Were you baptised?

The Preacher: ..do you reject Satan and all his works?
Bill Murray: Sure.

Actually, I'm still a practicing Catholic (though one in search of a more, um, liberal parish), so it continues to be "worth the bother" in my life.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha OH I WISH THAT WAS TRUE.

(My confirmation = almost a "hey, we're sorta forcing you to do this" sort of thing. Which I did feel thankful for when it came time for quinceanera season and I could confidently state that the whole useless and wasteful activity was also redundant in my case.)

Actually, I was pretty old before I was even sure that I had been circumcised.

Yeah, I mean, how are you even supposed to know the difference when you're a kid?

I was batpised in urine!

"Baptised In Shit!" - The Meat Shits

(My mother (and my sister and I) joined the fold late.)

My grandmother is a Mormon, so even though I've renounced that religion, I'm still going to have a Mormon license on me on Judgement Day. Eh, can't hurt anything, I guess.

Hmmm, I suppose that depends so much on how much you feel you belong to a community. That makes more sense, perhaps, in a small village like the one my sister lives in, where everyone knows each other, than in a big city like NY or London.

Kevin, I think if we just dug a hole and stuck someone in the ground or cremated them without a word being said it would be rather clinical and heartless don't you? And the moment that somebody says something - even if the someone has no official capacity like an ordained minister or a local government employee, then you introduce a level of ceremony through the act of doing so which turns it from a purely functional act of disposing of a body to a funeral.

As for weddings, well why do people get married if they aren't religious? Maybe we should ask Vicky and Chris. Whilst not wanting to offend them by putting words in their mouths, I would imagine that they would say that they wanted to make a public declaration of their love for each other and wanted their friends to share in their happiness, or something like that.

What about people like teeny, who eloped with no public, family, friends, etc?

I fear we may be derailing this thread, but hey.

If this is directed at me, and I guess it is, it's because I am a sad old traditionalist. I want people to know we are married, and taking Neil's name, calling myself Mrs and wearing a ring is the obvious way of doing that. I've got no pretentions of pretending I'm not a wife to someone by still being a Ms, keeping my maiden name, or not wearing a ring. We also had a white church wedding, and didn't live together first, if that gives you some kind of idea of what we are like.

However, I'd like to make it clear that I know this kind of wifely thing doesn't appeal to anyone, in fact, I'm the only person I know of my age who actually has changed their name, so I realise I'm in the minority. But each to their own, you asked about my reasons, that's them..

apropos of not much, I remeber writing the following Clerihew about the then Chancellor of the Exchequer

Normal Lamont
Was too big for the font
But nobody listened
When he was christened

Either way, I'd rather be baptised than not. I mean, sure, there probably is no hell or no limbo for unbaptised infants or whatever, but it's nice to feel innoculated. I mean, I'm never going to encounter the smallpox either, but I'm innoculated against that, too. Plus, my godmum is cool. I wouldn't have a godmum or a godfather if I wasn't baptised, so it was worth it.

Besides, like I said. It's not like I worship God. I worship England. Let's all have a rousing chorus of "And did those feet in ancient times, walk upon England's mountains green..."

I have ambivalent feelings about religion. My Mum got a lot of support from her church when my Dad died back in March. And the work I do raising money for these people would be more difficult if not impossible without churchgoing ppl who are very generous with their time and money. But on the other hand, religious beliefs can cause people to do and say some pretty nasty things.

http://www.cofe.anglican.org/

But I think that Church of England was first, and they started refering to it as "Anglicanism" when it started going places other than England. There's all kinds of stuff in there about the "Mother Church to the Anglican Communion" or some such stuff like that that makes my eyes roll back in my head, and I suppose I could ask my mum, but...

I took first Holy Communion both in the C of E and as a Roman Catholic. I had to get special compensation from the Bishop to do it. But I was going to a Catholic school at the time, and my mum didn't want me to feel left out because the rest of my fourth grade class were all doing Holy Communion.

Their rules about Holy Communion were all different and weird, and I got really mixed up trying to follow both of them. I think that's when I started to grow disillusioned with Christianity...

Some advice would be nice here.

I was christened C of E shortly after I was born. I went to two C of E schools, at the second of which I was confirmed aged about 14.

But I don't believe in God. At 14, confirmation was presented to us all as a given, something you just "do" regardless of how you actually feel. Freedom of thought was not exactly encouraged round my way - indeed it was suppressed in many areas - so it never really occurred to me to kick up a stink or object in any way.

We had no explanation of what it actually meant to be confirmed into a faith, giving oneself to God etc, and as such it never occurred to me to kick up a stink or object in any way. The whole thing was sold to us as "part of growing up" but no real big deal, and we all looked at is as half a day off school, when we got to see our parents (it was a boarding school) and maybe got a present or two.

