Evangelism and Christian Formation in the Early Church

By Robert E. Webber

God is one, and Christ is one, and his church is one, and the faith is one, and people are joined into a substantial unity of body by the cement of concord. Unity cannot be severed; nor can one body be separated by a division of its structure, not torn into pieces, with its entrails wrenched asunder by laceration. Whatever has proceeded from the womb cannot love and breathe in its detached conditions, but loses the substance of health. - CYPRIAN, EPISTLES 

We shouldn't retreat or lose heart when unexpected things happen to us. Instead we should submit to the one who knows best and who will test our hearts by fire as long as he likes. - JOHN CHRYSOSTOM 

It is useless to try to teach what you don't know and is worse still to be ignorant of your ignorance. - ST. JEROME

Recently I sat with a longtime friend in a local coffee shop discussing matters related to theology. We have both enjoyed the benefits of Reformed thinking so our discussion turned to the impact of Reformed theology on our lives. ''I'm not willing to call myself Reformed anymore," my friend said. "Why not?" I asked. "It's too shaped by the Enlightenment."

This conversation raised a brief but lively discussion on the nature of Reformed theology. Is Reformed theology, particularly the theology of the Reformers - Luther, Calvin, Menno Simmons - an attempt to recover the ancient theology and practices of the church or is Reformed theology what it became in the modern world?

It seems clear to me that the Reformers were concerned to return to a pre-Medieval, Patristic approach to the faith. The Anabaptists wanted to situate faith in the practices of the pre-Constantinian church, while Luther and Calvin were concerned to locate their theological tradition in Scripture as interpreted by the Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed and the Chalcedonian Creed. While there are differences between the Reformers, they were all concerned to restore the ancient faith and practice which they felt had been corrupted by the late Medieval church. The Reformers did not have an inkling of the Enlightenment to come and how that would reshape their recovery of the past.

We now live in a time in which the awareness of post Reformation developments have resulted in a new criticism of culturally-shaped Christianity. Reformed thought filtered through reason and science has distanced us not only from the early church, but also from the Reformers who called us to return to the early church. This is, of course, a return to Scripture as well, seeing that the formation of the Canon was intertwined with the formation of the creeds and many of the practices of the early church. This relation between Scripture and tradition can be maintained even as the final authority of Scripture in all matters of faith and practice are embraced.

I have stated this brief prolegomenon above as a way of legitimizing a return to the ancient practice of evangelism and Christian formation. [1] I needed to develop this apologia because what I'm about to present is not found in any developed form in the writings of the Reformers. The failure of the Reformers to refer to the ancient practice of Christian formation is not due to their rejection of it. Rather, because the particular documents that yield an understanding of the ancient practice of Christian formation had not been recovered by the sixteenth century, the Reformers knew nothing of it. I would like to think that if they knew the material, they would have translated it for their day.

I speak here of the ancient catechumenate which was revived by Vatican II. It has been revised by the Catholic church and incorporated into the universal mission of the Roman churches. Other denominations and fellowships are following the Roman church in adapting the ancient catechumenate to their mission and ministry. What follows here is my attempt to translate this material for the Reformed church and for the evangelical community in general.

One important preliminary comment must be made. What I present is drawn from the third century and is most applicable to the mission of the church in bringing new converts into Christian formation. The process is therefore oriented around adult baptism and immersion. I advocate, but do not develop in this article that a church in the Reformed tradition may practice both adult and infant baptism. Those adults who are converted as a result of the mission of the church would obviously be baptized as adults. However children, baptized under the covenant, would be formed in a process of Christian formation in keeping with that church's tradition. One process of Christian formation would be directed toward adults, the other toward children.

EVANGELISM AND SPIRITUAL FORMATION IN THE EARLY CHURCH 

A chief source for our knowledge of evangelism and Christian formation in the early church is The Apostolic Tradition written around A.D. 215 by Hippolytus, a bishop in Rome. [2] In this document Hippolytus reveals the method and content of evangelism in the early church. The method was a process, not a one-time decision made under emotional pressure without a support community. This process brought a person into Christ and full communion with the Christian community through the periods of development and growth related to baptism. For example, the following stages of formation can be discerned in The Apostolic Tradition: (1) a period of inquiry; (2) a time of instruction, (3) an intense spiritual preparation for baptism, and (4) continued nurture in the church. Further, each of these periods is set off by a passage rite that marks the transition to the next period of growth. These passage rites include (1) the rite of entrance into the time of instruction, (2) the rite of election into the intense period of spiritual preparation, and (3) the rites that surround baptism. Consequently, we may discern four periods of growth and development framed by three rites of passage. These seven parts constitute the framework of ancient evangelism and Christian formation.

