Page:Karel Čapek - The Absolute at Large (1927).djvu/165



will readily understand that the admission of the Absolute to the bosom of the Church afforded, under the given circumstances, a great surprise. It was carried out by virtue of the Papal Brief alone, and the College of Cardinals, being faced with the accomplished fact, merely deliberated whether the sacrament of baptism should be conferred upon the Absolute. It was decided to dispense with this. There was certainly well-known ecclesiastical precedent for the baptism of a God (vide John the Baptist); but even in such a case the candidate for baptism must be present in person. Besides, it was a very delicate political question to decide which reigning potentate was to be godfather to the Absolute. The Sacred Congregation therefore recommended that at the next Pontifical Mass the Holy Father should pray for the new member of the Church, and this was duly carried out in very solemn form. It was also made part of the body of Church doctrine that in addition to the sacrament of baptism and baptism by blood the Church also