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June 2011 Moms
emilys629
member
Not baptizing, dealing with mom
emilys629
member
Wondering if any of you have any experience or advice for me.
We are currently undecided about baptizing our son, leaning more towards no. I was raised Lutheran, and I believe in God, but I don't attend church and haven't since I was a teen. My husband never attended church and has no interest. (To be fair, I have no interest either.)
I feel it's disrespectful to show up to church for a few weeks, get him baptized and then never show up again. I respect that this is an important event to believers, but it just doesn't have the same meaning for me.
Well, my mom is very religious and is making a huge stink about this, telling me all the time how stressed she is that he's not baptized and how she prays every day for his "soul." Like I said, I'm respectful that this means a lot to her and I don't mean to knock on religious folks, but it's getting tiring and frustrating. She will. not. let. it. go.
I'm not even sure I can work up the will to do it just to make her happy (nevermind that I work on Sundays.) I feel like I'm at an impasse with her.
Have any of you been in a similar situation?
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Re: Not baptizing, dealing with mom
I have a similar situation with my mom. My family is Jewish and MH's is Catholic. Neither of us are religious at all and certainly were not raised that way. But for some reason my mom suddenly thinks she's super religious and is obsessed with us being religious and raising A Jewish. It started at our wedding - she insisted we have a rabbi even though I really did not want that. She was very disappointed, crying and making a whole scene so we did it. She also insisted that we get married on a Sunday because Saturday is the sabbath (which by the way we had never once observed while growing up).
When A was born she kept asking if we were going to raise her Jewish. I told her that we would celebrate both religions (to the extent we do anything) with the families but were not taking her to a temple or church and were not doing either of the religious ceremonies. She kept insisting that I have a baby naming ceremony for her. She even told me she'd take her to have it done if I didn't want to do it. I told her she better not! She also got upset because my MIL took her to take a picture with the Easter bunny, which doesn't seem very religious to me. Meanwhile I have taken the baby to temple with my mom several times (and all she does is stand outside and talk - she sits in the service for literally about 5 minutes). After one of her freak outs I finally told her it was my baby and my decision and I didn't want to discuss it anymore. She told me she was highly offended by that (???).
Anyway it's an ongoing battle. I try to stick to what MH and I want for our child and not let her influence me.
I think once my MIL has her health back and is back in town, we will be in a similar situation. DH and I have had the are we or aren't we baptizing discussion a few times. I was raised Lutheran, DH and I joined a Lutheran church when we got married because we found it while looking for a church and really liked it. However, there's been a lot of changes there and really, we haven't been there but a handful of times in the past few years that I really don't think it's fair that we hardly ever go (not even on holidays) and then have her baptized there. However, his mom has asked us repeatedly when we are (not since her whole illness though) and wants to have LO blessed at her church as well. I'm not about that and I think this is something that we are going to be guilted into doing.
Sorry, no advice...but I can relate.
Your situation sounds oh so very much like my own, raised Lutheran and havnt attended regular services since I was 17. DH was baptized Catholic but never went to church ever.
I have told my mom that I feel its hypocritical to baptize a baby into a religion I have no intention of really teaching her. If I planned to take her to church and was going to raise her in a church even if it was only once in a while I would do it. But seeing as I have no plans to do so at this point in my life I think it is wrong to pretty much lie to a church full of people and God himself about how I plan to raise my child. I have a lot of respect and understand for what baptizing a child means not only for the child but for the parents. Its a commitment to a life style and if your not going to follow the life style there's no reason to have the ceremony (at least in my opinion) It comes down to the fact that I am not going to lie in church no if, and, or buts about it. Maybe you can tell her that if you haven't already.
Good luck
Thanks for all the responses, ladies. I have told her that, and it doesn't make a difference. She will just change the subject and say something like "It breaks my heart to see you turn your back on everything I've taught you." DRAMATIC MUCH?
Well, good to know I'm not alone?
