Baptism is the outward, visible form, which serves as a vehicle for entry into the Ctn Faith. To seek baptism is to acknowledge that human existence is not in order and needs to be reoriented. Baptism also includes the moment of justification or righteousness. Justification implies being accepted, finding an identity, and counting as someone. Through baptism we are accepted, incorporated, delivered from the isolation of meaninglessness and placed within a community of faith.
Baptism is also the form under which begins the work of sanctification.
To be baptized means normally to receive the Spirit, to be made holy. Baptism also includes the moment of election. Election is vocation. Baptism is the vocation, or even the ordination, to the general ministry of the Church, which all members share, the ministry of reconciliation. In other words, explicit verbal communication and conscious individual decisions, important though they are, do not by any means constitute the whole life.