How do new Catholics find godparents for children?

[Zeebo]

I was raised Protestant. My wife still is Protestant. I became Catholic in 2007, but haven’t become all that involved at my parish. (I was in my first year of law school when I completed RCIA, so most of my free time has been devoted to my studies, and more recently, to caring for our infant son). My wife and I had a son born last year, and another on the way. We’d like to get them baptized, but I don’t really have any close Catholic friends in the area to serve as godparents. I do have two friends out of the area who are Catholic.

What do new Catholics typically do if they don’t have family or close friends who are Catholic? Is it common to select godparents from out of the area, people you might only see every couple of years? That doesn’t seem ideal. Our neighbors are Catholic, we get on well with them, but we’re not exactly close friends. Seems like the role of godparent should be reserved for someone with whom we have a close relationship. I have a number of very close friends nearby, but none are Catholic.

Seems like this is a hard decision for lifelong Catholics because they’ve got a long list of potential godparents, but for a new Catholic like me the list is nearly non-existent! Any advice would be appreciated.

 

[Michelle_Arnold]

While it is true that many people select godparents from among those Catholics to whom they are close, others see it as an opportunity to deepen Catholic friendships and to sort of welcome people with whom you are friends into your family. The latter strategy would seem to be particularly appropriate for new Catholics. Since it would indeed be better to select someone who lives locally, if that is at all possible, you could broach the idea of godparenthood with your neighbors. It would be flattering to them to explain that you decided to ask because you hope that this may be an opportunity for your families to get to know each other better. If you don’t like the idea, or if the neighbors don’t feel comfortable with it, you could ask your distant friends to be the godparents. If your friends cannot be in town for the baptism, your neighbors could be asked to stand in as proxies, witnessing the baptism on the godparents’ behalf.