Question. Who gave you this name?
Answer. My godfathers and godmothers in my baptism; wherein I was made a member of Christy the child of God ...

When you were bom, perhaps the child of Mr. and Mrs. Shovealfpenny, you were God’s child by creation (Acts 17, 28); for it was God who made you, and gave you life. You became a member, a living part, of the great human family all the world over descended from Adam and Eve. But Adam and Eve sinned; so everybody has caught sin from them, like measles (only much worse).

At your new birth in baptism (St. John 3,5) you became God’s child in a new and better way, by adoption (Romans 8, 15): God adopted, took, you into his divine or heavenly family. This family is called The Church. In it are all whom Jesus Christ - the Second Adam, because he came to this world to give it a fresh start (Romans 5, 19) - redeemed, or bought back, from sin (like something is redeemed, or bought back, from “Uncle’s,” the pawnbroker’s). When the water was poured on you at the font, the sin which you could not help catching from Adam and Eve (Original Sin) was washed away; you were given a fair start in life.

Have you noticed the difference between the first and second things that happened to you when you became a Christian by baptism? The difference between “a” and “the”? You were made “a” member of Christ, but “the” child of God. This means that God loves you as if you were his only child, “the” child; that, if you were the only baby in the world . . .

GOD COULD NOT LOVE YOU MORE THAN HE DOES.