Can a child be baptized into two churches?

[schlaps]

My wife is Methodist, I am Catholic. We got married in the Catholic Church. We were not planning children because we didn’t think she could have any. She is now seven months pregnant after eight years of marriage.

I say that we need to baptize the child in the Catholic Church. She is agreeable but she also wants to baptize in the Methodist church. I told her that neither church allows that, but she is headstrong about doing so and will not tell her minister about both baptisms. I remember that during the pre-marriage counseling the nun said that the child has to be baptized in the Catholic Church. Is there a way to satisfy us both?

 

[Michelle_Arnold]

schlaps:

Is there a way to satisfy us both?

Gently explain to your wife that baptism is not merely a cultural baby-welcoming ceremony that can be repeated for separate audiences. Baptism is a sacred rite in which a child is cleansed of original sin, given sanctifying grace, becomes a Christian, and is initiated into the Christian religion. To deliberately attempt to repeat a baptism is objective sacrilege.

As a Catholic who married a non-Catholic Christian in the Catholic Church, you made a promise at the time of your marriage to do your best to raise any children you might have within the Catholic faith. Your wife was informed of this obligation of yours and presumably agreed, since you mention that she is agreeable to you having the child baptized a Catholic. Explain to her that it would violate your duty as a Catholic to attempt to rebaptize the child and that lying to her minister would only compound the problem.

Perhaps your wife would be satisfied if her Methodist minister is present at the baptism as a Christian witness to the baptism. (Non-Catholics cannot be godparents at Catholic baptisms, but they can be invited to be Christian witnesses.) Speak to the priest or deacon who will be performing the child’s baptism to find out if such an accommodation is possible. After the baptismal ceremony, perhaps at a reception for the family and friends who gather to celebrate the baptism, your wife’s minister might be invited to say a prayer for the baby.