Libby Purvis pointed out in the Times religion blog that baptising kids to get into a specific school isn’t the irrelevant ritual that many parents imagine it to be.
OK, obviously it is an irrelevant ritual. But it’s a big deal to the Catholic Church. The Vatican page that Libby Purvis linked to is a mite chilling. It makes a lot of contradictory claims. The unbaptised have to go straight to hell without collecting their free pass. Except, if they are really small, Jesus will probably feel sorry for them….
Otherwise, the unbaptised can basically only go straight to heaven if they die doing some noble Christian work. This is called the “Baptism of Blood.” It sounds so much like a Goth band that I want to learn to play the guitar right now, just so that I can put the name on a street poster, in dripping red letters on black…..
I am getting a strong whiff of the abbattoir in “god’s purpose” for humanity, the thing that religious folk keep banging on about. Fresh meat seems to be the answer. You can’t have baptism removed. It’s like a cattle-brand n your soul.
Some soul eater needs to know if you count in heaven as the spiritual equivalent of “halal” or “kosher”. What with the Baptism of Blood image, as well. And believers being the Churches “flock.” Didn’t Jesus claim to be a Fisher of men? These are pretty blatant admissions of an agricultural purpose for humanity, methinks.
The National Secular Society produces a de-baptism certificate that you can download. It appears that you can get declared not a Catholic but you can’t undo the historical fact of having been baptised. The Church of England (Episcopalian?) is also unwilling to strike names from its register of baptisms, on the evidence of a letter from Chris Taylor.
I emailed the diocese where I was dunked many years ago asking if I could be struck from the record as I have always thought it to be a load of old rubbish and said that if my parents had given me the choice of going through some sort of black magic voodoo ceremony performed by a probable child abuser in a dress I would, even at the age of 6 months, have said thanks but no thanks. I received a reply telling me that there was nothing that I could do about it.
Well, if your destiny is being earmarked for some spiritual being’s special dinner on 6th November 2058, once you are on the menu, you’ve had it…
When I was still semi-conscious and illiterate and tiny, my parents had me baptized in an Episcopalian joint in Providence, right in the middle of Brown University, from which I later flunked out of and still later graduated. It never bothered me much once I found out the place was called Smoky Steve’s. I figured that what with being in the middle of that intellectual hellhole, with all that disbelief flying around questioning everything that ever existed, the Smoky part must have had to do with smoke and flame from Satan’s fascinating dominion, so the baptism didn’t mean a damn thing. I’m still free and inedible. Yes!!
So you are sort of smoked soulfood then? 🙂
More like half-baked, depending on who you talk to…