A debaptism letter to parents
From the Ugley Vicar blog:
Apparently there is growing interest in the practice of ‘debaptism’, reported here on the BBC website. The National Secular Society says that there have been over 100,000 downloads of its debaptism certificate. Then there is a deluxe version you can order online, which at £3 a pop shows there’s money to be made out of the gullible irreligious as well as the gullible religious.
And in all this, the churches are coming in for a fair amount of flak — especially the Church of England which is refusing to comply with people’s demands for an entry to be made in baptism registers noting the ‘debaptism’. (Though with the fee for a register search standing at £19 for the first hour, 100,000 inquiries could come in handy.)
The truth is, however, that the decision to have a baby baptized, at least in the Church of England, would have been made by the parents, not the Church. Indeed, clergy are not allowed to refuse baptism. Even a delay can only be justified on certain grounds.
Moreover, it is fair to say that in the vast majority of cases (as the NSS is keen to observe) this request will have made by people with little church affiliation themselves and who have rarely encouraged it in their children.
The blame should therefore clearly lie squarely on the parents, not the church. And so with that in mind, I offer here, free of charge, a ‘Debaptism Letter to My Parents’ for the dissatisfied victims of infant baptism to download and send to them at the same time as they obtain their debaptism certificates. Read more
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