I must admit, we attended church every second sunday leading up to Cs baptizum, but now it's just too hard, he won't sit still, and all i do is stand outside watching him run around. When he is able to sit still again or plays happily with the other kids we will start going again. It's funny because my husband is catholic which is why we had C baptized catholic, yet DH never goes to church. I was baptized Anglican and hadn't been to church in years and didn't care if C was baptized or not yet i'm the one who takes him???
We also wanted to send C to a catholic school so he could learn the values and morals of the bible which helped pursued me to baptize in the first place.
I guess I don't think it's disrespectful to baptize and not go regularly. For me I would think it's disrespectful to go and have your child run riot all over the church or sit crying out of frustration while others pray. I know we will go again when C is older and can understand - so that's what is important to us.
I hope you didn't take offense to what I said. I can totally understand not taking a baby who just cries and would ruin the experience of other to church. But you do have plans for his religious future that is a great thing and a reason to baptize in my opinion. You have a plan and will raise your child in the church the way you see fit.
My plan is if she want to go to church on her own more power to her but I (at this point in my life) am not going to go find a church and attend myself or make her attend so I see not point in promising a church full of people and God that I will do something I have no plans on doing.
Not at all. I'm not overly religious - it takes a lot for me to get offended over someones opinion on religion.... however i do think there are some really great messages from religion which i hope to be able to teach C - like respect and love for one another, basically I just want him to have faith (i don't care if it's in Jesus Christ, Buddah, or whatever)
I totally understand where you are coming from. I think yuo should stick to what you believe.
My sister and her DH are not baptizing my niece, which is disappointing to me (my only chance to be a Godmother), but of course I kept my comments to myself. Their (and when I say their, I mean her husband's) perspective is that they feel she should choose her own religion, and if you are baptized you can't convert to certain religions. I'm sure this won't make your mom happy, but you do not want to hinder your child future decisions, maybe she can see that? Of course I think it's complete poppycock (considering my sister is very into our religion, Episcopalian), but again, not my child, not my choice!
I do agree that you should baptize unless you find a church/community that you are happy with and committed to. We don't go to church every week (MAYBE once a month?!) but that is OK at our church, we are not looked down upon.
We also have babysitting and Sunday school during services, so you don't have to bring your child to sit for an hour until they are ready. You are also allowed to excuse yourself to go get your baby/child when it's time for communion do they can receive. If we did not have this wonderful community, I'm sure I'd be in the same boat as you. GL with your decision!
No real advice here, just though I'd share an example that I know of.
One of my cousins (Catholic) married a Baptist. I know that should mean that because they're both Christians, that it shouldn't be a big deal, but Catholics and Baptists are on complete opposite ends of the spectrum and generally have totally different views. Anyway, my cousin agreed to raise their children Baptist, so they have not yet been baptized. At first, my family was upset, but now (several years later), no one even mentions it and even has come to respect their decision on how to raise their family.
I hope that you can come to find peace with your decision and that your family will learn to respect whatever you guys decide!
We're in a less severe situation with my grandfather. Luckily, my parents understand and never expected me to baptize my children and H's parents don't care one way or the other.
But my grandfather has asked me on more than one occasion. I explained we don't have a church, and he offered his. I know his intentions are good, but I feel like it's the elephant in the room of our relationship now.
To make matters worse, 2 of my cousins just had babies in the past month- and both will be baptized by June. I may not attend either service, for work obligations, coincidentally but also I feel it would be odd.
I'm with you on this-
I love the priest at his parish, he is a wonderful man every time he's helped with my family's life events (weddings, funerals, baptisms). But the only reason I would baptize my boy is to make my grandfather happy- and that's not fair to my beliefs, to him, his priest, or the parish IMO.
I grew up in the a church all my childhood, but still my mother never baptized me, I was not baptized til I was only enough to decide what I wanted to do at like 10. So, stick to your guns, do what you want to do. I do think it would be bad to just go for a few weeks just to have your DS baptized, that's just my opinion. Good Luck!