There is not one piece of evidence, amidst the voluminous writings of the fathers, to suggest that infants participated in the church’s celebration of the Lord’s supper.
I’m with you and Calvin when it comes to the practice, but didn’t Calvin say otherwise on this point?
This permission was indeed commonly given in the ancient church, as is clear from Cyprian and Augustine, but the custom has deservedly fallen into disuse.
Yes, but Calvin didn’t have the sources we have, nor the ability to search and know those sources we have.
The important thing to note abt Jordan is that he claimed the practice was “until the twelfth or thirteenth century” when there is not a hint of it anywhere for the first 1/5 of that time. (Until Cyprian mentions it in 251.) Love,
Was Wilson attracted to Jordan and Leithart’s wordsmithing? Or did those two seek out Wilson?
Mutual. Not scholarship, but rhetoric posing as scholarship. Can’t say how awful Jordan was when I listened to him and Peter at the conference. What a crank, and nobody ever loved him enough to tell him to shut up. So sad. Love,
Hi there, I had a question about the lengthy Calvin quotation in the original article. Where is Calvin getting the idea that “The Passover was limited to only those old enough to be able to inquire into its meaning”? I can’t find it in Exodus 12 or any related Passover passage. (To the contrary, Ex. 12:47 states “All the congregation of Israel are to celebrate this [the Passover]”, barring only uncircumcised/foreigners.)
Someone else commented something similar above, but I do not believe anyone clarified Calvin’s exegesis/argument here (sorry if I missed the reply somewhere!!)
Here is Pastor Uri Britto responding to the recent paedo-communion online posting on Facebook.
“ The purpose of the CREC is not to be the PCA without Tim Keller or the OPC without D.G. Hart. We reject third-wayism and dualism, but there is much more that comprises who we are.
We are a communion of Reformed churches deeply interested in cultural renewal within the church and the home, theology that comes out of our fingertips, and a liturgy that enriches God’s people with joy.
Our confessions, diverse yet unified, reflect our catholicity. But it’s our shared distinctives that truly define us. We acknowledge that these may differ from the trajectory of other Reformed bodies, but they are the pillars of our 130+ churches. Among them are our eschatology, epistemology, and ecclesiology.
Our postmillennialism is deeply embedded in our lives. This is more than a preference for historical optimism. Postmillennialism is how we see the Bible moving. It is far from a mere academic discussion. In fact, it would not be easy to function happily in the CREC without that eschatological predisposition. It impacts everything from our preaching/teaching to our education and interpretation of the times.
Our presuppositionalism asserts that we are not ashamed of the Word of God or its language. The language of the Scriptures is the vocabulary of heaven, and we submit to its wisdom in totality. It further gives us confidence in affirming doctrines like six-day creationism, though many consider us Neanderthals. It is nearly impossible to come into the CREC denying that Genesis paradigm. We do not belittle tradition but restore tradition to its rightful place. The testimony of the church (tradition) leads us to a high and reverent esteem of the Sacred Scriptures.
Our paedocommunion practice is fundamental to our existence as a whole. Without the communing of baptized children, the CREC would fail to offer the grounds for our covenantal theology. Covenant communion is the way we enflesh our theology of children. We affirm that baptized children shall receive all the covenant benefits. We also believe that they are integral members of the body of Christ, without whom worship would be incomplete. While some congregations can function outside this system, they must understand that they are co-laboring with an undeniable majority who believe life and table, water and word, bread and wine, worship, and participation belong unto them.
We are happy to form fraternal relations with many denominations, and we have a growing sense of unity with a host of institutions and denominations who share our conservative political convictions against the insanity of the leftist ideologues. And the goal is to build much more on those in the months and years ahead. While we wish to continue growing, we understand that not every church is a good fit for the CREC.
While we cherish the hundreds of inquiries received worldwide and the overwhelming interest in our communion, we also want to grow in a manner that honors who we are without diluting the principles that made us who we are.”
I wish that the CREC men would go all the way and just remove their feigned adherence to the Westminster and write their own confessions. This doubling and tripling down they are doing on this error is sad and makes me wish I had never recommended anything from the Moscow crowd to friends and family.
