English

Noun

holy water ‎(plural holy waters)

1. (Christianity) In certain Christian churches, water that has been sanctified by a priest or bishop for the purpose of baptism or for the blessing of persons, places, or things.
   • 1854, Jeremy Taylor, Reginald Heber, Charles Page Eden, Alexander Taylor, The Whole Works of the Right Rev. Jeremy Taylor, page 88

     None comes to this holy feast but they whose sins are cleansed in baptism, who are sanctified in those holy waters of regeneration, who have obedient souls,

   • 1889, Charles Paschal Telesphore Chiniquy, Fifty Years in the Church of Rome, page 307

     ... with our signs of the cross and holy waters, our crucifixes and prayers to the saints, our scapulars and medals, our so humiliating auricular confession

   • 1979, "The Catechesis of Cyril of Jerusalem", translated by Lucien Deiss, Matthew J. O'Connell, in Springtime of the Liturgy

     In a parallel way, when you came up from the font and its holy waters, you received chrismation and the mark with which Christ was chrismated.

Translations