Baptism

“Through the sacraments, divine love reaches into the heart of matter, allowing created things to participate in God's own life and love.”

“In each baptized person, through his baptismal character, the entire order of the Church (which is a eucharistic order) is inscribed.”

“Instead of conceiving the institution of baptism as a most fitting crowning of the inherent symbolism of water, it could be said that baptism is the very reason for which water was created from the beginning.”

“With the insertion of the ‘new principle’ of Christ, the New Testament waters are the contact point between God and the world, where God himself is the living water which effects the eschatological purification.”

“To embark on an initiation into the life of Christ, it is fundamental to begin existentially, humbly, step-by-step, to enter into an experience of and a participation in eternity.”

“The quality of the mystical life is rooted in baptism; and that life is, in turn, a manifestation and fulfillment of the sacrament.”

“The fulfillment of the entire cosmic order is found in the movement from the ‘not yet’ of creation’s groaning to the ‘now’ of the Eucharistic God’s sacrificial presence.”

“The spiritual senses are the ways in which the realities presented in Scripture participate in the mystery of Christ, and the ways in which believers participate in the same mystery.”

“The great ‘more’ of being lies then not only in the act of existence but in the miracle of essence and existence taken together. . . . The source gives both in a single act of love.”