Baptism- baby- how soon?

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ever heard of Joseph Leo combination? for St Joseph and St Leo the Great. is that a rare combination?
No, John Paul as a combined name I’ve heard lots. Joseph Leo, not at all. Just out of curiosity I looked at the Vital Statistics archive for the province of my birth. I typed in one surname that would be associated with Catholics and Leo. I came up with 26 “Joseph Leo” and hundreds of Joseph + Leo + one other name.
 
Proxies are no longer used in the 1983 Code.

Sometimes priests still allow this practice.

Deacon Christopher
 
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Whoops, that should read 1983 Code - I hit “4” instead of “3”, and the post will no longer let me edit it.

Mea culpa,
Deacon Christopher
 
The godparents, providing they meet the criteria, could be in another state, country or even on the Space Station 🙂 You choose two people to stand as proxy for the absent sponsors.
 
That’s what we did for my son’s baptism. His godfather lived 8 hours away by car and unable to make it here.
 
Our hosts here at Catholic Answers have answered this question:

https://jimmyakin.com/2006/03/proxies.html

“You are correct that the use of proxies as sponsors in confirmation is not found in the Code, however this of itself does not mean that the use of proxies is illegitimate.”
 
Baptism…how soon…When I was born, many moons ago, 😁 my mother and dad had us (twins) Baptized on the 10th…we were born on the 8th…and I still have my little Baptism gown…it is silk! and…there’s no way I can fit into it! 😆
 
ever heard of Joseph Leo combination? for St Joseph and St Leo the Great. is that a rare combination?
Honestly, I don’t know the middle names of most people I know. But yes, the baptismal name can include two saints instead of just one…that is, you can be baptized with both first and middle name or just by your first name.

Our consideration of names for our children included what siblings would do with a combination. Timothy James sounds great, but you probably don’t want to set the child up as a Timmy Jimmy. I don’t know if Joleo is particularly problematic, but it is probably predictable from Joseph Leo.
 
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Proxies are no longer used in the 1983 Code.

Sometimes priests still allow this practice.

Deacon Christopher
So then who are my kids’ godparents? My parents, who we intended to stand in as proxies?!
 
The proxy is the person standing in for a sponsor who cannot attend in person.

The sponsor is recorded as the sponsor, the proxy is noted as witnessing the act in place of the sponsor.

From my understanding, the reason the 1983 Code removed mention of proxies was that there were abuses of them occurring. One example was that of a teacher standing in as proxy for a whole bunch of confirmandi.

Hope that helps.

Deacon Christopher
 
You don’t have to do within X amount of time.
But if you want to baptized your child without his consent or active preparation, don’t wait too much.

Historically, baptized took place the day of the birth, or a dew day after.
Currently, the more people are practicing, the more they baptized early.

Personally I want to baptized as early as possible.
BUT if you planned a party, you need to know that right after the birth, you (and your wife) may be extrememely tired. Not ideal, and impossible to know before.
I was in survival mode for three months, nothing would be possible.

Don’t wait too long. You don’t know what may happened. The worst would be death.
I am relieved to have baptized our last in december 2019. Family (and even the parish!) advised us to wait until Spring 2020. But I don’t want my child be too old. If I had wait, we would have postpone the christening because of the Coronavirus and my child would not be a christian now!
 
Baptize ASAP, later fly for party with family.
Unless extreme emergency, I don’t think it is a good idea.

party should be linked with ther sacrament.
  1. baptism and marriage and funeral are the only times many Catholics goes to the church in their life. If we make the party after, we will deprived them from the religious service.
  2. It brings the idea that baptism (or even marriage) is not important. What count is party to celebrate someone. It is a scary and secular idea and would brings more and more families to choose to skip the sacraments/rite of passage because we can party in all legitimity without them.
  3. You lost an occasion to educate them on the faith and religion.
  4. baptism is a mooving event for your invitees. Believers or not.
 
No, the party doesn’t count, what counts is the saving Sacrament of Baptism conferred at the proper time and place for the infant’s soul. Baptism is for the good of the infant, the party is for the good of the family and can be done any which way.
 
I don’t see any point to make a party for the sake of making a party.

To be reunited for a baptism make sense. To deliberately decide to have a party later to baptized quickly does not seems right.

I understand a quick baptism for an emergency.

But there is at least 3 months of delay before a baptism when we contact a parish (where I lived), so it is enough to organize a party.

What take time for us was to find godarents. That’s why we baptized our seconc later than the first. And because of the distance, it was less easy to organize the party than with the first.
 
3 months of delay? Good, the mother can apply for classes when she is 6 months pregnant and the baby can be baptized right on time.
 
I have never seen something like that, yet I know from people in this forum that it is common in the USA.

In my parishes, the children are usually baptized in their second year. If the couple is a practicing Catholic one it is often before the 1t birthday.

I would be hesitate to plan a baptism before a birth. We don’t know the health of the child after the birth. We don’t know we we would be enough in shape ourselves, mothers to organize something.
 
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