Jesus and the Children

The Frankish abbot Paschasius Radbertus (d. 865) provides this commentary on Matthew 19, 13-15, in which The Lord Jesus expressed his desire for even little children to be brought to him, and admonishing his disciples for attempting to prevent this:

"It seems strange to me that the disciples prevented the babies from being brought to Christ, that he might impose his hands on them and pray for them.  I think that we should not take it strictly that they did not want them to be touched by the hand of the Savior or to be blessed by his voice, but because they did not yet have the fullness of the faith or the understanding of Christ, they thought him to be wearied by the importunity of those who brought their babies to him.  They did not remember how the most beneficent Savior, a little while before, had taken a little child, stood him in their midst, and said: 'Unless you become as this little child, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven.'  And behold, immediately forgetting this childlike innocence, they forbade the children from coming to Christ, as though they came unworthy or unfit -- the children to whose innocence they were called, that they might become their imitators!  They did not pay heed to the faith of those who brought them for him to touch, as though they already knew well his power from past events: that the deceptions of our enemies are repelled and the grace of sanctification is granted not only by the imposition of the hands of Christ but also by those of his ministers."