A. Methodology

Most studies of confirmation are unconvincing because the problems are envisaged in too narrow a perspective. Since the beginning of the Middle Ages the Scholastics sought, by an analysis of the fruits proper to this sacrament, to define its special nature, in contrast to baptism, or even the Eucharist, on account of Ps 103:3, “panis cor hominis confirmat”. This method was based on “axioms” of a rather meagre sacramental theology. The sacraments were considered too exclusively as “in…