1 Peter 3:18-20

Part 1, Section 2, Chapter 2, Article 5, Paragraph 1

632 The frequent New Testament affirmations that Jesus was "raised from the dead" presuppose that the crucified one sojourned in the realm of the dead prior to his resurrection. 477 This was the first meaning given in the apostolic preaching to Christ's descent into hell: that Jesus, like all men, experienced death and in his soul joined the others in the realm of the dead. But he descended there as Saviour, proclaiming the Good News to the spirits imprisoned there. 478

Part 1, Section 2, Chapter 3, Article 9, Paragraph 3, SubSection 3, Heading 4

845 To reunite all his children, scattered and led astray by sin, the Father willed to call the whole of humanity together into his Son's Church. The Church is the place where humanity must rediscover its unity and salvation. The Church is "the world reconciled." She is that bark which "in the full sail of the Lord's cross, by the breath of the Holy Spirit, navigates safely in this world." According to another image dear to the Church Fathers, she is prefigured by Noah's ark, which alone saves from the flood. 334

Part 2, Section 2, Chapter 1, Article 1, SubSection 2, Heading 1

1219 The Church has seen in Noah's ark a prefiguring of salvation by Baptism, for by it "a few, that is, eight persons, were saved through water": 14

The waters of the great flood you made a sign of the waters of Baptism, that make an end of sin and a new beginning of goodness. 15 Return