So now I'm stuck with this thing, confirmation, which apparently means a *lot* to devout Christians, but means less than nothing to me, and I'm suddenly faced with something of an ethical quandary.

If I ever get married, I can't imagine it being in church: even though I could easily hoodwink them into thinking I'm "eligible", I feel like a grubby hypocrite just thinking about it. So should I renounce the faith I never really had anyway, just to make it concrete?

And what if the person I want to marry is a Christian, even in a lackadaisical British non church-going way, and won't consider a non-religious ceremony? Would this be such a deal-breaker when everything else is so peachy?

Hmmm.

I mean, my father, a devout and practising atheist, was confirmed.

If it means a lot to your partner, but means little to you either way, wouldn't you rather make your partner happy?

If you're looking for an excuse to break up a relationship, religion is always a really good one. I mean, how many wars has it caused? What will one more divorce matter? One can *always* find a deal breaker for a relationship if you're looking not to be in one.

However, if you want to be a grown-up about it, then two people can learn to compromise about the things that matter to them.

Religion or any other difference of belief is rarely the *actual* problem in a relationship. Inability to accept a partner's beliefs (or lack therof) and the inability to compromise around is what splits people up.

View it as a test. If you can figure out a way around it where both of you are happy, then you have a relationship headed for marriage. If you can't get your head around the split, then don't bother getting married.

Man, and I thought *I* was a clever elsa.

My experience is that if your partner starts talking all "I want to do THIS!!!" and won't budge, then it bodes ill, no matter what the discussion is.

"no matter what the discussion is" - really? I mean, this is religion, it's very important to a lot of peple who aren't me, it's a guiding life-changing deal-breaking principle to many. I, like most nice people, respect the beliefs of believers, whatever those beliefs may be, but I don't think believers respect the non-beliefs of non-believers nearly as easily.

No two people, no matter how well suited, will agree on everything. In fact, the test of whether your relationship is good or not is NOT whether you agree on everything, but on how well you handle the disagreements.

If you feel that there is an unequal amout of respecting going on (and it's funny how often *both* sides of an argument feel that) then surely that's a sign that a disagreement is not being handled well.

I think it was another one of those "this is what most people are doing so we will too" things my parents did - the same reason I was circumcised, I suppose. My father was baptised in an Anglican church in Manitoba, my mum Presbyterian in Edinburgh, although I get the impression that after their teenage years, they very little to do with the whole 'religion' thing. Mind you, both have read the bible, and my mum has recently joined a church group in their small Ontario town, but this is mainly just for social reasons.

In the Anglican church, confirmation is the point at which you start taking communion; and the confirmation occurs during your first eucharist service. If you're an Anglican and haven't been confirmed, then you shouldn't take communion, but you may go to the altar with the rest of the congregation and receive a blessing from the priest (the same as the children in the congregation).

At least, that's how I remember it being when I went to church. I think it doesn't apply to people who are baptised as adults, who are then "full members" of the church without requiring confirmation; but I could be wrong.

Later, at 15 years of age, I was baptised in a Pentecostal church at my own request.

i loved first communion-- pretty dress, family photos, gold cross, lovely white bible. i refused to drink the wine, though, and was selected to lead the girls down the aisle.

i had to go to church/CCD from then until i was in high school. then, since i decided to go to a catholic school, i was allowed to stop going to mass with my dad, and go at school instead (good deal, since it was only once a month or so).

i made a big effort to 'find my faith' freshman year, as a way of fitting in. it didn't stick, in a major way.

i refused to get confirmed, which my dad didn't like, we had massive rows about it, and it was decided that i'd get confirmed or i couldn't take drivers ed. so i was confirmed. is that an act of free will? i'm not sure. i can't rememember my confirmation name-- i seem to remember picking something terrible as a stupid act of 13-year-old rebellion.

got permission off father ken at school to 'take some time off from church' when i said i was having issues with the catholic church, especially from a feminist perspective. he said i could come back once i'd thought about it all more, and i haven't been back since. (well, i've been to mass since, but that's a different story)

my grandma still tells me i have an 'indelible mark on my soul', though. i don't think it's worth much, to be honest.

no wait, that almost sounds like fun.

No idea about the wedding thing, but having your kids baptised is like a kind of safety net, isn't it? Your kids can renounce the church at their leisure, but you're giving them the chance to embrace it right from the start. Mind you, if you do it then don't let them anywhere near a church afterwards, bit silly, innit?

i'm probably explaining myself poorly as usual, but hopefully you get my meaning.

and like this http://www.altrofoto.de/pictures/layout/l_00240-04.JPG

Oh but this was the best part of confirmation, and probably the thing that made it palatable for me: I chose JEREMIAH!!