I’ll probably get back to this, but after decades listening to Muscovites and their friends, I wonder if you can ever speak for Moscow without adopting the habits and sounds of the huckster. Seriously (not being snarky), here is all anyone needs to know about Moscow any more: “we have a growing sense of unity with a host of institutions and denominations who share our conservative political convictions against the insanity of the leftist ideologues.” One thing that’s maybe positive is he speaks the truth about Moscow, for sure. I keep thinking of Thomas Müntzer and his Peasants’ War/Pitchfork Rebellion. But even more Jerry Falwell. Love,
Dear Michael, first welcome! And thanks you for the question. There’s good support for Calvin’s statement about the Passover, and I expect someone will give it here. But one thing I’ve noticed over and over in the argument of people sympathetic to paedocommunion is broad statements about history lacking proper qualification. There are a number of examples of this, but simply to address the question of whether or not children participated in the Passover, it’s impossible to lasso all the meanings that word “participate” could have here. Present and allowed to sip the water and wine, but not eating the lamb? Banned from the room? Infants on the breast wrested from it long enough to shove all the meal’s elements in their mouth while they scream and cry? And by “children,” are we talking 5 year olds and up only, or four and up, or three and up, or two and up, or one and up, or newborn and up?
We have the same problem discussing historical references to children and infants in connection with the elements. Is the reference to weekly forced infant communion in the Mass, which it would need to be in order to be an historical example of paedocommunion commonly practiced today. Every single infant and toddler forcibly communed by parent every last week during formal worship.
So I want to define terms, and what Calvin was condemning was what paedocommunionists argue for, and hence their opposition to what he says there (including his exegesis!!). If we understand Calvin to be making the point that infants did not participate identical to the participation of adults in a sacramental way at the Passover, I think he stands on good ground. But again, I’ll leave it to someone else to bring in the evidence.
Again, welcome. With love,
Thank you for your reply! Yes, I’ll look forward to whatever evidence exists for the view Calvin expresses in the quote (the first I’ve ever heard of it). It seems central to Calvin’s argument that the Passover be expressly limited, since his model of OT/NT sacraments depends on it. If “circumcision:baptism::Passover:Eucharist”, but there is a mismatch in who can participate in one vs the other, that would be pretty damaging to the argument, nuanced paedocommunion applications aside.
Thanks again!
Quick note: There is already a mismatch in who can participate in one vs the other in baptism. So we know there can be changes to who will participate in the New Covenant.
Actually, no. The fundamental issue is fulfillment of the explicit mandates issued by God in 1Corinthians 11. This is the reason paedocommunion fails. Their exegesis is ridiculous, just on the face of it. So my recommendation is for you to study 1Corinthians 11, noting how it’s in shreds when paedocommunionists are done with it. But I’m sure there will be more on the Passover, tertiary though it is. Love,
So we know there can be changes to who will participate in the New Covenant.
The kind of change seems fundamentally different, however; while both males and females are baptized, due to the expansion of salvation to all (Gal. 3:28), there is an opposite limiting of communion to only those of age.
At any rate, I am not a paedocommunionist, but am mostly just interesting in the logic of the thing, particularly Calvin’s comment. 
Our postmillennialism is deeply embedded in our lives. This is more than a preference for historical optimism. Postmillennialism is how we see the Bible moving. It is far from a mere academic discussion. In fact, it would not be easy to function happily in the CREC without that eschatological predisposition. It impacts everything from our preaching/teaching to our education and interpretation of the times.
So much for catholicity. Postmillennialism, in this formulation, is a hermeneutic rather than an eschatology. It shapes and determines the meaning of the prophets, rather than being shaped and determined by them.
None of the Reformed confessions speak this way. Our hope is in the coming of the Lord and the resurrection of the dead. There is no way, as this makes clear, to function happily within one of these churches without presupposing a very peculiar modern formulation of postmillennialism. Everyday a new application of this hermeneutic reveals itself, whether it be masks veiling the glory of God or some other religious-political commitment. I don’t see how binding the consciences of the sheep to eschatology in this way does anything but create schism.
Anyways, resume the conversation about paedocommunion. Thank you shepherds for warning us.
And so much for Ben Merkle’s sermon at the CREC general assembly (or whatever they call it) about 10 years ago. He urged that those things must not become the shibboleths of the CREC. It was a very encouraging sermon. Sad to see it so blatantly rejected.
