Following atheist trend, Britons seek 'de-baptism'

[Exalt]

Actually Exalt, your analogy of your camera and your computer is flawed. Your camera doesn’t configure itself to your computer, does it? Isn’t there software on your computer that allows the computer to read the files on the memory card in your camera through the USB port? Viewed that way, yeah, you’re the camera, God is the computer. Except that somehow, back through that Baptism USB port, a permanent mark is put on the memory card in the camera.

By the way, do you believe in all this stuff? The camera? the computer? That’s faith.

I have no idea how the camera actually works with the computer, so I can’t speak to the accuracy of the analogy.

In regards to your accusation of me having “faith,” which - as someone who advocates careful rational thought above taking random leaps of belief - I take some degree of offense to, I don’t think believing in a camera or a computer is anywhere near believing that there’s an invisible sky-being who watches out over everyone, and is, for some reason, extremely concerned with taking a permanent marker to my soul before allowing me entry into Heaven. I mean, bouncers use that sort of method to track certain people in bars and clubs because there’s really no better system. Now, if bouncers were omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent, there’d be no need for the markers. So why does God need baptism? (As others have postulated, God doesn’t actually need baptism at all to allow someone into the exclusive divine club, which naturally makes me wonder about why it’s necessary at all.)

 

[MelanieAnne]

I have no idea how the camera actually works with the computer, so I can’t speak to the accuracy of the analogy.

In regards to your accusation of me having “faith,” which - as someone who advocates careful rational thought above taking random leaps of belief - I take some degree of offense to, I don’t think believing in a camera or a computer is anywhere near believing that there’s an invisible sky-being who watches out over everyone, and is, for some reason, extremely concerned with taking a permanent marker to my soul before allowing me entry into Heaven. I mean, bouncers use that sort of method to track certain people in bars and clubs because there’s really no better system. Now, if bouncers were omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent, there’d be no need for the markers. So why does God need baptism? (As others have postulated, God doesn’t actually need baptism at all to allow someone into the exclusive divine club, which naturally makes me wonder about why it’s necessary at all.)

The point of the analogy is that you have put your faith in science and technology, even tho’ there is much that cannot be explained and has to be accepted on faith. You put your faith in (and your life in the hands of) the captain of an airplane every time you board a plane, and yet you know nothing about that person. People make leaps of faith all the time, they just call it something else.

As for baptism, and your concerns about an “invisible sky being” and permanent marks on the soul, as long as you’re an atheist and God doesn’t exist, what possible good use of your time and resources is it to worry about such things? Is the point to ridicule those who believe differently from yourself? What? While you’re busy being (or at least claiming to be) offended, do you have any concern whatsoever that your ruminations are also offensive?

 

[Exalt]

The point of the analogy is that you have put your faith in science and technology, even tho’ there is much that cannot be explained and has to be accepted on faith. You put your faith in (and your life in the hands of) the captain of an airplane every time you board a plane, and yet you know nothing about that person. People make leaps of faith all the time, they just call it something else.

Just because I can’t explain how my computer works doesn’t mean that *no *one can. There are reasonable, scientific, and logical explanations for why technology works the way it does. Human beings, after all, designed them.

One thing that is a common mistake with Christians has to do with the definition of the word “faith.” Faith is a word with lots of different meanings. If I say I’m faithful to my spouse, it means that I’m a good husband - I do the things that good husbands do, and don’t do the things that bad husbands do. If I say I have faith that gravity works when I start to walk down a flight of stairs, that means something very different from the first definition I just mentioned. And both of those things are very different than the type of Christian faith you’re alluding to above. So, what you’re effectively doing (whether you realize it or not) is a simple bait-and-switch with words. It’s not really a fair argument.

We both acknowledge that it takes a special type of “belief” or “faith” to accept that the tenants of Christianity are true when compared to the type of “belief” that we talk about when we buy a plane ticket, assuming that the plane will land safely. If you *really *want to dispute this, you will have bored me, and you can have the conversation with a less experienced forummer elsewhere.

