What the Early Church Believed: Confirmation

In Scripture

Confirmation appears in Acts 8:14-17, 9:17 and 19:6, and in Hebrews 6:2, which speak of the laying on of hands to bestow the Holy Spirit. Hebrews 6:2 is especially important because it is not a narrative and cannot be dismissed as limited to the apostolic age. It lists the "elementary teachings": repentance, faith, baptisms, the laying on of hands, the resurrection and eternal judgment (Hebrews 6:1-2). This is the order of salvation, and the laying on of hands here must be confirmation, since laying on hands for ordination or healing is not given to every Christian. Like baptism, confirmation is a sacrament of initiation.

The witness of the early Church

• Theophilus of Antioch (181): we are called Christians because we are anointed with the oil of God.
• Tertullian (203, 210): after baptism we are anointed, as priests were since Aaron, and then the hand is laid on, inviting the Holy Spirit. The flesh is washed, anointed, signed and shaded by the imposition of hands so the soul may be cleansed, consecrated, fortified and illuminated by the Spirit.
• Hippolytus (215) gives the rite: the bishop lays his hand on the baptized, prays for God's grace, anoints their heads with holy oil, signs their foreheads and greets them.
• Cyprian (253): the baptized must also be anointed with chrism to be God's anointed. As Peter and John laid hands on the Samaritans baptized by Philip, so the newly baptized are brought to the bishops to receive the Spirit by prayer and the imposition of hands and be perfected with the Lord's seal.
• The Seventh Council of Carthage (256), citing John 3:5, holds that converts must be born again in the Church by both sacraments.
• The Treatise on Re-Baptism (256): by ancient custom, those baptized outside the Church receive the Spirit by the bishop's imposition of hands, as with the Samaritans (Acts 8:14-17).
• Cyril of Jerusalem (350): after baptism comes chrism, which after the invocation is no longer plain ointment, as the Eucharist is no longer plain bread; as the body is anointed, the soul is sanctified by the Spirit, armed against the adversary.
• Serapion (350) prays that those anointed may share the gift of the Spirit and, "confirmed by this seal," remain firm.
• The Council of Laodicea (360): after baptism the illuminated are anointed with chrism.
• Pacian of Barcelona (383): the power of baptism and confirmation passed to the bishops.
• The Apostolic Constitutions (400): by the bishop's laying on of hands the Lord gave the Spirit and sealed the faithful with the oil of gladness.
• The African Code (419): those baptized as children by the Donatists are received into the Catholic Church by the imposition of hands.