Roman Catholics teach that children should be baptized so that they might be justified and regenerated from an early age in baptism.
Baptists teach that children should not be baptized because baptism is reserved only for those who are able to make a credible profession of faith and who are already justified and regenerated.
Both are wrong.
The apostles taught that the children of believers are to be baptized for
covenantal reasons. This reasoning is rooted in Old Testament revelation and would be particularly understandable for a Jewish audience. But as the church grew beyond the bounds of Judaism into Gentile lands, the practice of infant baptism was retained, yet it gradually became unmoored from its covenantal framework. Pagan ideas crept into the church and began to influence thinking on baptism and baptism gradually became more magical as the church headed into the medieval era. The Reformation recovered the covenantal setting of baptism. Here's the proper rationale:
- The Covenant in the OT and in the NT is essentially one, although administered differently. This is to say that both Abraham and the NT believer are in the same covenant of grace. Both Abraham and the NT believer are saved by Jesus Christ - by grace through faith. Jesus fulfills the promises given to Abraham rather than introducing something altogether new.
- The children of believers were included in the OT administration of the covenant of grace. Not only Abraham but also his children were given the mark of circumcision and recognized as members of the covenant community. Circumcision was a sign and seal of faith but was not necessarily accompanied by faith in the one circumcised. All in Israel were called to circumcise their hearts.
- There is an explicit connection made between circumcision and baptism in Colossians 2:11-12. Paul says that the one who has been baptized has been circumcised.
- There is no New Testament command to not baptize children and to exclude them from the covenant. Since the NT administration continues the covenant that God began in the OT, and since in the OT the children of believers were included in the covenant, one would assume that the children of believers should also be included in the NT administration of the covenant. If they were not to be included and given the sign of inclusion, then one would think that the apostles would have explicitly said: "Don't baptize children like you circumcised them in previous times!" But there is no such command. Within a covenantal context, the silence is very telling.