Baptism of Bells

[Will_Pick]

Can any one that is Catholic tell me any thing about " Baptism of Bells" I was told it was started by pope xiv in about 965AD and is against the Bible,I was told this by a member of the Church of Christ,I;m Catholic and I have not ever heard of this,can any one help me ? Thank You

 

[Corpus_Cristi]

The baptism of bells is not the administering of the sacrament of baptism to an inanimate object, it’s just blessing it. A priest blesses a bell by having holy water poured over it. It was only called the baptism of bells some time after it got started because it did appear that the priest was baptizing the bell, but he wasn’t.

 

[cestusdei]

Ask him to give you chapter and verse that commands us not to bless things like bells. Tell him it must be specific and mention baptizing or blessing bells. Don’t let him change the subject. Hammer away at the point. Then ask him where the Bible says the Bible alone is all we need. It doesn’t.

 

[Katholikos]

Will Pick:

Can any one that is Catholic tell me any thing about " Baptism of Bells" I was told it was started by pope xiv in about 965AD and is against the Bible,I was told this by a member of the Church of Christ,I;m Catholic and I have not ever heard of this,can any one help me ? Thank You

The person who told you this – whether he knew it or not – was quoting the infamous book “Roman Catholicism” by Lorraine Boettner. This book is still heavily quoted by anti-Catholics, although Boettner himself is long dead. It’s a pathetic pack of lies masquerading as history, giving the dates certain events allegedly occurred in Catholic history.

You can read about the book in these two Catholic Answers articles:

catholic.com/library/catholic_inventions.asp

catholic.com/library/more_catholic_inventions.asp

Here’s what CA says about the “baptism of bells.”

QUOTE
Item: “Baptism of bells instituted by Pope John XIII . . . [A.D.] 965.”

What is the reader supposed to make of this? Most non-Catholics realize that Catholics baptize infants, but bells? If Catholics think they can baptize bells, why not baptize automobiles or any other inanimate object? The charge, if true, does make the Church look silly. But what happened was not what Boettner implies. There was indeed a “baptism of bells,” but it was not a baptism in the sacramental sense of the word. When a church received new bells for its bell tower, the bells were blessed, usually by the local bishop. Any object can be blessed, a blessing being a dedication of a thing to a sacred purpose. The ceremony used in the blessing of the bells was reminiscent in some ways of the ceremony used in baptism, so in popular usage it came to be called the “baptism of bells,” though no one thought the bells were actually receiving a sacrament. The phrase is innocent, but when anti-Catholics refer to it in just a few words, it looks particularly bad. END QUOTE

I encourage you to read both of these articles so you’ll know what you’re up against with people who use Boettner’s alleged “facts.” His book is pure, malicious bull-oney.

JMJ Jay