They stand and recite the ancient creed about the
creation of the world and the resurrection of the dead. They make promises on
behalf of the child to ‘renounce Satan and all that is evil’. They participate
in prayers for the child. And yet, it seems in many cases as if this is a merely
social ritual, a convention that initiates the baby concerned into a family
rather than includes him or her as a member in the Church of God.
Why do they continue to come and seek Christian
baptism? One young parent said to me ‘I look at the Jews in our neighbourhood,
and they seem to have roots. I asked myself ‘what are my roots’? And the answer
is, ‘we are Church of England’.’ The baptism of infants has become for them a
cultural and social ritual rather than a mostly spiritual one.
The irony is that at least in my part of the Anglican
Church, the more fervent the faith of the parents, the less likely they are to
seek baptism of their infants. There is a sense in which the misuse of the rite
of infant baptism has made it seem counterfeit to believing Christians. Added
to this is another sociological phenomena, which is the deep-seated belief in
the need for authentic and genuine individual experience. To baptise a child
strikes against our strong conviction that faith is an individaul and personal
thing, and can’t be promised for someone else, or held for someone else. That
is far too institutional and corporate to be genuine.
Of course, the teaching of the Protestant Reformation and
its descendent, the Evangelical movement of the 18th century has
added to this sense that faith must be an internalised affair –a genuine and
heartfelt condition to which the individaul must testify for him or herself.
Protestant denominations have, notoriously, been divided over believer’s
baptism and infant baptism. Even denominations that share reformed convictions
in almost every aspect divide over this particular rite.
And today, even though the Anglican Church is
thoroughly paedobaptist, and has never altered that position, Anglican
churchgoers may have less allegiance to the institutional forms of their
denomination – and less knowledge of them – than in the past. They observe
nominal Christianity’s love of the ceremony involving babies, and it is
disturbing to them. They cannot explain biblically or theologically why
baptising babies make sense. And so, many are reluctant to bring their infants
to the font.
The purpose of this book is to expound the Book of Common Prayer’s teaching on
baptism and confirmation. This component of the theology of Reformation
Anglicanism has had a controversial history indeed, and the langauge of the
original service has caused deep division, as we shall see.
Nevertheless, the original services contained within
the 1662 book are a profoundly evangelical rite, combining the themes of
justification by grace only and the call to a sanctified life with
extraordinary power and insight. They diagnose our human condition as fallen
creatures, and prescribe for us the only remedy that is effective – the blood
of the Lord Jesus Christ.
