Catholic Baptism problems

[smartypants1000]

Basically, we have our daughters' Baptism booked for late May, outside of our Parish (where Godparents live and where we are originally from). For various reasons (serious bereavements for two of the Godparents, the girls are aged 4 and 2 - it has always been the intention to have them Baptised. It seemed pretty straightforward but we've now been told that we need the permission of our Parish Priest. This shouldn't have been a problem, except that he won't give his permission.

We moved into the Parish less than 3 months ago, and he requires that we be registered members of the Parish for 3 months before we can apply for Baptism. Then, he requires us to attend a preparation course here, and won't accept us attending preparation in the Parish where we will be having our dd's Baptised. he also requires baptism certificates for all Godparents - they don't live locally, and probably don't know where their certificates are. But the main problem is the 3 month rule. I have attended Mass with the children every Sunday since we moved here in Feb. But he requires both of us to attend for 3 months before he will allow us to attend the preparation course, and since that only runs at certain times, will not allow us to have the Baptism as planned - it has been a military operation getting a date when everyone can make it, and after so many problems I don't want to delay, as it is very important to me that the girls are Baptised :-(. Dh is Catholic, but he isn't practising. he is happy for the dc to be raised Catholic. I joined the church as an adult (prior to meeting dh) and it is so important to me to raise the children with faith.

I'm feeling very unwelcome in the Church at the moment, very upset about this, feeling that my children are not considered good enough. Can the Parish really deny us permission? Can they really just impose these arbitary rules? When ds was Baptised, it was very friendly, welcoming and straightforward. Is there anything I can do, or do I have to accept that the Baptism will not happen?

Boy do I sympathise with this. I had my DC baptised at 3.5 and 2. I always intended to do it earlier but family illness, deaths, house moves etc delayed it. I always wanted them baptised as I was brought up RC. I like taking them to church. I never wanted the over subscribed RC school as I wanted and got our local multi faith community school. I was made to feel I was not worthy and very nearly told the priest to stuff it. I was very close to going CofE where we would have been welcomed with open arms. It has made me very bitter. They are now baptised and we go to a different church - no doubt the priest still thinks we were trying to wangle a school place.

school admission is really up to the school and should have fuck all on baptising a child.

stupid priest

stupid stupid priest

in your situation i would be taking this higher ASAP, and i would also ring around other catholic churches and say - have you got a problem in baptising my child ?

honestly, i would forgo any ceremony just get a catholic church that will baptise on a date when the godparents can make it

also e-mail is a shit way of communicating

i would want a meeting in person.

i'd be ringing the bishop

can you imagine jesus saying umm no, have you been coming to the river every sabbath? no? well then sod off

And who is going to honestly say that they are more interested in the school place, come on.

And if he wanted to ask that then all it would take would be a letter to the previous parish priest to confirm that the Op had been a regular attender for the last 10+ years. There is absolutely no reason why a priest should refuse to consider the child of a practising Catholic until they have been in the parish at least 3 months unless he's a total jobsworth.

Is there another Catholic church nearby you could attend. I'd be running from thus one as fast as possible.

I think He wants people who genuinely love and honour Him to be baptised and enter into His family.

that is for the school to decide admissions policy

it should not interfere with a child being baptised at all ever

3 months. It's only 12 Sundays.

Why is that too much to ask of someone who wants to enter their child into the Catholic faith for life?

Really would have trouble seeing Jesus turning this one away if I'm honest. I think he'd have more trouble with a priest putting barriers in the way than with baptising the OP's children.

floggingmolly, I'm not sure where you got this impression - we are not having a party or a knees-up, we are having our 2 daughters baptised with only Parents, Grandparents and Godparents present. The reason for the delay is that 2 of the Godparents suffered the death of their husbands (one of whom was also to be Godfather) and so out of respect to them we chose to delay the ceremony. It is important to us that they are present.

Can the PP who is baptising them have a word with the difficult priest? This is so unlike my experience of having babies baptised so it isn't universal to the Catholic church but unfortunately the rules around your 'home' parish take precedence and are being spectacularly unhelpful.

If not I really would appeal to the diocese.

In terms of Godparents we just needed one practising Catholic, the others were other denominations.

I hope you get it sorted, how sad if the church loses new members due to beurocracy.

*3 months. It's only 12 Sundays.

Why is that too much to ask of someone who wants to enter their child into the Catholic faith for life?*

It isn't. I go to Mass every Sunday, as I already said. The issue is with not being allowed to join the prep course that begins next week, because it is only 2 months since we moved here.

DH's parish priest had the same criteria, I thought they were fair enough. I'm not Catholic btw.

Seriously, 3 months, if you're that committed a Catholic then that's barely anything. If you've only been there 6 weeks or whatever, it's a bit unfair to ask the priest to change his requirements just for you.

I cannot see any reason why attendance in another parish would not count in terms of demonstrating commitment. Churches are not islands, they are part of a body and, as a fellow Catholic I am sorry that you are being treated this way.