As for baptism, and your concerns about an “invisible sky being” and permanent marks on the soul, as long as you’re an atheist and God doesn’t exist, what possible good use of your time and resources is it to worry about such things? Is the point to ridicule those who believe differently from yourself? What? While you’re busy being (or at least claiming to be) offended, do you have any concern whatsoever that your ruminations are also offensive?

I’m interested in the subject of religion, and have been from the time I was a small child. I studied it in college. I’m less interested in the actual doctrine itself, though, than the people who believe it. What a religious doctrine means to someone in particular is far more interesting than the Catechism or the Bible or the Sutras or Talmud or any other religious text. The reason I post here is to get *real *people’s perspective on these topics. That’s why I’m asking these questions about baptism.

Plus, I enjoy a good healthy debate. =p

 

[MelanieAnne]

Just because I can’t explain how my computer works doesn’t mean that *no *one can. There are reasonable, scientific, and logical explanations for why technology works the way it does. Human beings, after all, designed them.

True, humans designed many of the technological things we use. That doesn’t actually mean they know why it works. Often, as it happens, they just know it DOES. They can describe how it works, but many things are poorly understood, or not understood at all. Electricity, for example.

One thing that is a common mistake with Christians has to do with the definition of the word “faith.” Faith is a word with lots of different meanings. If I say I’m faithful to my spouse, it means that I’m a good husband - I do the things that good husbands do, and don’t do the things that bad husbands do. If I say I have faith that gravity works when I start to walk down a flight of stairs, that means something very different from the first definition I just mentioned. And both of those things are very different than the type of Christian faith you’re alluding to above. So, what you’re effectively doing (whether you realize it or not) is a simple bait-and-switch with words. It’s not really a fair argument.

Incorrect. You stated that you don’t make leaps of faith, and I simply showed you how people do so, outside of religion, all the time.

We both acknowledge that it takes a special type of “belief” or “faith” to accept that the tenants of Christianity are true when compared to the type of “belief” that we talk about when we buy a plane ticket, assuming that the plane will land safely. If you *really *want to dispute this, you will have bored me, and you can have the conversation with a less experienced forummer elsewhere.

Whatever

I’m interested in the subject of religion, and have been from the time I was a small child. I studied it in college. I’m less interested in the actual doctrine itself, though, than the people who believe it. What a religious doctrine means to someone in particular is far more interesting than the Catechism or the Bible or the Sutras or Talmud or any other religious text. The reason I post here is to get *real *people’s perspective on these topics. That’s why I’m asking these questions about baptism.

Plus, I enjoy a good healthy debate. =p

I’ve had a similar lifelong interest and a similar pattern of study. But I don’t have to make fun of people, I don’t have to call into question whether they’re rational, I don’t have to ridicule their God and refer to Him in disparaging terms, to discuss religion with them.

Have a nice life, bye.

 

[dzheremi]

But children are baptized very young, before they can do anything wrong. They have committed no sin.

Luke 18:15-17 shows us how Jesus receives babies even though they “have not done anything wrong” (I’m leaving out the doctrine of original sin, since not all the Apostolic Churches adhere to it). His desciples were sending those with babies waiting to be blessed away, and Jesus tells them: “Permit the children to come to Me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it at all.”

I know that won’t settle this issue for you, but for the Churches that practice infant baptism it is reason enough.

So, Baptism has to happen for someone to go to heaven. But what if very good but unbaptized person dies who doesn’t want particularly *want *to be baptized? Does God send them to hell?

This is really beyond my scope of knowledge. I’m just some guy. God does what God does. I can only point you to articles like this one from the Catholic Answers library, and to passages like John 3:5-6 in which Our Savior says “Amen, amen, I say to you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. What is born of flesh is flesh and what is born of spirit is spirit.”

I suppose you’ll say, as the next poster does, that they must be “entrusted to God’s will.”

I didn’t say that, but that is easier than trying to find anything in life that is not entrusted to God’s will, so, yeah…I would have no problem saying that.

That, of course, means that they hope God will do something miraculous to circumvent his own rules.

So says you, but I don’t think for a second that praying that God show mercy on anyone in any circumstance is equivalent to “hoping that God will…circumvent His own rules”. When I die, I hope that God will show mercy on my (baptized!) soul, just as I hope He will show mercy on your soul when you die. It is natural to pray for this, as I recognize that none of us are naturally worthy of the Kingdom of God either through our own works or through simple desire.

