Some Church Fathers On The Efficaciousness Of Prebaptismal Faith

Some of the church fathers who use highly efficacious language about baptism also use highly efficacious language, including language about the new birth and salvation, when discussing prebaptismal faith. However you explain that (that they viewed justification as a multistep process, that they were inconsistent, or whatever), it offers partial corroboration for the view that we're justified through prebaptismal faith. They ascribe more to prebaptismal faith than advocates of baptismal regeneration typically do. It also provides another example of the diversity of the baptismal beliefs of the pre-Reformation sources. The historian Nick Needham writes that the view of these fathers "effectively makes initial justification itself a twofold process: faith introduces us to salvation, and baptism perfects the introduction" (in Bruce McCormack, ed., Justification In Perspective [Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Academic, 2006], 42). He cites Origen, Cyril of Jerusalem, and Basil of Caesarea as examples. He goes on, "Basil's use of 'seal' imagery may indicate that he regarded baptism as the public and official declaration of a justification that until then has been private and unofficial" (ibid.). Whether you explain these fathers' comments as Needham does, explain them in some other way, or remain agnostic about it, I agree that such comments are found in the three fathers he mentions. At least in the passages I've read, it's clearer in Cyril and Basil than in Origen, but seems likely to be present in Origen as well. It may also be present in a Western source of the fourth century, Fortunatianus, though his comments are highly metaphorical and harder to interpret. He wrote in his Commentary On The Gospels:

The King Is Here, Dispensing Favors

"And after rebuking the other [thief on a cross], he [the repentant thief] says, 'Lord, remember me; for with Thee is my account. Heed not this man, for the eyes of his understanding are blinded; but remember me. I say not, remember my works, for of these I am afraid.'...Therefore also he justly heard the words, 'Be of good cheer'; not that thy deeds are worthy of good cheer; but that the King is here, dispensing favours. The request reached unto a distant time; but the grace was very speedy. 'Verily I say unto thee, This day shalt thou be with Me in Paradise; because today thou hast heard My voice, and hast not hardened thine heart. Very speedily I passed sentence upon Adam, very speedily I pardon thee. To him it was said, 'In the day wherein ye eat, ye shall surely die'; but thou today hast obeyed the faith, today is thy salvation. Adam by the Tree fell away; thou by the Tree art brought into Paradise.'...O mighty and ineffable grace! The faithful Abraham had not yet entered, but the robber enters! Moses and the Prophets had not yet entered, and the robber enters though a breaker of the law. Paul also wondered at this before thee, saying, 'Where sin abounded, there grace did much more abound'. They who had borne the heat of the day had not yet entered; and he of the eleventh hour entered. Let none murmur against the goodman of the house, for he says, 'Friend, I do thee no wrong; is it not lawful for Me to do what I will with Mine own? The robber has a will to work righteousness, but death prevents him; I wait not exclusively for the work, but faith also I accept. I am come who feed My sheep among the lilies, I am come to feed them in the gardens. I have found a sheep that was lost, but I lay it on My shoulders; for he believes, since he himself has said, 'I have gone astray like a lost sheep'; 'Lord, remember me when Thou comest in Thy kingdom.''" (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, 13:30-31)

How The Afterlife Completes And Makes More Sense Of This Life

"Many murderers have died in their beds unpunished; where then is the righteousness of God? Yea, ofttimes a murderer guilty of fifty murders is beheaded once; where then shall he suffer punishment for the forty and nine? Unless there is a judgment and a retribution after this world, thou chargest God with unrighteousness. Marvel not, however, because of the delay of the judgment; no combatant is crowned or disgraced, till the contest is over; and no president of the games ever crowns men while yet striving, but he waits till all the combatants are finished, that then deciding between them he may dispense the prizes and the chaplets. Even thus God also, so long as the strife in this world lasts, succours the just but partially, but afterwards He renders to them their rewards fully." (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, 18:4)

Tear Out The Evil By The Root

"But perhaps thou sayest, I am a believer, and lust does not gain the ascendant over me, even if I think upon it frequently. Knowest thou not that a root breaks even a rock by long persistence? Admit not the seed, since it will rend thy faith asunder: tear out the evil by the root before it blossom, lest from being careless at the beginning thou have afterwards to seek for axes and fire. When thine eyes begin to be diseased, get them cured in good time, lest thou become blind, and then have to seek the physician." (Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures, 2:3)