The Catholic Church did not invent it. Holy water is in accordance with God’s ways in the Old Testament, and the Catholic Church has merely kept the Christian practice which has existed from the very beginning of Christianity, and which the Protestant reformers rejected as usual in the 16th century. St. Justin Martyr, who died in the year 163 A.D., tells us that the faithful at Mass were sprinkled with these cleansing waters. A document called the Apostolic Constitutions, which dates from the very earliest ages of the Church, gives us in Bk. VIII., sect. XXIX., the following significant prayer, “Let the Bishop bless the water, and if he be not there, the Priest. And let him say: 0 God, Creator of the waters, sanctify this water through Thy Christ, and grant it power to banish demons, and to disperse all snares through Christ our Hope, through whom be to Thee and to the Holy Ghost, glory forever. Amen.”
Radio Replies Volume 1 by Rev. Dr. Leslie Rumble MSC and Rev. Charles Mortimer Carty
Historical language and viewpoints in the original collection are preserved. For current official teaching, consult the Catechism and the Holy See.
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