Last Sunday, 29 US Marines were baptised by Navy Chaplain William Hlavin in the ocean near Camp Pendleton.

All were volunteers assigned to 3rd Battalion, 25th Regiment, heading for duty in the Taliban stronghold of Helmand province.

Their Battalion Commander commented, “The spiritual and religious foundation we’re able to develop here allows us to perform our job the way we need to in a very challenging environment.”

One Marine said, “I believe and trust that God will take me and my fellow Marines back home safely.” (Forty-six 3^rd Battalion Marines were killed in Iraq)

So what is baptism? Why involve these supposedly tough men in it?

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What does today’s Gospel reading in traditional Catholic churches say?

Mark’s gospel, chapter 7:

Leaving the district of Tyre, Jesus went by way of Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, into the district of the Decapolis. They brought him a deaf and dumb man, begging him to lay hands upon him.

Taking him away from the crowd, Jesus put his fingers into his ears, and spitting, touched his tongue. Looking up to heaven, he groaned, and said: ‘Ephpheta,’ which means, ‘Be opened.’

Immediately his ears were opened, his tongue loosened, and he spoke clearly . . . .

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We are all deaf and dumb spiritually. The noisy, sin-filled world has deafened us.

We need Jesus himself, in the person of his priest, to welcome us and to say, ‘Ephpheta’ — so our ears may be opened to Faith and our tongues loosened to praise God.

Baptism is a Sacrament.  In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost — one God – baptism washes away all sin from the soul and confers supernatural life on the person baptised.

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Those marines may misguidedly see baptism purely as a good luck charm helping them survive.

And they mightn’t have been validly baptised, i.e. not in accordance with Catholic Church practice.

However, if a person is sorry for his sins, loves God whole-heartedly, and desires to obey God in everything – yet hasn’t been sufficiently instructed to understand baptism fully and so receives a ceremony objectively flawed — God, in such a case, accepts the will for the deed.