Choosing Godparents

sking72 · February 2014

Curious what everyone does for this. Do you automatically do your siblings? Are you choosing godparents based on who would take your child if something were to happen to you and your SO?

I am already aware that my godparent choice is going to cause drama with my family. SOs brother and SIL are most likely going to be our choice, since SO is his nephews godfather. I know my sister is going to be offended she isn't godmother, especially since she was immediately jealous when I said my SIL was throwing me a shower. But at the same time, I know if I made one of my sisters the godmother, the other would be jealous. I know drama is going to come no matter what, oh well, ill deal with it.

WifeofaComposer · February 2014

My brother is an idiot, so we would never consider him for a Godparent. We chose one of my DH's brothers - his only sibling who isn't useless or disrespectful, and we chose 2 of our close friends who share the same values we do. Our baby has 3 Godfathers, but we can't decide on a Godmother.

ricekez · February 2014

We chose close college friends for DS and are going to ask some neighborhood friends for this baby. We do not consider the godparents to be people who would take our children if they were orphaned. My ILs are the kids' guardians should something happen to DH and I.

My sister is an athiest or agnostic (she can't decide), so we're not picking her. She wouldn't want to be a godmother, anyway, given her beliefs. DH's middle brothers is a non-practicing Catholic but would be jealous if we picked DH's youngest brother (who is a practicing Catholic). So we won't pick DH's youngest brother just to keep the peace and won't pick the middle brother because he doesn't even practice the faith we are baptizing our child into. Plus, neither of DH's brothers are married, so we'd have to find a godmother or only have a godfather.

My opinion is that it's totally up to you to pick godparents who meet the requirements of your church, and that it's more important that the godparents share similar beliefs and values as you and SO than that they are family.

tkseg09 · February 2014

DH and I are running into this same problem. For DS we chose my brother (my only sibling) and DH's sister (his only sister). My brother was definitely a good choice, but his sister not so much. We were trying to do right by his family, but she was really a horrible religious choice. It really just hit us how bad of a choice she was since we're trying to decide on DD's godparents. We're Catholic and DH's sister doesn't really believe in anything and is actually a self-proclaimed "witch". I really wish we wouldn't have chosen her. We would never want her to have anything to do with DS if something were to happen to us. DH's brothers really aren't much better, so we're totally lost with what to do for DD. The only ideas we've had so far are to pick 2 of my cousins (who would be great choices) or some friends of ours. Either way we wouldn't use DH's brothers, which we're afraid is going to cause some serious drama.

Choose who you think will ultimately be the best decision for you and your child, not necessarily who will cause less drama. You can't please everyone and I'm speaking from experience with completely regretting the choice that was "right" at the time.

momofmanyinthemitten · February 2014

Our godparents have to be practicing Catholics, so that rules out all if my family. We chose DH's brother and sister for DD and DH's other brother and wife for DS. This baby's godparents are close friends of DH who go to our church. With baby #4, we might have to recycle.

KarenEliza · February 2014

I prefer to look outside the family for godparents. Our kids will already have our siblings as Aunts and Uncles. By having non family godparents it extends the number of adults our children have supporting them and people they can ask for advice etc.

MadBloom · February 2014

We are struggling with who to pick a well. Who we pick would NOT be the guardian of our child if something were to happen to us. We want to choose someone who would continue to teach the child good values and follow in our faith. Doesn't need to be someone who goes to church every week or anything. Just someone who shares our faith and who would take on the responsibility of teaching our child.

The problem is.... We have very few people who qualify! We have great friends who are very catholic but we're not catholic. I have a very close friend who would be perfect but she lives 7 hours away and has no desire to move so she wouldn't be very present to be able to build a relationship with the child. I have an aunt and uncle who would be perfect.... If they weren't in their mid 50's....
So yea no idea.

laurel22 · February 2014

Our Godparents for DS1 are my DHs best friend and my SIL. They are not the people who would take care of our children if something were to happen to us (SIL is disabled and could not care for children, but she was delighted to be a Godparent). DS2s Godparents will be my best friend and her DH, who ARE the people who would take care do our children if need be. I wanted my brother to be a Godparent, but neither of us are baptized, which means he can't really be a Godparent (this is pretty much all for the sake of my in-laws, since I wasn't really raised in a religious household).

eireyes · February 2014

DH and I struggled with this decision as well. None of DH's siblings are religious, and my older sister and her husband are, but my younger sister and her husband are not. My older sister and I have both made it clear to my younger sister that we can't in good faith ask her to be a godparent because she is not active or participating in the church. We both feel bad about it, but we don't have any real choice according to church guidelines.

I don't think godparents are necessarily who would take car of LO, but more who will support them in their life and growth. We will probably have different godparents for each LO, but we'd want them kept together if something ever happened.

csmily51 · February 2014

We aren't doing Godparents, I'm Catholic & DH is Baptist. We have decided that DD will go to my sister, in the unfortunate event something were to happen to both of us. She is only 18 right now, and lives with my parents, and that is a situation we are completely comfortable with. DH loves my parents, and is comfortable with them being her main care takers until my sister is ready and able. We have not discussed this with them yet, it will be discussed when they come for our baby shower in a few weeks. DH's parent's are 15 years older than mine, so this is not an option. If not my sister, it will NOT be DH's only brother & SIL, they have 3 with another on the way, and can't handle what they have at all, and not to be mean, they are weird and nothing like us, and would treat her differently than their own kids. Instead it would be my cousin, she and I are super close, and we love her husband, and we would be comfortable with them as well, they would love her as their own.

Side note: DD has a generous trust fund, set up by my grandparents, and fear certain people in the family would use it for themselves, and not DD.

tracint · February 2014

KarenEliza said:
I prefer to look outside the family for godparents. Our kids already have our siblings as Aunts and Uncles. By having non family godparents it extends the number of adults our children have supporting them and people they can ask for advice etc.

