BEM and Indiscriminate Baptism

 

              There is a document called Baptism Eucharist Ministry, that highlights best practices and common agreements across denominations about those three subjects. I remember first reading it in the library of St. Mark’s Retreat Centre in Audley End, UK. I was supposed to be sorting the library or maybe setting up an upstairs worship space, but I started reading BEM and next thing I knew I had read the whole thing. There was one section that sort of haunts me, a section about the misuse of baptism by folk who practice infant baptism, it reads:

              “The latter must guard themselves against the practice of apparently indiscriminate baptism and take seriously their responsibility for the nurture of baptized children to mature commitment to Christ.”—BEM page 5.

              I think of my own entrance into the body of Christ, was that unserious or indiscriminate? I think too of the many baptisms I have performed where the parents and sponsors are less than perfect church attenders, certainly inconsistent, and sometimes you get the sense that they’d not consciously acted or reflected on their faith since they were in Sunday School.

But then I think God does not solely, or even primarily, welcome perfect people, consistent souls, those whose actions and reflections always align with the Gospel. No, when God came in the flesh, he told stories of welcoming strange folk to wedding banquets and was accused of supping with sinners and transforming tax collectors.

That said, I do wish there was a good process of continually walking with the baptized in their faith. Yes, we offer Sunday School, First Communion instruction, Confirmation, and so on, but the weight of the world and concerns for college applications and future successes, tend to crowd out the garden of a baptized life.

As I’ll write about tomorrow, there are a lot of dynamics that have broken up those traditional patterns the church has relied on to form the baptized to be mature Christians. We now have to rely on atypical means to pass on the faith, which requires creativity, flexibility, and a lot more work than the program model of the previous generation. More importantly, we must rely on the grace of Jesus Christ, which requires ongoing faith—trusting that God will guide the Church as we pass on the faith.