Within this sevenfold process, four basic principles of this process can be discerned: (1) Christ as victor over the powers of evil, (2) the church as a nurturing and mothering community, (3) the power of external rites to order inner experience, and (4) the principle of growth into Christ and the church through various stages of development. This article comments on each of these principles and thus clarifies the meaning of liturgical evangelism more fully.

CHRIST AS VICTOR OVER THE POWERS OF EVIL 

According to Gustaf Aulen, the fundamental view of Christ's work held by the early church is Christus victor. [3] This theme, which may be traced back to the Pauline writings, perceives the world in terms of a conflict between light and darkness, Christ and Satan, the kingdom of God and the kingdom of evil. This biblical story begins with creation and the fall and extends into the future to the end of history. The scope of the story is cosmic and includes everything from creation to re-creation. The elements of the story, such as the fall, the covenants, the incarnation, the death, burial, and resurrection, the ascension and Pentecost, as well as the history of church and its anticipation of the future, tell of Christ's conquest over evil.

The Christian makes the confession of faith that Christ is victor over sin, death, and the dominion of the devil. He has "disarmed the principalities and powers and made a public example of them, triumphing over them" (Colossians 2:15). Yet the victory of Christ over the powers of evil is no mere intellectual proposition. It is essentially a doxological affirmation, a proclamation of praise, a liturgical affirmation. Thus, in worship the church experiences this victory and cries "Jesus is Lord" (Romans 10:9), "Hallelujah! For the Lord our God the Almighty reigns" (Revelation 19:6). The church joins heavenly worship in its hymn to Christ the victor, "To Him who sits upon the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!" (Revelation 5:13). [4]

Through evangelism and Christian formation a person is brought into an experience of Christ as victor. In this process the converting person is turned away from following the "prince of the power of the air" and is made "alive together with Christ" (Ephesians 2:1-10). In the early church, this process of conversion was ordered around the rites that culminated in baptism and entrance into the Christian community. Through these rites the new Christian experienced Christ as Lord over the powers of evil.

This emphasis on the experience of Christ's present lordship over the powers of evil is clearly evident in the rite of initiation. It is expressed, for example, in the exorcisms, the renunciation of evil by the baptismal candidate, the anointing with the oil of thanksgiving, and the Eucharistic prayer. The words of the Eucharistic prayer represent a climax in the process of conversion and coalesce the entire experience of turning away from sin toward Christ, the victor over the powers of evil.

A unique feature of the baptismal journey and the culminating Eucharistic experience is that my story and his story converge. The Christ story is the overarching story that gives meaning to my story through the incorporation of my story into his. This one story, is captured in the biblical image of Christ as the second Adam, who, because of his sin, brought us under the dominion of death and condemnation. Were it not for the second Adam, Christ, we would all be left in the state of condemnation and alienation from God. The second Adam is the one who brings righteousness, life, and justification. Only through Christ can the human condition and that of the entire universe be restored and renewed. Consequently, the baptismal journey makes one a participant in the story set forth in the Eucharistic prayer. This story, for which we give thanks, locates Christ in a cosmic setting. He who is one with the Father became incarnate in the womb of the Virgin Mary, destroyed death by his death, tread down hell by his resurrection, and gained for himself a holy people, the church.

The liturgy of the church celebrates this true story through re-enactment. Through baptism one makes the journey to union with Christ who, by his destruction of the powers of evil, makes fellowship with God in the earthly life of the church possible. The Eucharist repeatedly celebrates the victory of Christ over the powers of evil, a celebration that brings the healing effect of the Christ event to the worshiping community again and again.

This supernatural conception of Christ as victor over the powers of evil and thus Lord of the cosmos and Lord and Savior of my life lies at the heart of liturgical evangelism and Christian formation. The evangelism of the early church did not seek to evangelize people into a cosmic idea, myth, or a mere window to the Father. For the early church, Jesus was the incarnate Son of God, victor over sin, Savior of those who repented and put their faith and trust in him as Lord.

THE CHURCH AS A NURTURING AND MOTHERING COMMUNITY 

A second principle of liturgical evangelism in the early church asserts that conversion into Christ takes place through the church. The church, far from being a mere aggregate of human persons, is, from the standpoint of Christian formation, the mother in whose womb God's children are born, the mother who offers her breast for nurture and sustenance.

