BREAKING NEWS: Secrets of Vatican Reveal Baptismal Font

April 15, 2011 - PRLog -- The "Lost Mystery of Baptism" by Daniel Keeran includes a description of an unusual oval basin in which the current baptismal font has been placed at Saint Peters basilica in Rome.

The current baptismal area is actually two baptismal basins with an interesting history. The large red marble basin with the ornate brass cover is set into a large oval basin cut into the floor of the basilica that originally had three marble steps descending to the basin floor. The basin below floor level is about 8 feet long, 5 feet wide, and 3 feet deep, ordered by Pope Benedict XIII in 1725 who “wanted to perform the ancient rite of baptism by immersion” (Powers, 116). The description of the basin and reference to Benedict XIII* is given by Powers as page 214 in a book written in 1750 by a contemporary of the events, Raffaele Sindone, Della Sacrosancta Basilica di S. Pietro in Vaticano (Rome, Italy: Presso Giovanni Maria Salvioni, Vol.2, 1750).

Benedict’s decision was opposed by others who thought the immersion basin would distract from the beauty of the piece designed by Carlo Fontana for infant pouring which following the Pope’s death was placed in the floor basin and obscures the presence and functionality of Benedict’s basin. The porphyry infant basin, had previously been the sarcophagus of the Emperor Hadrian in Sant’ Angelo and afterward had been the tomb of Otto II.

*Benedict XII in Powers due to a change in the list of Popes.

Source: Richard J. Powers, The Baptisteries and Baptismal Fonts in Saint Peter's Church, Rome, 366 to 1982 A.D. (unpublished thesis). Counsellor Publishing has a copy of the thesis from the original located in Rome.

Numerous examples of ancient and medieval baptismal fonts are described an catalogued in "The Lost Mystery of Baptism" that can be ordered at http://www.counsellorpublishing.com and on Amazon.