This exactly... we decided no aunts & uncles as God parents.
We'll probably be choosing some ready good friends of ours. They chose dh & I to be their ds#2's god parents, but that's not why we'll choose them. They have similar religious beliefs as us and they're stable lol mentally, financially, emotionally, in their marriage, etc. which is more than most other couples we know. So we think they would have the best influence on our daughter.

Alana526 · February 2014

This was really hard for us as well and we wanted to avoid family drama at all costs. I have a sister and my hubby has a brother - which seem like the natural choices, but my sister is really young and my hubby's brother is a bit of a mess, so we were at a loss. We are the godparents to my hubby's cousin's daughter and we wanted to pick them, but we both knew our siblings wouldn't be mature enough to realize that we were old fashioned and prefer established godparents who will be in-charge of our child in the event that something happened to us.

Ultimately we went with our siblings because we wanted to avoid the drama and our cousins' are mature enough to understand why we had to and that they will be our next child's godparents. My DH and I are still contemplating putting down different guardians on our will that we can change as one of our siblings get older and would be more readily able to take care of a child, but that is also causing us a headache haha. Good luck - I wish I had better advice, but this is a tough situation sometimes. It isn't always as cut and dry as it seems.

KatieGummow · February 2014

It was easy for us, thankfully. My brother and his fiance and my sister and her husband are a lot like my husband and I. They are financially stable and have good heads on their shoulders. We will be choosing those couples to be our children's Godparents. Husband's brother is too strict (religiously) and his sister still in college.

So tough though in your situation and hard not to hurt feelings. Good luck

luvU2theMoon · February 2014

My sister will be god mom. She is married but we are using My SO's Brother for god dad. If something were to happen to us Baby would go with my sister as she is older and would be able to provide. We are using his brother because he is a great person and will be an amazing roll model for baby. My SO wanted to have his brother and i wanted my sister so we compromised by going this route.

leighbball · February 2014

For ds it was an easy choice- my sis and bil. For dd it was a little trickier but I wanted it to be someone on dh's side and we agreed on his cousin and her husband. They were so surprised and excited!

good luck with your choice!

nycgirlkat · February 2014

My DH and I had a nasty fight months ago over this topic that never got solved.

My SIL (DH's sister) and her husband have expressed an interest in being Godparents (a bit presumptuous if you ask me). I also have a sister & BIL. I'd like to ask my sister to be Godmother (my BIL is agnostic so we wouldn't ask him), but since my sister and family are moving to Texas in 6 months, DH feels my sister shouldn't be because she won't be in close proximity to the baby. But then again DH doesn't necessarily feel strongly about his sister & her husband being the godparents either (they live closer, but are 2 hours away). So we have no one yet....I have lots of friends, but DH isn't very close with them and DH only has a handful of friends he really doesn't keep in touch with anymore.

I suggested co-godmothers (both sisters) with my SIL's husband as godfather. My DH said absolutely not. My husband is more hung up on the godparents being guardians should something happen. I'm more about godparents being good role models for the child.

So who knows....we will be baptizing the baby Lutheran even though I'm Roman Catholic and my husband is Lutheran.

Stace0616 · February 2014

I'm so confused over what part I even want religion to play in LO's life. I like the idea of a community and traditions, but DH is an atheist (raised fallen Lutheran) and I'm agnostic (raised Catholic but rarely attended church). My parents have been bothering me about getting the baby baptised, but I don't know if I can baptize my child as a Catholic. Episcopalian seems like a good middle ground, but the only godparents I can think of are my sister and BIL who are both VERY Catholic. We will probably also ask them to be our kid's legal guardians if anything happened to us.

It's a weird situation when you've got atheist brothers and sisters on one side, then devout Catholics on the other. Ahhhh decisions!

sking72 · February 2014

I'm confirmed Roman Catholic, attend an episcopalian church and SO is Lutheran ... This is going to get complicated.

Mustardseed2007 · February 2014

We're not catholic but god parents are optional in our denomination. We chose my sister to be DS's godmother, which was an obvious choice b/c she is studying to be a minister in our faith. We didn't do a Godfather. DH's entire family is non religious and my immediate family are all our faith but not really practicing so we would have had to ask friends. Since godparents are optional anyway we decided to just stick with my sister.

This time we'll either do my sister again or no one.

nicole mackenzie · February 2014

We picked DH's best friend and his ( probably soon to be fiancé). They would take dd if something were to happen to us.

Our siblings aren't in a good place to be considered right now. For health reasons or age.

We close our friends because they are good people. They are kind, even tempered, have steady jobs, a home, and would take really good care of our daughter. And want children.

MSchepper · February 2014

We picked my DH's sister to be god mother and my DH's friend who married us and is in active recovery with my husband they are each other's back bones in recovery and I couldn't be happier

baileymama3 · February 2014

KarenEliza said:

I prefer to look outside the family for godparents. Our kids will already have our siblings as Aunts and Uncles. By having non family godparents it extends the number of adults our children have supporting them and people they can ask for advice etc.

THIS and it doesn't offend the 4 sisters I have between my DH and I. Also, we are selecting Godparents based on support and advice, etc-- the guardianship of our child would go to a MIL until one of our siblings was older/married/financially stable.

Edit: Clarity

britndavid · February 2014

We chose our Pastor & his wife along with two of our closest friends as godparents, so she'll have 4godparents total. We chose people we knew would make great examples to our child in more ways than one. I believe typically the godparents are chosen to be gaurdians if needed but that wouldn't be the case for us, Our parents would be chosen if a situation ever occurred.

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