The theme of Ecclesia Mater originates in both the Old and New Testament and is rooted in the fusion of the symbols of bride and groom. [5] For example, the relationship between God and Israel is depicted in Isaiah, chapters 61-62, and Jeremiah, chapters 25 and 33, as that between a bride and bridegroom. This marriage relationship between God and Israel is expressed in the mystical union between Christ and the church in the New Testament (Ephesians 5:21-33). Consequently, at the end of history, the holy city, the new Jerusalem that is understood as the church, is proclaimed to be the bride of the Lamb (Revelation 21:9).

The early church fathers drew on the image of the bride to develop the feminine and mothering qualities of the church. Perceiving a mystical union between Christ and the church, they stressed the need to be converted to Christ in and through the church. Cyprian declared that "he can no longer have God for his father who has not the church for her mother." [6]

Descriptions of the church as mother abound among the early church fathers. Tertullian speaks of "Our Lady Mother the Church" who nourishes us "from her bountiful breasts." [7] Clement of Alexandria extols the church as "Virgin and Mother - pure as a virgin, loving as a mother." [8] Cyprian, whose writings on the church are replete with female imagery, proclaims the church to be "the one mother copious in the results of her fruitfulness .... [By] her womb we are born, by her milk we are nourished, by her spirit we are animated." [9]

But how does the church fulfill its mothering role? First, according to the early church fathers, the church is the womb in which God's children are born. This image of gestation appears as early as the second century in the First Apology of Justin Martyr, a work written to the Emperor Titus to explain the Christian faith. Justin describes the church as a womb and draws an analogy between the water of baptism and the "moist seed" of conception. In the water of the church, the candidate is washed "in the name of God the Father and the Lord of the universe, and of our Savior Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Spirit." For Christ said, "Except ye be born again ye shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven." [10] In the womb of the church, conversion to Christ is conceived. And the water of baptism, which is the unique possession of the church, symbolically represents the creation of new life. [11]

Second, the church is mother because of the quality of the nurture it provides. Augustine is so assured of the loving nurture of the church that he can say, "You are safe who have God for your Father and His Church for your Mother." [12] In his treatise on baptism, Augustine stressed both the birthing and nurturing aspects of the church. The church "gives birth to all ... within her pale, of her own womb." [13] The church brings to birth, nurses, cares for, and even agonizes over her children. In spite of these statements, Augustine acknowledges that not all who are in the church are of God. Some may stray from the naming that was done over the waters. These repudiate their birthright and disclaim God's ownership of their lives. Those "who are born within the family, of the womb of the mother herself, and then neglect the grace they have received, are like "Isaac's son Esau, who was rejected, God Himself bearing witness to it, and saying, 'I loved Jacob, and I hated Esau; and that though they were twin-brethren, the offspring of the same womb.'" [14]

Evangelism and Christian formation, then, is evangelism in and through the church. It is not mass evangelism, parachurch evangelism, or even one-on-one evangelism. While each of these models may feed into Christian formation, ancient formation takes place in the context of the local church, of the mystery of faith that is experienced and modeled by a local spiritual family born and nurtured by its mother, the church. [15]

THE POWER OF EXTERNAL RITES TO ORDER INNER EXPERIENCE 

Another principle of Christian formation in the early church recognizes that external rites have the power to order an inner experience. This principle, which unites external action and internal reality, is rooted in the Christian doctrine of incarnation. The confession that the human and divine are united in the person of Christ affirms that God can and does work through material and physical creation. The rites of initiation make God and his saving presence a reality through physical signs. In order to clarify this principle, I have set forth eight statements that will illuminate more clearly the idea that external rites order inner experience. [16]

First, the rites of initiation must be seen as commemorating an historical event. The historical reference point for Christian formation is the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. In the Christian vision of reality, this story rises above all other stories of life. We may be enchanted by the stories of Abraham or the life of Moses, the glorious account of a David or a Paul, but these stories, important as they may be in the Christian family, cannot compare with the story of Christ set forth in the Gospels. As Christians our ultimate identity is found not with Moses, David, or Paul, but with Jesus Christ. Christian formation, then, particularly in the rites of initiation, connects our story, our life, and our journey with the one story, the one person from whom and through whom our life gains ultimate meaning. By this means our inner experience of living, dying, and being resurrected with Christ is ordered and accomplished.

