and wine in ritual, while calling normal Catholics heretics for assuming the Eucharist is a memorial of the Last Supper, in an effort to bend longstanding customs and practices of the universal Church to fit their over-specialized interpretations of early Church documents?

This is the situation we are in, with this discussion about restoring the unity and order of the sacraments of initiation and controversy about the sacrament of confirmation.

I don’t mean to be incendiary, but I am one-hundred percent correct about the canon from the Council of Trent. It's not heretical to believe that confirmation involves professing the faith as a young adult into which one was baptized as an infant. It’s not, it’s not, it’s not. I swear, I’m not the crazy one.

The heart of my complaint is that religious sanity resides with the traditional customs of the faithful, and not with the fashions of scholars. Luther called the sacrament of confirmation, “monkey business” and many Catholic theologians seem to agree. But praise is due to the Lutherans for recognizing the practical necessity for catechizing adolescents before a profession of faith as young adults. A Church would have to be in the midst of a serious crisis of self-preservation to disparage the catechesis of adolescents and a ceremonial profession of the faith they intend to practice, but that may be where we are.

And supposing that the unity and order of the sacraments of initiation were restored, and granting that the Church would continue some idle ceremony whereby adolescents profess their faith after a period of catechesis, but which was no longer sacramental in nature, wouldn’t this resulting situation, in effect, be another example of the protestantizing of the Catholic Church?