I’ve recently become a sponsor (or “godfather”) for an older teenager who received the Sacrament of Confirmation (Chrismation). This has led me to reflect on the relationship of the sacraments of Baptism and Confirmation to the spiritual life and to contemplation itself.

In Baptism we receive the Gifts of the Holy Spirit, since we cannot avoid sinning gravely without them. (We’re too stupid, as Saint Thomas says; being in a state of grace means living the Gifts of the Holy Spirit to some degree.)

Then, in Confirmation, these Gifts are strengthened into a spiritually adult mode of activity; this, it seems to me, is what the Catechism of the Catholic Church says (#1285):

The reception of the sacrament of Confirmation is necessary for the completion of baptismal grace. For by the sacrament of Confirmation, [the baptized] are more perfectly bound to the Church and are enriched with a special strength of the Holy Spirit. Hence they are, as true witnesses of Christ, more strictly obliged to spread and defend the faith by word and deed.

I’d take from this that, while it is really possible to enter into a continuous or quasi-continuous loving union with God with Baptismal grace and innocence alone, the normal route is via a strengthening of the Gifts of the Holy Spirit. I could be wrong. That’s what I’d take from it, though.

Baptism, by right, makes us beginners in the spiritual journey. If we pass beyond being beginners without being further strengthened in the Gifts of the Holy Spirit, this is a remarkable thing indeed! To become more than a beginner with a beginner’s initiation is remarkable – not impossible, of course, because God alone knows how all graces are dispensed, but really remarkable!

There is a certain affinity between spiritual maturity and “maturity” or strengthening of the Gifts of the Holy Spirit. In other words, it would be difficult to pass through the dark nights of the senses and of the spirit without the Gifts strengthened through Confirmation. It would be difficult to enter into contemplative union without Confirmation. It would be difficult to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thess 5:17) without Confirmation.

Difficult but not impossible.

But yes, definitely difficult.

And in this we have something to thank God for. He could ask on us to become his true lovers only by Baptism or our first grace. But he doesn’t just do that. He does more. He gives another sacrament that enacts a greater strength and a more spiritually adult mode of activity in us.

In this context, it becomes clear that contemplation does not exist as a separated reality from the Church. They are intimately linked. Thanks be to God!