December 2003

Last week I witnessed a church mass in which a couple of children were baptised (among which my little nephew :o) ). I certainly haven(t lost my faith, even if "my faith" is a tad bit hard to define. And as I've mentioned already in for example the text Pointless there are a lot of things of which I think they are uummmm... strange... caught up... left behind... not from this world anymore...
I was going to say "wrong", but who am I to judge if something in religion is wrong or not? So let's leave it at one of the above mentioned...

During the ceremony the parents are asked to promise to raise the child in good faith, teaching him/her about god and "the ways", to help the child through good and bad, and to take care of him/her.
That's very understandable. And that's not something I disapprove of. But after that the people in church were asked to rise and promise pretty much the same thing. To help the child when it would be in need and to help and assist the child whenever it would come to them for help.
And the people confirmed and agreed without a second thought.

Now THAT's something that could worry me. The people make a promise to the parents and to the child, but I wonder if they realize what this promise contains. They say yes to it without thinking.
But suppose that during the child's life something happens and the child turns to one of the people, holding them to the promise they made during the child's baptising? How many of the people would remember what they promised and actually carry out that promise? I would guess that in 90% of the cases the person who was taken up on the promise would turn the child down by saying I don't have anything to do with you, go to your family.

You could say that the promise made during that church mass was just a formality and it's done with every baptising. But since when is a promise a formality? Since when are you allowed to take a promise with a pinch of salt? Since when or in which situation are you allowed to not take a promise serious?

I'm sure that in early days, when society was still a lot more personalized than today's individualistic society, this kind of promise would have worked. In small communities where everyone knows eachother and maybe a big part of the community is related to eachother. But in these days... The world has moved on. In general people don't care anymore. But the power of a promise has never lost its importance. And I think in these kind of ceremonies one should not play with the meaning of promises.
If you can't or won't live up to a promise, don't make it. And most certainly don't force people into making one when they are not fully aware of what they are promising.
In my eyes a promise such as this, and in this case the ceremony of baptising a child, loses its meaning immediately and irreversibly.