Sacramental Preparation: Confirmation and First Communion

Restoring Confirmation’s Place Within Initiation – Recent Church Teaching

The teaching of the Second Vatican Council and subsequent teaching of the Magisterium lead to several conclusions about the nature of confirmation and its relation to the other initiation sacraments: namely, that confirmation is a sacrament of initiation, and that it is to be celebrated after baptism and in preparation for the celebration of the Eucharist. (CCCB)

Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy

The liturgical renewal introduced by the Second Vatican Council called for the link between confirmation and the other initiation sacraments to be restored. The Constitution Sacrosanctum Concilium on the Sacred Liturgy, for example, states that “The rite of confirmation is to be revised so that the intimate connection of this sacrament with the whole of the Christian initiation may more clearly appear” (no. 71).