I just don't see why you expect him to bend the entry requirements for you.

Annunziata, I think that if people are as dishonest as you think they are, and are prepared to go through a Baptism they don't believe in in order to secure a school place, don't you think they'd be prepared to turn up and give lip service every Sunday for three months?

Anyway, it's my understanding that school admission would require a letter from the Priest to confirm that the family are practising?

This doesn't apply to our family anyway.

No, I'm not forgetting it's a sacrament. That's exactly why it's so important to me. In what way have I not signed up to the "way of life"? I take my children to Mass, I pray with my children, I read the Bible with them at home. I'm not sure why you seem to think that I want a party (we're not having one) or a school place (we don't want one).

But if you were saying this to someone who wasn't practising, yet had some inkling that they wanted their children baptised - you'd effectively be saying to them "we don't just take anyone, you're not good enough". Wouldn't it be more helpful to be gently encouraging?

That is very poor- we never had to do a prep course but I did have to go every week for 6mths before he let me have a form to fill in to apply to baptise. I had explained that my DC were a handful and not great at sitting still. They proved that when they ran / screamed / sang though many a mass. I often went on a Saturday instead if Sunday due to other commitments (not family mass) and they were the only kids there. Boy did he know they were in church we got lots of frowns but lots of people made us feel welcome

Exactly because "entry requirements" is an ugly way of looking at a christian church. And because I'd expect him to be more concerned about the spirituasl welfare of the children than ticking a box?

I had a very obstructive pp too, hoop after hoop, even finally demanding certificates for all parties (ex soviet union all of us, not easy at all, orthodox history pre 1989). We'd moved and wanted a prompt christening for a new baby, especially after a series of serious health scares. My old pp stepped in and did it anywayafter I blubbed all over him !
It turned out we'd unknowingly moved next to a desirable school and outsiders were commonly robbed off, whilst non- Catholic attendees had no issue...

No, three months is long enough to put off the Christmas Catholics in my experience.

I don't think anyone should just turn up and expect to be baptised. It's too important for that. You have to show your commitment and your respect for the church.

Only one godparent needs to be catholic! And for that matter, only one parent does too! They just need to agree to them being brought up in the faith.

As far as I am aware it is all up to the priest who is doing the baptising about what is needed. He is obviously wanting to cover himself. You should check if another parish in that area will baptise them (otherwise talk again to the original planned priest about the dilema).

As for your current parish, move church. There must be another parish nearby - just start going there. Vote with your feet. In my home parish (don't live there any more) that is exactly what a large part of the congregation did due to the priest getting too big for his boots

We didn't have to attend prep classes for our kids to be baptised. Nor did we have to provide baptismal certificates either for ourselves or for the godparents. And in fact, I had only been a resident member of the parish for about a year before DD1 was born. And we didn't get married in that church, we got married in my home parish. But, on the other hand, we had all our DCs baptised within 6 weeks of their birth. I do think things are being generally tightened up though - when Dd1 was confirmed 2 years ago, there were classes etc but many of the kids had very patchy attendance (DD1 had about 80% and she was the top attendee) - this year, DS is being confirmed and they made it VERY clear to all the kids that anything less than 100% attendance except in case of proper illness wouldn't be tolerated and the kid wouldn't be allowed to be confirmed. In fact, DS missed one class through a bad asthma attack, and had to leave the final retreat before the end on the last day because of a MT rehearsal (he wasn't the only one, one other kid is in the same production and also had to leave early) and we were very concerned that would say goodnight Vienna but luckily they didn't. They also asked for baptism certificates which is all very well except for the fact that our PP doesn't issue them (the confirmation is for two parishes, but it's taking place in the other church and that PP is a bit better at paperwork). It's all been sorted out now, luckily we and the other parents with kids baptised in our parish all knew the precise dates of the baptisms so they were easy to find in the parish register.

I think the requirement for classes is unreasonable for practising Catholics, I think the requirement to be a regular attendee is not unreasonable. Like it or not many people DO try and fiddle school admission and the church has a responsibility to try and protect against this.

I think he should 'bend' his requirements because the church is supposed to be a place of welcome and refuge.

A stranger to the parish who is clearly struggling with living in an unfamiliar area is seeking support if the church and being denied it.

The OP has explained that she us a regular church attender who was unaware of the need to become a 'registered' parish member (it wouldn't have occurred to me either as I have never known such a thing).

More Christian welcome and less rules seem wholly appropriate here.

it makes me sad that a devout convert of ten years is being treated like this.

Treated like what? She is being asked to be a member of the parish and to join in the community for a certain amount of time before she takes her children to be baptised and taken into God's family. There is nothing wrong with that.

Surely we are not going to let the peculiarities of the British state school selection process alienate Mothers and children from the Church.

The school process makes a mockery of everyone who truly believes and truly goes to church every Sunday. The answer isn't to baptise everyone who appears for a few weeks.