Second, the external process of Christian formation symbolically represents the original Christ event. Liturgy, like art, seeks to bring us into the truth. For example, the very form of the rite of initiation - its design, its symbols, its sequence, it content - illuminates the original event of Christ. It represents what is fundamental, what is enduring and essential, what is central to the gospel in its action of representing the truth. Consequently, this evocative form lifts the original event from its historical roots and brings it down through the corridors of time into the present moment.

Third, the sevenfold process of Christian formation is the external agency through which the belief of the Christian community is handed down to the new believer. All forms of formation require an external agent that will break in upon the recipient, distress that recipient with a sense of sin, and arouse that person to faith. Faith results from the work of the Holy Spirit, which sometimes acts through the agency of personal witness and at other times acts through proclamation. However, in the case of evangelism, the Holy Spirit incites contrition and faith by the entire process of initiation. These stages of conversion and passage rites symbolically organize, assist, and carry along the inner experience of the soul. Thus, the process itself - what is symbolized - and the sequence through which it proceeds represent the faith of the community and present God's call to faith, awaiting the soul's desire.

Fourth, Christian formation may next be seen as a way of ordering and giving shape to Christian experience. It is not a series of events that the participant judges. One does not set oneself against the periods of formation, for that would be presumptuous. Rather, the person places himself or herself under the process of initiation and freely allows it to name the experience of conversion. When the recipient feels the process speaking in his or her heart and realizes an inner correspondence to the meaning that the outer forms symbolize, that person is truly named as Christ's own and led into a deeper relationship with God.

Fifth, the symbolic forms employed in Christian formation cannot be exhausted intellectually. The rites, such as the inquiry, the catechetical period, the exorcisms, the washing with water, anointing with oil, and so on, are all pre-logical forms of expression. These ritual forms of communication cannot be exhausted by logical inquiry or empirical investigation. These symbols communicate through the senses to a level of consciousness that lies deeper than our thoughts. The point of contact in human personality that builds the bridge between this world and the next is not the mind, but the heart.

Sixth, formation, to function in the ways described previously, has a sacramental character and ought not to be regarded as merely illustrative. If the process of initiation only illustrates and informs, we cannot speak of the rites as embodying the original event they represent. Unlike illustration, sacrament is participatory. It is incarnational, co-mingling the physical and the spiritual. Thus, through the rites the conversion that is represented may actually take place. The rites must be seen as a necessary element of the process, for they not only represent the Christ event, but they also embody the event, so that the participant actually enters into the Christ event and its saving reality through the participatory experience of the rites observed.

Seventh, because Christian formation is sacramental, it requires faith. Faith, of course, is not in the thing itself but in that which it embodies, namely, Jesus Christ. In this process of formation the person also carries a responsibility to discern truth, to exercise his or her will to affirm and intend what is represented.

Finally, then, the response of faith to the event represented in the rite creates participation in the reality the rite represents. Participation in Christ and his church is the goal of formation. Christian formation that only brings a person to a detached intellectual acquiescence is not a spiritual formation at all. It is a mental affirmation of God who exists as the other alongside of the self. Spiritual formation strives to accomplish not a mere recognition of God, not a mere acknowledgment of his existence, but a participation in the life of Christ through the life of the church in which he dwells. This inwardness is achieved not by the rejection of the external rites and orders of the church, but by the recognition that these rites, attended by the desire of the soul, actually bring us into participation, into a relationship with Christ and the salvation he brings.

The actual ordering of the rite of initiation, together with the symbolic gestures that signify the meaning of the action taking place, give shape to and order the inner experience of spiritual formation - but not without the faith and intention of the convert.

GROWTH IN CHRIST THROUGH VARIOUS PERIODS OF DEVELOPMENT

A final principle of Christian formation in the early church recognizes that growth into Christ and the church is subject to process and development. This assertion does not preclude the possibility of instant conversion. Certainly, there have been and will always be conversions "on the road to Damascus." But even these conversions require development and nurture that may be represented by stages of maturation and growth. For example, St. Paul went away to Arabia, then, after three years, went to Jerusalem for fifteen days to confer with Cephas. Next, he went off to the regions of Syria and Cilicia. And finally, fourteen years after his conversion, he went to Jerusalem and on to his famous missionary work (Galatians 1:15-2:1). Exegetes agree that these fourteen years were a time of growth and development for Paul. Like Jesus, who "increased in wisdom and in stature, and in favor with God and man" (Luke 2:52), Paul underwent periods of growth and maturation. Consequently, formation looks upon conversion into Christ and the church as a process that, even if preceded by a dramatic conversion, still requires a person to develop over time a responsible and dynamic relationship with Christ and the church.

