[21] who through him believe in God who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God. [22] Since you have purified yourselves by obedience to the truth for sincere mutual love, love one another intensely from a (pure) heart. [23] You have been born anew, not from perishable but from imperishable seed, through the living and abiding word of God,
(CCC 613) Christ's death is both the Paschal sacrifice that accomplishes the definitive redemption of men, through "the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world" (Jn 1:29; cf. 8:34-36; 1 Cor 5:7; 1 Pt 1:19), and the sacrifice of the New Covenant, which restores man to communion with God by reconciling him to God through the "blood of the covenant, which was poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins" (Mt 26:28; cf. Ex 24:8; Lev 16:15-16; 1 Cor 11:25). (CCC 2769) In Baptism and Confirmation, the handing on (traditio) of the Lord's Prayer signifies new birth into the divine life. Since Christian prayer is our speaking to God with the very word of God, those who are "born anew"… through the living and abiding word of God" (1 Pet 1:23) learn to invoke their Father by the one Word he always hears. They can henceforth do so, for the seal of the Holy Spirit's anointing is indelibly placed on their hearts, ears, lips, indeed their whole filial being. This is why most of the patristic commentaries on the Our Father are addressed to catechumens and neophytes. When the Church prays the Lord's Prayer, it is always the people made up of the "new-born" who pray and obtain mercy (Cf. 1 Pet 2:1-10). (CCC 1228) Hence Baptism is a bath of water in which the "imperishable seed" of the Word of God produces its life-giving effect (1 Pet 1:23; cf. Eph 5:26). St. Augustine says of Baptism: "The word is brought to the material element, and it becomes a sacrament" (St. Augustine, In Jo. Ev. 80, 3: PL 35, 1840).
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