Been reading voluminous correspondence between Buswell and Machen about intense conflict at the beginning of their Presbyterian Church of America between premils and amils. Growing most heavy in November and December of 1936, in his letter to Machen dated December 4, 1936, Buswell says:
I do not question the right of a professor in a truly Presbyterian seminary to teach the amillennial view if he believes it. You do not question the right of a professor to teach the premillennial view if that is his conviction. It has seemed to me however that the shift of emphasis from historical critical apologetics to philosophical apologetics has resulted in a very strong and disproportionate emphasis upon the amillennial view. This, in my humble judgment, has resulted from a philosophical conception which has unconsciously been allowed to creep in, and has not been the result of careful critical Biblical scholarship.
A few letters followed, then Machen suddenly died. This was the center of the controversy which, the following year, split the new denomination. It’s my conviction this conflict would have found a resolution if Machen had lived, and that is God’s providence, inscrutable as it remains.
To Moscow, all one would have to change in the text above is amil to postmil, and the thrust behind it being political rather than philosophical. Love,
Premillennialists have tended to be biblicists (a chapter/verse approach to theology; think Grudem’s ‘Systematic Theology’), and amillennialists have tended to be more on the side of good and necessary consequence (more of whole-scripture approach to theology; think Bavinck and ‘Wonderful Works of God’).
Both biblicism and good and necessary consequence have their place, but the CREC seem to have given both a miss. It’s like they’ve taken the credobaptist criticism of paedobaptists - ‘you give one sacrament to your children but not the other’ - as their North Star, without understanding either exegetical theology (biblicism) or historical theology (good and necessary consequence).
Some Thoughts and Questions on Fleeing Moscow’s Paedocommunion
I’m writing this after reading the article, but before reading any comments. Maybe I’ll find some answers to my questions and counter arguments to my arguments. We’ll see.
Notes on 1 Corinthians 11:17-34
Prior to this article I’d not read John Calvin’s writing against paedocommunion, and I’d not heard of remembering(vv. 24-25) and witnessing/proclaiming(v. 26) as requirements for receiving communion. To remember some historical event and to proclaim an historical event in view of its future culmination(v. 26) definitely would require maturity of thought and intention that would exclude all but the most precocious from participating in the Supper before the upper elementary or junior high years. But the passage seems to be saying that when an individual eats the bread and drinks the cup, that act in itself, done along with the others in the congregation is a remembrance and a proclamation, without any reference to the maturity and mental capacity of any individual.
Eating in a worthy manner(v. 27), examining oneself(v. 28), and discerning the body(v. 29) clearly are requirements for the individuals participating in the Lord’s Supper(v. 20). These requirements also necessarily imply some degree of individual thought and intention that I believe rules out a strict paedocommunion position. But I’ve read Moscow’s defense of allowing for a kind of immature expression of faith, the sort an 18 month old might express. The idea seems strange to me, but the argument made strikes me as plausible. I find myself in the proverbial situation of hearing the first guy make his case, which sounds pretty good. Then the second guy makes his case, and that also sounds pretty good.
So I’m going to imagine five different cases, and see if they might help us understand better.
Five Different Churches Fence the Table, or Don’t
Case #1: Willy Nilly Nondenominational International Fellowship
Elders don’t fence the table at all. The parents do whatever. Most of them are Baptists by default, but it doesn’t occur to them that their kids’ receiving of the Lord’s Supper, without being baptized, is kind of nuts from a Scriptural and historical point of view. The elders don’t teach them any different. Once an elder mentioned, while leading communion, that baptism is supposed to come before receiving communion. His theological acumen was not appreciated… by anyone.
Case #2: Tall Steeple PCA
The elders fence the table, if somewhat mildly and formulaically. It’s mostly understood that communion begins at age 12 after completing the Communicants’ Class. The elders would maybe go down to 8 or 9 for that precocious penitent, but once took a case to presbytery to prevent a 6 year-old from coming to the table. Precocious is one thing, but let’s not get crazy. Presbytery backed up the session against the parents’ desire and view.
Case #3: Clearnote Reformed
Elders passionately, carefully, conscientiously, and lovingly fence the table. Eight or nine is pretty normal, but they’ve gone as young as four. The nurture and admonition of parents and pastors is milk for the little ones until they can eat solid food.
Case #4: First Hinder-them-not of Moscow
Elders passionately, carefully, conscientiously, and lovingly fence the table, but also believe (mistakenly?) that an 18 month old who is not pitching a fit and coos or grunts assent to a few simple questions from dad is fulfilling 1 Corinthians 11 in the way an 18 month old is able. If John the Baptist could leap for joy in Elizabeth’s womb and David could praise the Lord at his mother’s breast and God ordains praise from infants, then why not? The littles need food so they can get strong, not the other way around.
