Joint Christening service with other families?

[JulyDreams]

Our vicar at our local church is offering us a christening but it will be a job service with other families so our child will be baptised at the same time. Has anyone else heard of this?

Yes, it's how it usually works.

Never heard of that and also I've been to christenings in the past where it's a single family. Not to worry. Do you think our service will be less personal? @Johnnysgirl

Well, the service is about welcoming them into the church community, so...

Think it's quite common. And for there to be a normal congregation there as well to welcome new member(s) into church rather than a private affair.

@Johnnysgirl literally just asking, never had to organise one before!

Thanks for clarifying @Forestdweller11

Sorry. But it's as @Forestdweller11 said, it's not intended to be private or personal.

@Johnnysgirl some christenings I have attended have been private and personal but in other communities to me hence I'm just slightly confused why ours was different.

Do you not go to the church often? It’s quite common for a few babies to be baptized in the main Sunday service as a welcome to the church. If that’s not what you want then discuss with your vicar.

We opted to have a Saturday christening so certain people could attend so we had a short service with just friends and family but then we still had to attend a main Sunday church service to be introduced to the congregation and complete the baptism.

@Lolloped no to going to church often so a little unsure. We are getting ours baptised on the Sunday so it would be a main service for her. Thank you!

Normally church going families have their babies baptised as part of the normal Sunday service. The normal congregation is there, plus possibly a few extra people (friends/family who don't usually go to that church). If there are multiple babies of the same age in the church, I think it would be lovely to do them all in the same service. They are going to be growing up together in the church after all.

If you aren't a churchgoer, and it's not really about raising your child in the church community, I expect some churches would do a special baptism service for just you, where you choose hymns etc and invite who you want. Perhaps in the afternoon? I guess many churches would (reasonably) charge for this though, like a wedding.

I've never heard of this either and I've attended several different churches across several denominations and been to more than one Christening.

In my current church, baptisms take place during the usual Sunday service with the focus being on welcoming the child into the church family.

I've been to others that take place in the afternoon and it's only friends and family in attendance.

Every time, it's only been the one child.

Adult baptisms are usually performed en masse but I think that's because it's more of a faff to fill the baptistry than the Christening bowl/font.

Are you a member of the church or having a Christening for other reasons? Either way, I would think the more people celebrating the better and you can have a more personal celebration afterwards.

Congratulations! 💐

Typically they are within the Sunday service here but twice a year we have Saturday baptisms and there will be 4 or 5 families. Churches aren't free to run, there's lighting, heating, booklets are needed plus 2-3 volunteers and there's no charge for baptism, the typical donation of £20 from the baptism service doesn't cover turning on the heating!

As I say, most of ours are actually within the main service on a Sunday or immediately following it, on a Sunday you will be the only family

No need to pile on in response to a question.
I've only ever been to christenings of a single person so i would also have been surprised OP, but i like what some pp's are highlighting (in amongst unnecessaryharshness), that since it's a welcoming into a church community a communal christening makes sense. So it would be more meaningful that way.

@Orangio the Church of England doesn't charge for christenings.

When you think about it, the heating costs a bomb, the minister, musician and verger need to be present. It needs to be when they are there anyway, rather than at a separate service. It's very costly in time and money to organise it separately.

Very common at our church to baptise in groups. We always do it in the context of a service so the congregation can welcome the family.

We did consider offering afternoon baptisms, to clear the post-Covid backlog, but they would also have been several families.

I've only been to 1 baptism which was included in the normal Sunday service.
My SIL is a vicar and 99% of the baptisms she does are separate from her Sunday morning church service, usually carried out afterwards. Maybe it's to do with the amount of people being invited? I'm not sure.

When I asked her about DD1's baptism, she said she does them on Sundays, unless there is an exceptional reason to carry out on another day (important person can only do that day, etc) and she gave me the time of 11am, so that's what we did

Yes, our twins were baptised with 4 other babies. It was nice!

The church my DDs were Christened in only did 11 Christening services a year, max 2 families (although I'm sure they would have done more if required!). Last Sunday of the month, January to November.

Three babies were baptised at each of my children’s christenings - and one of them is a teenager now! It’s not a new thing.

It’s common to group them in areas where there may be a lot of young families - to do them individually would take up all of the celebrant’s time. There were 9 babies baptised at one of my niece’s christenings.

Usual at our church, baptisms happen in the Sunday morning mass (RC). I have been to couple of CoE christenings when it has been just the family and not part of a mass.

It's very normal in some churches and unusual in others I think. I can see the pros and cons to both approaches depending on the norms of the congregation. In my family Christenings tend to be these huge family gatherings and you'd never fit all the guests in a regular church service especially with multiple families. In other churches there are very few extra guests on top of a normal Sunday congregation so Christening babies during a regular service makes more sense.

Normal in my parish, we have loads of baptisms.

Perhaps groups were more traditional in the past, as many more babies were christened! It's definitely standard practice in the Anglican Church though I haven't seen more than one baby at a time in years. I think it's lovely though.

Perhaps consider why you're having your child baptised if you don't go to church... have a naming ceremony instead?

My RC parish does baptisms in batches on the first Sunday of the month after the last morning Mass.