God said everyone needed to be baptized, but some good people don’t get baptized and die, and they hope they go to heaven, so they theorize that God would break his own rule to help them. Interesting.

Interesting indeed. If someone recognizes baptism as one of “God’s rules” which they want to follow, then why would they not get baptized? This situation makes no sense. Anyone who recognizes the necessity of baptism and wishes to be baptized obviously would do so if possible. For the cases in which it is not possible to do so, “baptism of desire” is seen as entirely valid, basically saying that such a person would have been baptized were it not for whatever circumstance that kept them from it.

You’d think that God would sort of write these “exceptions” into the rule book itself, as the picture of God without these “exceptions” is pretty abysmal.

Well, considering that the Catholic and Orthodox Churches do not believe only in a “rule book”, but in the traditions passed down from the days of Jesus and the Apostles themselves, it is not necessary that we have everything spelled out for us in this way. You’ll notice that the article I linked you to earlier in the post from the CA library contains many quotes from the writings of the early Church fathers. They were inheritors of those same traditions, even though many wrote prior to the canonization of the Bible.

We both agree that baptism appears to have very little to do with stopping *future *sin, that much is clear.

No we don’t. You’re projecting your prejudices onto what I write. I said that baptism is not a guarantee that you’ll never sin again. We do not claim, as others do, to be “once saved, always saved” so that it doesn’t matter what we do once we are baptized. But in so far as baptism marks you as one who has been consecrated to God, it has a lot to do with reminding the individual of their vows. This is also reinforced by the placing of hands on the individual during confession (for those who confess face-to-face; I always make a point of doing it this way…I like to hope it keeps me more honest!). None of these things will ever physically stop you from committing any sin, but then who ever said they would? If baptism worked that way, what need would we ever have for confession?

Christians seem to struggle with wrongdoing just as much as everyone else. And, as you say, it doesn’t mean that you’ll necessarily get into Heaven, especially seeing as how pretty much everyone ‘sins’ after being baptized. So baptism doesn’t stop future sin and it doesn’t write your ticket to heaven. As you said, what it *does *do is make someone “clean” who once was “dirty”. I assume you’re talking about sin here once again. Well, a little baby can’t possibly be “dirty” with sin, right? I mean, the little guy or girl is brand new to the world. They can’t possibly have committed any wrongdoing against anyone.

Many people seem to be stuck on the idea of infant baptism because they think that it brands a baby as being “sinful”, but I’ve never seen it that way. Jesus said (as was quoted above) that we are to receive the Kingdom as children, and we don’t think those were just empty words. Do you also advocate that no babies be immunized until they show symptoms of polio or rubella? That would be crazy, and so it would be with parents who would not consecrate their children to God because of their age. It is always best to entrust everything in your life to God, including your children of any age. To not do so is not raising your children in the faith (a violation of Catholic and Orthodox principles), and so places you and them in grave danger.

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

I ask questions to learn more about people.

I suppose a branding/marking designates something as belonging to something else. Which, I suppose you mean that Baptism says that someone belongs to Christ. But what does that actually mean? What *change *does it actually have in my life?

It’s like a brand on a farm animal, except that it can’t be destroyed. Sheep go down into the fank to be deloused, up they come out of it, then their wool is marked to indicate ownership:​

• [DALMORE - Tales of a Lewis Village: Fainge Dhal a' Mor. The Dalmore Sheep Fank. (DALMORE - Tales of a Lewis Village: Fainge Dhal a' Mor. The Dalmore Sheep Fank.)

Baptism = delousing & branding all in one. Confirmation, & ordination to the priesthood, also confer the sacramental character (as this mark is called).

Okay, so Baptism doesn’t have anything to do with going to heaven…

Well - it does; except that “going to heaven” is pointless as well as impossible if one is not Christ’s. Christian faith is not about anything as trivial as “going to heaven” - that sort of nonsense puts the emphasis on man, instead of Christ.​

Okay, so to clarify: What I’m asking is what effect is there other than I have a nifty new invisible tattoo on my invisible soul?

Belonging to Christ - from which much more follows…​