Why wouldn't a priest bless a stillborn infant?

[theresa3]

Recently my niece unmarried and nineteen years of age, lost her child. Baby was born dead. A priest was asked to bless the baby, but only BLESSED my niece. Trying to understand, if a priest is to serve the spiritually of it’s. People why he choose not to do so.

 

[Fr.Charles_Grondin]

First let me say my heart goes out to your niece and your family in the wake of such an awful tragedy. She, and her child, will be in my prayers.

I cannot answer why the priest did or didn’t do something. It could have been a simple case of misunderstanding what was being requested. Or perhaps the priest was shaken by the moment and simply got disoriented in what he was doing.

The Book of Blessings contains an Order for Blessing of Parents after a Miscarriage which may be what the priest in question prayed. However the Order of Christian Funerals contains prayers that can be said in the presence of the deceased’s body which can be adapted for infants and also contains prayers explicitly for deceased children that can be used immediately following a death. There are a few options that the priest could have chosen but if he had not encountered such a situation previously he may not have been aware of them at the moment. He may have simply turned to the Book of Blessings and prayed the Order for Blessing of Parents after a Miscarriage because that’s all he could think of. I would not judge him too harshly, I think he was doing his best to be pastoral and present to your niece in her time of need.

May you take comfort in God’s everlasting mercy and love:

As regards children who have died without Baptism, the Church can only entrust them to the mercy of God, as she does in her funeral rites for them. Indeed the great mercy of God who desires that all men should be saved and Jesus’ tenderness toward children which caused him to say: ‘Let them come to me, do not hinder them’ allow us to hope that there is a way of salvation for children who have died without baptism. (CCC 1261)

You will come to understand that nothing is definitively lost and you will be able to ask forgiveness from your child who is now living with the Lord. (BPJP2, The Gospel of Life – 99).

God bless.