Redemption begins in God’s initiative through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, removing humanity’s barriers to God and opening participation in divine life. The International Theological Commission sets Christian salvation alongside Hindu, Buddhist, Islamic, traditional religious, and modern accounts of liberation, arguing that Christian hope is uniquely grounded in the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Covenant, the resurrection of the body, and the renewal of creation. Biblical and patristic reflection presents Christ as the obedient Suffering Servant and new Adam whose Cross establishes the new covenant, defeats sin and death, and restores humanity in God’s image.

A historical survey contrasts Anselm’s satisfaction, Abelard’s revelation of love, Aquinas’s superabundant representative satisfaction, Reformation accounts of penal substitution, and modern liberal, existential, political, and pluralist approaches. The Commission’s constructive Catholic account holds together divine initiative and human response: grace is indispensable, yet faith must be enlivened by charity and expressed in a transformed life. Baptism incorporates believers into Christ, Penance restores baptismal grace, and the Eucharist unites the Church to his self-offering. As a universal sacrament, the Church continues Christ’s saving work through prayer, good works, suffering, and mutual intercession. Redemption reconciles people with God, one another, and creation, resists injustice without becoming merely political liberation, and reaches fulfilment in Christ’s return, the resurrection of the body, and the renewal of all things.