Case #5: Pure Paedo Presbyterian
Elders strictly fence the table against unbelieving and rebellious adults while receiving the tiniest baby just as Jesus did. They teach parents not to starve their babies. Don’t let the tinies choke to death, but if they can eat rice mush, they can eat the body and the blood. Of course you’ve got to soften up the body with the blood until it’s more like the pablum of Christ, but I’m sure it’s fine.
I was baptized at age seven upon profession of faith and took the Supper from then on. I’m presbyterian now, and my kids were baptized as infants. I was a youth pastor in Case #2 churches and then a missionary school teacher and elder in a Case #1 fellowship. A Case #3 church is very appealing to me, but a #4, to me at least, also has a strong biblical case to make. Case #5? I don’t know. I guess they make the argument that all the discerning happens as one is able and has nothing to do with babies. Doesn’t seem like a good case to me, but maybe?
I believe in fencing the table, and I believe in letting the little ones come to Jesus. Actually the hard part is parents teaching and modelling repentance and faith for their kids all along the way and elders doing the same and helping parents and holding them accountable; parents and elders accepting expressions of faith from children and, as appropriate, holding them accountable as fellow believers. If you’re taking the Supper, you can be banned from the Supper, whether you’re a fit-pitching 4 or a fornicating 18.
Some may be getting sick and falling asleep because they’re coming to the table in an unworthy manner, but I don’t think being sincerely mistaken about how old someone must be to take the elements counts in that 1 Corinthians 11 category. That goes for a mistake in either direction, whether you’re holding the kids off a little too long and requiring a little too much or if you’re bringing them to the table too early. Do what you can do by faith in good conscience as guided by Scripture in the community of saints, and always be searching the word and praying for sanctification. Submit to your elders. They will give an account.
So, yes Willy Nillys are lazy and Pure Paedos are weird. Tall Steeples are in need of renewal and reformation. But must the ClearNotes and the Hinder-them-nots flee from one another? I want to say no, but maybe I’m wrong. I’m open to correction. Is Moscow a #4 or a #5? If they’re a #5, why can’t we just say you’re wrong and we’re praying for God to bless your child rearing just like we pray for Him to bless ours?
But if Moscow is bearing good fruit and Evangel is bearing good fruit and they’ve both been rocking on for 30 plus years, isn’t that pointing towards an attempt to work out an agreement or a peaceable agreement to disagree? You might not need more careful engagement of differing exegeses (exegesi?), but I think I do. Probably others do as well. Maybe that exists. Tell me what to read.
Hi Calvin,
Not sure where you picked up the name for #3 but that’s our church name and we typify that description. The issue between #3 and #4 is that only one of them is acutally fencing the table. #4 may claim to fence the table but they do it without regard to where Scripture builds the fence. In their context, all they require is baptism. No substantive examination, proclamation, discernment, ever.
When the children are young, they argue that the child is exempt from these requirements (if they’re even willing to admit that these requirments are applicable to adults) because they’re not able to obey. They assume the child will grow into these abilities but then never teach the children to this effect. It would be better for them to fence the table simply by saying that these things are required but that the children are exempt for a time but need to grow into these things as they mature. I’ve never heard anything of the sort in the numerous CREC worship services I’ve attended. They always have communion and there is never a word of warning, just “Come and welcome to Jesus.”
What goes on in CREC churches is not fencing. It’s just welcoming. That is part of the reason #3 And #4 can’t just agree to disagree. The link that Tim shared from Baylyblog is very helpful reading in explaining the differences and the dangers.
Love,
Welcome, Calvin. Glad to have you. You have by now read David Abu-Sara’s response, and I just want to add my agreement. The fundamental issue is the sacraments biblically administered is a mark of the church, and paedocommunion is not a biblically administered sacrament. I don’t stop saying, please compare paedocommunion liturgies of the eucharist to historic reformed and protestant liturgies. No smallest resemblance, and this particularly at the fencing of the table—as David Abu-Sara has pointed out. Please read the many links we have provided at the bottom of the OP. Years of work. Sacraments really really matter, and protecting them is fundamental to the duties of pastors and elders. Again, welcome. Love,