I'm considering baptising my child - I have questions

[Helevitia]

I am history and religiously challenged, so I am gathering different people's views about baptism and why people do it.

First of all, my fantasy in my mind is that I would baptise my daughter but not with any specific form of religion and allow her to decide later in life which path she chooses to take. I believe that it is good to have some sort of spirit or power in yourself that you can tap into when needed. I feel that baptising my daughter will give her a sense of spirit later in life when she starts to think about what everything is all about.

Knowing that, what are my options? What do other people do? What does it mean when you get baptised? How do you go about getting it done?

[Jessterw]

Baptism comes in several forms and is tied to a few different religions. Christianity is the more prevalent religion to practice it, but even then it isn't a uniform practice (some 'sprinkle', while others 'dunk'). Christian baptism has roots in Judaism and the practice of mikvah (might have the spelling wrong there).

Wikipedia actually has decent coverage of the subject matter...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baptism

[TransformX]

I say, follow your heart. In matters of the spirit and belief (as opposed to religion), let your heart guide you.

[az]

Maybe a stupid question, but why not just wait and let her decide when/if she wants to do it?

[Helevitia]

That's something I'm considering, but it's not just up to me. My wife has a say in it as well.

[Dr Mordrid]

Male survival 101: don't dig holes you can't climb out of.

If your wife leans that way let her make the mother-daughter call. Any other way will just stress the wife out, with you being the negative focus.

No different than objecting to the girls first grown up 'little black dress' after mom helps her pick it out

[Gurm]

My sons had nothing. No ceremony, no nothing. In retrospect, I would have liked to have a baby-naming. A bris would have been impractical from the "we're not Orthodox" point of view. A baby-naming is a nice ceremony involving friends and family that affirms the child, their life, their name, and the support of their loved ones.

As for baptism... do you believe in Jesus? Do you want your child to believe in Jesus? If not, then baptism is pretty pointless. It's a ritualized way of asking Jesus to come and live in your child's heart and soul. I mean, maybe Jesus was a righteous dude, but I don't want to stuff him into my kids without their knowledge, y'know?

We have atheist/agnostic friends that christened their kids. I find it sacrilegious, to be honest. (Probably why I wasn't invited!) I mean, they're ATHEISTS. To invoke a deity you don't believe in to come and ENTER your child? I dunno, man. That's pretty messed up.

Not to mention that depending on the religion you have to make all kinds of promises in your kid's name. Baptise her Catholic and you have to promise to "mess her up for life". (In Catholic-speke you promise to raise her in the Church, which amounts to the same thing in my book!) You won't KEEP the promise, we hope, but you have to promise it anyway (any Catholics in here who are offended that I would insist that the entire premise of your religion is to "mess her up for life" can just hush now, I'm on a soap box). Same thing with most of the outspoken forms of Protestantism. Gotta promise to keep her heart pure for Jesus, teach her to go to church, etc. etc. - and you have little intention of doing that, right? And if you find a bland enough version of Christianity to baptise her in, what's the point, really?

I don't mean to sound down on religion... IF YOU BELIEVE IT. But what a way to start a kid's life - by lying? That's what got me down on our friends. Essentially, baptising a child in a religion you don't believe in... is lying. To yourself, to them, to the church, to the other people involved.

You wanna fill her up with spirit? Have a big party. Invite everyone that loves her. Dress her up nice. Everyone can say the prayers they like, hold her, and fill her up with their love. How does that strike you?

I know, I'm a cynical bastard. *shrug*

[Jessterw]

Baptism isn't just the domain of Christians. In many religions or cultures that have a baptism ritual, it may not even involve water. In in the simplest form it is purely a spiritual cleansing.

Not sure about Jews in general, but those that subscribe to Orthodox Judaism still practice the ritual of mikvah (which I reference earlier), which is for purification, much like baptism is (indeed, the later has roots in the former as Christians were Jews).

But Jason is right, or rather I agree with him - having your child baptized just because seems a bit silly (disregard this if your wife actually believes in the ritual from whichever religion) and definitely disingenuous.

[Gurm]

Baptism isn't just the domain of Christians. In many religions or cultures that have a baptism ritual, it may not even involve water. In in the simplest form it is purely a spiritual cleansing.