The notion of process and development was not foreign to the early church fathers. Irenaeus, for example, refers to growth this way: "Man has first to come into being, then to progress, and by progressing come to manhood, and having reached manhood to increase, and thus increasing to persevere, and by persevering be glorified, and thus see his Lord." [17] Even more interesting, Irenaeus argues that Christ himself sanctified the various stages of human life. "He came to save all through his own person; all, that is, who through him are re-born to God; infants, children, boys, young men and old. Therefore he passed through every stage of life." [18] Today, the insights of Jean Piaget's cognitive developmental structuralism, Erik Erikson's psycho social theory, and James Fowler's stages of spiritual growth provide a fertile contemporary basis for the restoration of a Christian formation that takes into account various periods of development. [19]

The process of formation consists of a series of readily identifiable stages of development. The period of inquiry presupposes a certain degree of commitment; the period of intense spiritual preparation before baptism assumes a resolute determination and an inner resolve to identify with Christ; the rite of initiation (baptism) is a turning point, a crisis moment in which one plunges fully into a relationship with Christ; this results in the final period, that of incorporation into the church, participation in the body of Christ, and an acceptance of responsibilities implied by belonging to the family of faith.

CONCLUSION 

Allow me to return to where I started this article. My contention is that when Calvin is read as a return to the early church and not as a forerunner of the Enlightenment, he will be read in full support of the ancient form of evangelism and spiritual formation. A few quotes from the Institutes of the Christian Religion will point in this direction.

First, while Calvin did not expand Christus Victor, he did acknowledge it. He writes, "Nor are we to understand that by the curse which he endured he was himself overwhelmed, but rather that by enduring it, he repressed, broke, annihilated all its force." Quoting Colossians 2:15, he comments that "Paul magnificently celebrates the triumph which Christ obtained on the cross, as if the cross, the symbol of ignominy, had been converted into a triumphal Chariot." [20]

Second, Calvin was very clear on his view of the church as the womb in which we are conceived and the school in which we are to continue in all of our life. Calvin writes.

[I]t is now our purpose to discourse of the visible Church, let us learn, from her single title of Mother, how useful, nay, how necessary the knowledge of her is, since there is no other means of entering into life unless she conceive us in the womb and give us birth, unless she nourish us at her breasts, and, in short, keep us under her charge and government, until, divested of mortal flesh, we become like the angels (Matth.xxii.30). For our weakness does not permit us to leave the school until we have spent our whole lives as scholars. Moreover, beyond the pale of the Church no forgiveness of sins, no salvation, can be hoped for, as Isaiah and Joel testify (Isaiah 37:32; Joel 2:32). [21]

And then, third, what about the power of external rites to order internal experience? Calvin was certainly against the notion of a sacramental ex opere operatum - and rightly so. But he would not have found himself in sync with the later Enlightenment approach that viewed sign as mere illustration either. He repeatedly uses the phrase that sacraments are "visible signs of invisible grace." [22] While early church fathers do not use this term, they recognize the same principle. For them, as for Calvin, spiritual realities are not separated from the material. Both Calvin and the ancient fathers reject a form of dualism that sets the spiritual against the material. So ritual, properly understood is the physical side of a spiritual action.

Finally, the notion of stages of growth in the spiritual life is also not foreign to Calvin. He does not present specific stages marked by passage rites as in the early church. However, he acknowledges progress and growth in the Christian life. He writes of the first inkling of faith as a point "we begin to behold the face of God placid, serene, and propitious; far off, indeed, but still so distinctly as to assure us that there is no delusion in it." He then refers to the "progress made" in the Christian life as a "nearer and surer view, the very continuance making it more familiar to us." We move; he suggests, from a "knowledge of God" which "is at first involved with much ignorance - ignorance, however, which is gradually removed." [23]

Today we live in a tumultuous time. A time when the methods of ministry which have been used to evangelize people are in question. I have suggested in this brief article that we look again to the ancient church, to the biblical and early Christian sources of evangelism and Christian formation. Our vision for the future will be better served, I suggest, by going behind the Reformers whom we admire and embrace. For the roots to which they returned are more biblical than the adaptation of their writings made by their enlightenment successors.

