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Update 45 pages 6-7.
In Update 45:
Still an issue,
Godparents,
S.E. London,
Perry,
1662 Confirmation,
Funerals,
Liturgy,
Hooker,
Andrews.
Full Christian Initiation by local elders
David Perry, Ecumenical Officer for Hull and Vicar of Skirlaugh with Long Riston responds to David Wright's "A more complex question" in Update 43.
David Wright’s article presented much important material. I have always thought that Aland, having comprehensively demonstrated that infant baptism was for centuries a marginal response to infant mortality while the norm was baptism after a catechising of the candidate, then tamely failed to claim the victory. However, it is a vertiginous experience to begin to think that the church has got things wrong for perhaps 1,600 years! The outcome is a state of giddy ecclesiastical paralysis.
Personal transformation. The blunt fact is that baptism set out as a transformative ritual relating to evangelism and discipleship. From Constantine to Augustine it turned into a system of social control. The switch is from baptism for “fants” (those who could listen, speak for themselves, and offer their lives to Christ through baptism) to “infants” (those incapable of speaking for themselves). The driving force for infant baptism was the political need for social cohesion. It was also the only route which would allow Augustine a chance against the Donatists in North Africa, where in his early days the Catholics had become a minority. He, being a theologically minded bishop rather than an imperial politician, had to develop a doctrine of original sin and limbo and a repressive exposition of the gospel in order to survive. His motto was “Compel them to come in”. What easier target than a new born babe born into a world governed by the Theodosian Code in which the possibility of a person changing religion had become a capital offence?
Who was the innovator? The reason Pelagius was such a hate figure for Augustine was that he came from Britain, where a realistic pre-baptismal catechumenate still prevailed and loomed like a question mark over this new stress on instant infant baptism. When Pelagius came to Rome he was shocked to see how conventional the faith had become. He still held the naďve belief that Christian initiation was meant to be a personal and life-changing event which required the willing participation of the candidate. The elimination of personal commitment forced theology to drift away from evangelistic and pastoral realities and instead go down a speculative path of philosophising about free will and predestination. In the end Augustine only “won” thanks to the intervention of the Roman emperor, and Eastern Christianity has never followed the Augustinian line on original sin.
Local Bishops. One factor in our paralysis is the practice of episcopacy. In the early church there was local episcopacy as the man in the street might see it. How large was Mopsuestia? Probably no larger than my village of Skirlaugh with its 2,000 inhabitants. Yet it had a bishop who was part of his local community. The local Church had the capacity to grow; evangelism and initiation were integrated.
Thanks to Constantine and the development of Christendom we have seen “local” take on very curious dimensions, even resulting in a diocese of Europe! The effects are truly drastic, destroying the coherence of Christian initiation.
Hitherto the bishop had been able to preside at the baptism and confirmation of all candidates at Easter after an orderly process of catechesis had been followed. This involved everyone in the local church - people and presbyters in deciding whether someone was suitable to be baptised, deacons and bishops liturgically, catechists in doing the teaching.
Imagine what it might be like if the leader of every one of the 35,000 churches in Britain was empowered to deliver full Christian initiation to all those who had been prepared to receive it on Easter Day? The evangelistic process would be truly impressive. Easter Day would become a seasonal event on a par with Wimbledon!
Instead, Anglican clergy have always been neutered by the bishops keeping to themselves the Church’s full reproductive capacity, i.e. the power to confirm. A mere 200 bishops to minister to a nation of 45 million people whom they reckon are their concern?
If such a point is put to a bishop, the response is complacency. “I seem to meet all the requests that come to me for confirmation.” In fact, the C of E is hopelessly marginalized, and those coming to faith within it a meagre precentage of converts in Britain. C of E confirmations are also down, as a result of toning down or abandoning confirmation for those entering the C of E from non-episcopal churches. Meanwhile Methodists, Baptists, URC, and all the others, including new churches and new streams get on with welcoming people into the fellowship of Christ with no reference to any bishop.
If we want real ecumenical baptismal integrity for the new millennium, we do well to face up to the facts as best we may. Every denomination has distortions in baptismal practice, even the Baptists who so blithely snap the connection between being a communicant and being baptised.
Baptismal practice is the great unmentionable issue but unless we square up to it, no yearning for the “coming great Church” can ever come to fulfilment.
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