Problems with baptism, need suggestions

[TAS2000]

You pulled a CNN job on what I wrote, twisting it, adding your assumptions and then piecing it together in order to fit what I’m betting was a preconcieved argument before you even finished reading everything I wrote. .

Now whose twisting stuff? Your betting on MY intentions and saying I didn’t read you post? Let me try this slower so I don’t confuse you again.

First of all I said the thread was full of holes, not your story. Meaning that there were a lot of unanswered questions that should be answered so that we aren’t all just speculating. Like specifically what the “fee” was for, and if you had ever asked. LOTS of times we hear on these forums that people were told they had to pay a fee, but it is really a suggested donation or stipend that can be readily waved in cases of hardship, but since most people understand the word “fee”, that is what a lot of places use. (Plus it cuts down on the amount of people who ignore anything labeled “donation”, but will readily pay if it says “fee”). Also, several posters, including myself have said that you need to talk to someone other than the staff person (like a preist), and there is no mention of whether you have done that. You complain about the fee but haven’t asked the people who’d actually KNOW (namely the Basillica), but just complain to a bunch of anonymous people. That sounds like a hole to me. Get the facts, then you’ll know.

In the first paragraph what are you arguing about? You’ve taken two seperate topics that I was talking about and combined them into one to argue I don’t know what. A quick glance will show you that I mentioned “hispanic neighborhood” in the first paragraph and “five minutes” in the second. The fact that it was seperate paragraphs should be an indication that they weren’t on the same topic. .

I never said they were part of the same argument. I simply gave FACTS that respond to several of your statements. Sorry if having them in the same paragraph confused you. You said:

I would guess there is a very small percentage of parishioners who do live in the immediate area, being that it resides in what has now become mostly hispanic neighborhoods and weekend masses are dominated by caucasions.

I told you that if you limited it to five minutes, that would be true, but within 15 minutes are some VERY affluent caucasions dominated neighbohoods, so many of those people you see at the weekend mass COULD be from the immediate area, as well as (I’ve already stated) MANY one time vistors. Apparently, you choose to take that as some kind of arguement, rather than an explanation of geographic facts.

My mention that I was about five minutes from the Basilica was in response to the person who questioned why I didn’t baptize my child in my geographic area…2.4 miles … which I believe makes it my geographic parish…

And I responded that there are over dozen Catholic churches in that same geographic area that would also qualify. After all, you DID ask about other parishes in the area, and as another poster suggested, maybe the Basillica is too big to wave the standard policy for you. But again, you assume I’m somehow attacking you instead of offering suggestions?

The comment about being in a low income neighborhood was made to demonstrate how ridiculous a $50 dollar registration fee is. …a $50 dollar registration fee is a hurdle to alot of these people. And before you go assuming I don’t know anything about low income hispanics…No I didn’t ask what the $50 dollars was for. It doesn’t matter to me what it’s for, it is uncalled for.

See my above commments about complaining, but not ever asking to find out the facts. You are totally correct that it would be dead wrong to “charge” a “fee”, and I am SURE the Basillica knows that, so you need to find out what they were really asking for.

I did my research and referenced …the church bulletin … and looked up the cannon law on baptism to support my objections of waiting seven months for baptism.

And I pointed out that you DIDN’T grasp the part the says you need to prepare before hand. You ASSUMED that the baptism class was a one day thing. In some parishes, you might be right. But in our parish it is a 1 hour class every other week for several weeks. My point however, is that you never looked into it before hand other than to read the front of the bulletin. YOU were lax in NOT finding out ahead of time that you needed to be registered for 6 months, so now you are upset with the churches rules. I’m just pointing out it works both ways. You can’t just apply the part of the law you want (you soudl baptise right away) and ignore the other part (you have to be properly prepared). Just because you underestimated what “prepared” means in this parish isn’t the parish’s fault. A phone call AHEAD of time probably would have cleared it up for you.