In an attempt to support the Catholic doctrine of infant baptism, Isaiah Bennett wrote the following:
Mormons ignore several Bible verses supporting infant baptism: Acts 16:15, 32-33 and 1 Corinthians 1:16, which reveal the apostolic practice of baptizing entire households. (Isaiah Bennett, When Mormons Call: Answering Mormon Missionaries at your Door [San Diego: Catholic Answers, 1999], 38)
While it is true that there were instances of household baptisms in the New Testament, it should be noted that all the members of the households were cognizant of their belief in the gospel and acceptance of baptism, unlike infants. How do we know this? Take Acts 16:34:
He brought them up into the house and set food before them; and he and his entire household rejoiced that he had become a believer in God. (NRSV)
Unbelievers do not rejoice when someone confesses faith in Christ and is baptised in his name. Furthermore, infants are incapable of such actions. It is clear when one reads the context, Luke is not recording an instance of infant baptism, but “believer’s baptism,” even in Acts 16.
The overwhelming scholarly consensus is that the New Testament does not advocate infant baptism. See, for instance, Everett Ferguson, Baptism in the Early Church: History, Theology, and Liturgy in the First Five Centuries
Continuing, Bennett wrote the following:
The gift of the Holy Spirit, given through baptism, is specifically promised to children in Acts 2:38-39. (ibid)
The text in question reads as follows:
Peter said to them, "Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 For the promise is for you, for your children, and for all who are far away, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to him." (Acts 2:38-39, NRSV)
Firstly, the “children” refer to Jews and “all who are away” are the Gentiles. Catholic and non-Catholic commentators agree on this point. For instance:
2:39.The “promise” of the Holy Spirit applies to both Jews and Gentiles, but in the first instance it concerns the Jews: it is they to whom God entrusted his oracles; theirs was the privilege to receive the Old Testament and to be preached to directly by Jesus himself. St Peter makes it clear that this promise is also made “to all that are far off”—a reference to the Gentiles, as St Paul explains (cf. Eph 2:13–17) and in line with Isaiah’s announcement, “Peace, peace, to the far and to the near” (Is 57:19). Cf. Acts 22:21. (The Navarre Bible: The Acts of the Apostles [Dublin: Four Courts Press, 2005], 37)
This promise (epangelia, 2:39; see 2:33) is not only for Peter’s audience, but for their children and for all those in the future (2:39). There is a rich ambiguity in this phrase; it may be a temporal reference to future generations, or a spatial reference to Diaspora Jews living in areas beyond Jerusalem and Judea, or, more likely, as an ethnic designation referring to Gentiles who will now be included in God’s mercies of salvation (see above and the similar phrase in Acts 22:21). In fact, from the narrator’s perspective, all these are true and will, in varying degrees of success, be fulfilled by the narrative’s end. The final phrase of Peter’s speech, as many as the Lord our God calls to himself (2:39), takes the last phrase of the Joel citation (2:21) and turns it on its head. The invitation to salvation is reciprocal: those “who will call upon the name of Lord” will be those whom “the Lord our God calls to himself.” Luke indicates that Peter continued his soteriological invitation by bearing witness with many other words, which Luke sums up in the peroratio (or final exhortation): Be saved from this crooked generation! (2:40), which reiterates the conclusion of the Joel quotation (2:21; see Witherington 1998, 139). (Mikeal C. Parsons, Acts [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic, 2008], 47-48)
39. In proof that they will receive the Holy Ghost, he tells them that to the Israelites in general, in whatever place they are, many of them here present from even the most distant nation under heaven (“far off”) was made the promise announced by Joel (v. 17) regarding the effusion of the Holy Ghost.
“And their children,” their sons and daughters referred to by Joel, limited neither to time nor place. It embraced “all flesh.”
The terms, “afar off,” are frequently employed in the Old Testament to designate the Gentiles, who were to be co-heirs of Abraham’s promises (Galatians 3:29; 4:28), in opposition to those “near,” which denotes the Jews. However, it militates against its application here, that St. Peter needed to be informed by a heavenly vision, after this, of the call of the Gentiles (Acts 10:10, &c.) Moreover, it was of the Jews, Joel spoke. “Whomsoever the Lord our God shall call.” Besides being of the race of Abraham, they needed a Divine call to be partakers of the promised blessings. (J. MacEvilly, An Exposition of the Acts of the Apostles Consisting of An Analysis of Each Chapter, and of a Commentary, Critical, Exegetical, Doctrinal, and Moral [Dublin: M.H. Gill & Son, 1899], 31)
In addition, the next three verses refute the infant baptism reading of the text (emphasis added):
And he testified with many other arguments and exhorted them, saying, "Save yourselves from this corrupt generation.” So those who welcomed his message were baptized, and that day about three thousand persons were added. They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. (Acts 2:40-42, NRSV)
Infants cannot perform such actions; again, when read in context, Acts 2 is teaching believer’s baptism, not infant baptism. Again, Bennett is guilty of eisegesis.
For a thorough review of Isaiah Bennett's two books on The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the other being Inside Mormonism: What Mormons Really Believe [Catholic Answers, 1999]), see:
Barry R. Bickmore, A Passion for Faultfinding: The Deconversion of a Former Catholic Priest
For my lengthy review of another anti-LDS work published by Catholic Answers (Trent Horn, 20 Answers: Mormonism [2015]), see:
I also wrote a follow-up article on his criticisms of "swords" in the Book of Mormon:
