Question Three of Chapter Seven of the Second Decade
Whether an angel, having assumed the appearance of a priest, can baptize or absolve
It is asked whether a good or evil angel, appearing in the appearance of a human priest, can baptize or absolve.
To this it is answered as follows. It is fitting neither for a good angel nor for an evil one to baptize.
This is proved first concerning a good angel according to that saying of Hebrews, chapter 5: “In those things which pertain to God a pontiff taken from among human beings is appointed for human beings.”
But good or evil angels are not human beings. Therefore, neither can they be ministers of the sacraments.
An evil angel can in no way baptize. The reason is that, since evil angels are most perverse, they would in no way intend to procure the salvation of the person baptized, which is spiritual regeneration. Rather, they would act with an intention to deceive, since they are spirits of falsehood.
But intention is especially required for the efficacy of baptism.
Whence, because an evil angel would not agree with the Church in intention, although he immersed someone, he would nevertheless not baptize, even if he possessed the due form of words.
I say similarly concerning absolution from sins. For someone would not be absolved if an evil angel appeared in the form of a human priest, as is evident in the Lives of the Fathers.
Nevertheless, those baptized by good angels, if their goodness were certain, ought not to be rebaptized.
The reason is that, just as God has not so bound his power to the sacraments that he cannot confer the effect of the sacraments without the sacraments, so also he has not so bound his power to the ministers of the Church that he cannot grant to good angels the power of ministering in the sacraments.
And because good angels are messengers of truth, if some sacrament were ministered by them, it would have to be held valid, for it would be certain that this occurred by the will of God, just as certain churches are said to have been consecrated by the ministry of angels.
And when it is argued that to baptize is a hierarchical action according to Dionysius, being a certain purification, while angels exercise hierarchical actions upon us because they purify and illuminate, and therefore can also baptize, it is answered by denying the consequence.
For angels execute those hierarchical operations invisibly, not with corporeal instruments. Therefore, the cases are not similar.
These things are from Lord Johannes de Turrecremata, Cardinal, upon the chapter Romanus, On Consecration, distinction 4.
Addition
If a good angel baptized and the person were truly baptized, this would be from the absolute power of God, not from his ordinary power.