Not sure about Jews in general, but those that subscribe to Orthodox Judaism still practice the ritual of mikvah (which I reference earlier), which is for purification, much like baptism is (indeed, the later has roots in the former as Christians were Jews).

Mikvah is just cleansing. It is almost never used for children/babies. It is used after childbirth to cleanse the MOTHER, and for purification in general.

Baptism is not STRICTLY limited to Christianity, but might as well be. Unless you are Sikh or one of those fruity "John the Baptist is our lord and savior" types.

Edit: Those fruities are called Mandaeans.

[Gurm]

But Jason is right, or rather I agree with him - having your child baptized just because seems a bit silly (disregard this if your wife actually believes in the ritual from whichever religion) and definitely disingenuous.

Of course if your WIFE has specific beliefs then by all means run with it, let her do whatever. But if neither one of you holds much truck with the Jesus stuff...

[Jessterw]

Mikvah is just cleansing. It is almost never used for children/babies. It is used after childbirth to cleanse the MOTHER, and for purification in general.

Baptism is not STRICTLY limited to Christianity, but might as well be. Unless you are Sikh or one of those fruity "John the Baptist is our lord and savior" types.

Yeah, wasn't trying to imply it was in regards to babies. Baptism in most non-Catholic forms of Christianity won't perform it on them either.

I was going to suggest Sikhism, but that seemed a bit extreme in this case

[Jon P. Inghram]

I know, I'm a cynical bastard. *shrug*

Well, technically speaking, if they're agnostic as opposed to atheist then having their kids baptized is legitimate from both a "better safe than sorry" point of view and for social reasons. If they really are atheist, then social interaction with the community would seem to be the only valid reason, otherwise it wouldn't be any different than any other time the kid takes a bath or goes for a swim.

[Jammrock]

For what it's worth, my church doesn't baptize until the age of 8 year old. That way they know at least a little bit what they are doing, and the ceremonies are usually pretty small and personal. Whatever you decide, I would recommend only having close family and friends for the actual baptism. Ten or so is a good number, at 20 it's unmanageable. Makes it more special that way.

Then if there are more people that want to congratulate you and so forth, have a small post-baptism thing and show off the baby in nice white baptism gown and tell people who you didn't invite that "space was limited" or some other none offensive excuse.

Jammrock

[Dr Mordrid]

Christians, Judaeism (as explained by Gurm), Latter-day Saints (Mormon), Jehovah's Witnesses, ancient Egyptians, Babylonians, Mayan, some Japanese, Sikh....all have used baptism.

Islam denies having baptism, though a cleansing bath & change of clothes is recommended before embracement. Some would call that a distinction without a difference.

3 types;

Affusion: pour water over the head
Aspersion: sprinkle water over the head
Immersion: submerging the body in water (tub. pond, river etc.)

Most denominations recognize baptism performed by other clergy. Catholics recognize a trinitarian baptism ("...I baptise you in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost..."; Matthew 28:19) even if it's performed by a non-Christian as long as it's done with good intent.

If there is doubt of a previous baptism being performed then the trinitarian form changes to "...if you are not already baptised, I baptise you ..."

In an emergency, such as a person in danger of immenent death, a layperson can perform a conditional baptism and it will be recognized as valid by most denominations. If they survive then clergy can then repeat the baptism later on.

Most times it's best to follow the trinitarian form and water must be applied 3 times.

I've known people who have done this after the unattended birth of their child or if an unbaptised family member sustains a serious injury. I've also known doctors or other medical staff to do it when clergy isn't available and at the request of the family.

Needless to say; our hospital kept an unofficial list of people who were trained by the chaplains and willing to do it in emergencies.

[schmosef]

This thread reminds me of the episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm where Larry accidentally prevents his cousin from getting baptised/converting to Christianity. That was some funny shtick!

Listen Helevitia, religious ritual is for human benefit, not G-d's. The sprinkling of some water on the head does not in any way affect G-d's interest in someone. And if it did, would G-d truly be worthy of our veneration?

If you want to do it because it makes you feel good, or you think it will make your daughter feel good, then that's 100% a good enough reason to do it. But don't harbour any fear that G-d will reject your daughter otherwise.