Anniversary of Our Baptism

IT is a very excellent and profitable devotion to celebrate in a pious manner the anniversary of the day on which we were baptized. We have far more reason to rejoice at the thought of the signal blessings imparted to us in our spiritual regeneration, than in the possession of life itself; for the latter can scarcely be a desirable object, unless it be sanctified by the institutions of religion, and become thereby a preparation for the happiness of eternity. Let the day of your baptism, therefore, be annually devoted to exercises of piety, and other good works. Besides your morning and evening prayers, which should be recited with more than usual devotion, make a meditation on the happiness you received in your spiritual regeneration, when you became a child of God, and a member of his holy Church. What gratitude should you feel, and what fervent thanksgivings should you offer for this inestimable grace, which has been conferred upon you in preference to so many others! At your communion renew, with all the fervor of which you are capable, your baptismal engagements. Repeat to God the promise you once made, to renounce the devil, with all his works and pomps, that is, to shun sin and all its occasions. Beg pardon of God for having been so unfaithful to this promise, and consecrate yourself with increased zeal to his service.

A PRAYER FOR RENEWING THE PROMISES OF BAPTISM.

MOST holy Trinity! Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, one God in three persons! I present myself before thy sovereign Majesty, to pay thee the tribute of my adoration and thanksgiving, for the innumerable graces and blessings which thou hast so liberally bestowed upon me, from my first coming into the world, until now. I thank thee particularly, O my God! for the inestimable grace of my baptism. What gratitude can bear proportion to such a favor? By baptism, I have been delivered from the power of darkness, and translated into the kingdom of thy beloved Son; by baptism, I have been cleansed from the stain of that sin, in which I was born; by baptism, I have been made a member of the body of Jesus Christ, to live of his life, to be animated and guided by his spirit, to be fed with his sacred flesh, to enter into his designs, to imitate his virtues; finally, to be a living image of what he has been during his mortal life. These are the obligations of my baptism, these are the conditions of the alliance, which thou wouldst have me to contract with thee; and although I was at that time ignorant of them, and my will had no part in this sacred contract, far from wishing to be released from them, or appealing, in any manner, from my vows and professions, I ratify them now, and renew them in thy presence from the bottom of my heart, with a profound sorrow for having hitherto led a life so little conformable to my promises, and proved myself, by repeated transgressions, so unworthy of the glorious quality of thy child. But now, relying on the promised assistance of thy grace, it is my firm determination to labor all my life in fulfilling the sacred engagements which my sponsors have contracted in my name.

Yes, O my God! I renounce, for ever, Satan and all his suggestions, the world and all its pomps, sin and all its concupiscences. I am resolved, as it was promised in my behalf, to unite and attach myself more and more to Jesus Christ, my Saviour, and to make his divine laws and maxims the object of my earnest study, and the invariable rule of all my actions.

O Eternal Father! who wast pleased to adopt me in thy Son Jesus Christ, as one of thy children, and to call me to thy celestial inheritance, revive in me the grace of this divine adoption; and since I am regenerated by thee alone, in order to be a citizen of heaven, grant that I may live for thee alone, and that all my desires and labors may be directed to the acquisition of heavenly goods.

O Jesus, the only begotten Son of the Father! who hast made me a member of thy mystical body, washed me in thy blood, and sanctified me by thy holy sacraments, perfect thy work in me. Purify my heart from the remains of the pride and corruption of Adam; and form thy precious image in my soul, by engraving in it thy charity, thy humility, thy purity, and all thy other virtues, which are the glorious features of that image.

O holy Spirit! adorable principle of the divine adoption! be also the principle of my life, of my actions, of my desires, and of all the motions of my heart, that they may be worthy of a child of God, and member of Jesus Christ.

O Holy Trinity! who, in consecrating me to thy service by baptism, hast made me the adorer of the Unity of thy name, and of the Trinity of thy persons, mercifully grant, that I may adore thee in spirit and in truth during my life, and love, praise and enjoy thee during eternity. Amen.

A PRAYER TO OUR HOLY PATRON OF BAPTISM.

GLORIOUS St. N.! whose name I have the honor to bear, who wast given in baptism as a protector and a pattern, and who, although secure of thy own immortal bliss, art nevertheless solicitous about my happiness; assist me by thy powerful intercession, as thou instructest me by the examples of thy holy life. For I truly can behold in thy life, as in a bright mirror, what I am to correct in myself, and what I am to practise. Thou hast been like me, subject to suffering, encompassed with infirmities, assaulted with temptations; but being rooted and founded in charity, thou hast spurned the rage and persecutions of the world, despised its allurements, and triumphed over its malignity. Obtain by thy prayers, that I may be endued with thy spirit, and become a follower of thee, as thou hast been of Christ. Draw me, that I may run after thee in the odor of thy ointments, that is, of thy virtues. On the day in which I was buried together with Christ by baptism unto death, thou wast given me for a witness and a guardian of my engagements. I beseech thee, therefore, that thou assist me in thy prayers for me to God, that I may hold fast the confession of my hope without wavering, and that laboring to make sure by good works my vocation and election, I may pursue towards the mark for the prize of the celestial vocation of God, in Christ Jesus. Amen.