The Sacrament of Confirmation: From Being Educated in Faith to Christian Maturity
The Sacrament of Confirmation: From Being Educated in Faith to Christian Maturity

Summary/Abstract: While Eastern churches have kept the practice of Christian Antiquity, that is, to confirm immediately after conferring Baptism, the Western church gradually separated Confirmation and Baptism. Baptism was conferred short after the child’s birth, while Confirmation came to be associated with the age of discretion. This development is also mirrored in contemporary codes of canon law in force: while the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches prescribes the Chrismation immediately after Baptism, the (Western) Code of Canon Law presupposes for the candidates of Confirmation the age of discretion. However, particular legal norms of Bishops’ Conferences raise the age of the confirmees in such a way that the preparation for this sacrament in fact substitutes catechesis for the adolescents. In this process, one overestimates the role of rational understanding and human maturity as opposed to the conditions used for the sacrament of the Eucharist, where the age for the First Communion is lower.

• Details
• Contents