Author 

Dr. Robert E. Webber is the William and Geraldyne Myers Chair of Ministry professor and the director of the M.A. program in worship and spirituality at Northern Baptist Theological seminary in Lombard, Illinois. He taught for 32 years at Wheaton College and is the author of numerous books, including Ancient-Future Faith, Ancient-Future Evangelism and Ancient-Future Time. He received the B.A. degree from Bob Jones University, the B.D. from Reformed Episcopal Seminary, the Th.M. from Covenant Theological Seminary and the Th.D. from Concordia Theological Seminary, St. Louis. Bob lives in Wheaton, Illinois, with his wife, JoAnne, and also serves as a contributing editor to Reformation & Revival Journal.

Notes 

1. This article is an adaptation of "What Is Liturgical Evangelism?" in Robert Webber, Celebrating Our Faith (San Francisco, Harper & Row, 1986), 1-15. Recent publications on this theme include, Journey to Jesus (Nashville: Abingdon, 2001) and Ancient-Future Evangelism (Grand Rapids, Baker, 2003). 
2. See Gregory Dix and Henry Chadwick, The Treatise on the Apostolic Tradition of St. Hippolytus of Rome (Rigefield: Morehouse Publishing, 1992). 
3. Gustaf Aulen, Christus Victor (New York: Macmillan, 1969). 
4. For the development of the Christus victor theme as related to the powers of evil, see Hendrik Berkhof, Christ and the Powers (Scottsdale, Pennsylvania: Hearld Press, 1977); Clinton D. Morrison, The Powers That Be (Naperville, Illinois: Alec R. Allenson, Inc., 1960); G. B. Caird, Principalities and Powers (London: Oxford University Press, 1956); Heinrich Schier, Principalities and Powers in the New Testament (New York: Heider & Heider, 1961); John Howard Yoder, The Politics of Jesus (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1972). 
5. For this and other images of the church, see Paul S. Minear, Images of the Church in the New Testament (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1960). 
6. Cyprian, On the Unity of the Catholic Church, Quoted from the AnteNicene Fathers, compiled by A. Cleveland Coxe (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1971), 5:423. Hereafter referred to as ANF. 
7. Tertullian, On Martyrdom, I. ANE 3:693. 
8. Clement, The Instructor, Book I, 6. ANE 2:220. 
9. Cyprian, Unity of the Church, 5. ANE 4:423. 
10. Justin Martyr, First Apology, 61. ANE 1:183. 
11. An excellent expansion of this whole theme is found in Tertullian, On Baptism. ANE 3:669-79. 
12. Augustine, Against Petilian, Book 3,9-10. The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1957),4:601. Hereafter referred to as PNF. Edited by Philip Schaff. 
13. Augustine, Against Donatists, Book 1: 15-23. PNE 4:421. 
14. Augustine, Against Donatists, Book 1: 14. 
15. For further development of the theme of church as mother among the early church fathers, see Michael Dujarier, "A Survey of the History of the Catechumenate," in Becoming a Catholic Christian, edited by William J. Reedy (New York: Sadlier, 1981), 19ff. 
16. For an extended argument on the incarnational principle that external rites shape internal experience, see Adrian Nichols, O. P., The Art of God Incarnate: Theology and Symbolism from Genesis to the Tiventieth Century (New York: Paulist Press, 1980). For recent books on the rite of initiation see Maxwell E. Johnson, The Rites of Christian Initiation: Their evolution and interpretation. Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1999 and William Harmless. Augustine and the Catechumenate (Collegeville: The Liturgical Press), 1995. 
17. Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book 4: 38, 2-3, in The Early Christian Fathers, translated by Henry Bettenson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969), 68. 
18. Irenaeus, Against Heresies, Book 2: 22, 4. Bettenson, 80. 
19. See Jean Piaget, Structuralism, translated by C. Maschler (New York: Basic Books, 1970); Erik Erikson, Childhood and Society (New York: Norton, 1950); James Fowler, Stages of Faith: The Psychology of the Human Development and the Quest for Meaning (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1981). 
20. John Calvin, The Institutes of the Christian Religion, translated by Henry Beveridge. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997). Book 2, chapter 16: 7, 440. 
21. Calvin, Institutes, Book 4, chapter 1: 4, 283. 
22. Calvin, Institutes, Book 4, chapter 19:1, 623. 
23. Calvin, Institutes, Book 3, chapter 2: 19,486.