Augustine of Hippo has the theory that infants do not have actual sin. So, even though Scripture attributes original sin and its guilt to the tiniest infant, he thinks that they have not committed any actual transgressions of the law. On the basis of this opinion, it is perfectly clear that Augustine never had the responsibility of caring for a newborn. Who, after caring for an infant, comes to the conclusion that children are perfectly innocent; that they commit no sin? Think of the incessant and self-centered demands made by a newborn child and made at all hours of day and night. In his pre-Christian days, Augustine did father a child by a woman who was not his wife. Shockingly, Augustine never mentions her name in his voluminous writings, but his son's name was Adeodatus. Adeodatus must have remained in the exclusive care of his anonymous mother until his childhood was over. If Augustine had done the work of a proper father, he would have had no doubt about infants perpetrating actual sin.

Not only does Augustine's opinion fail at the level of human experience, but it also fails to account for the biblical data about the sinfulness of all persons. He presumed that there is a time of innocence during which, though being a sinner, the infant does not sin. The infant then is for some time caught in the limbo between original sin and actual sin. He is a sinner, but has not yet sinned. While this is theoretically possible, such a quasi-neutral position in not having yet sinned is deemed impossible by the divine Word. A bad tree bears bad fruit (Mt 7:18). That which is not of faith is sin (Rm 14:23). There is no neutrality possible. Despite Augustine's strange opinion about neutrality between sin and righteousness, he recognized that there could be no reason to baptize infants if they did not partake of original sin. Only sinners who receive the divine righteousness enter the kingdom of heaven. This alone demanded that infants be baptized.

Augustine posited the necessity of infant baptism because Lord Himself had said, "I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance" (Lk 5:32). The Lord has built his kingdom only for sinners, only for those who are incapable of entry to it on the basis of their own righteousness or their alleged freedom from sin. The Lord calls into His kingdom only those who are sinners and has pronounced the blessed (Ps 32:1). If, according to Augustine's theory, infants have not yet sinned, then they need to be baptized because they are sinners, that is, through the inherited sin and guilt of Adam. In this he is only half right. They need to be baptized for both reasons. Children are the paradigmatic case of salvation because they are incapable of contributing anything to their salvation. They are the truly humble of which the Bible speaks, when it says that God exalts the humble (Lk 1:52). This is the grace of God at work.

Augustine of Hippo