#Parenting #Baby #Baptism #Religion #FamilyDisagreements
Hey there! đź‘‹ So, you’re in a bit of a pickle with your husband about whether or not to baptize your unborn baby. It’s a tough decision, especially when you and your husband come from different backgrounds and beliefs. But don’t worry, I’m here to help you navigate through this situation respectfully and tactfully.
Let’s break it down step by step:
##Understanding Each Other’s Perspectives
First things first, it’s important to sit down with your husband and have an open and honest conversation about why you both feel the way you do about baptizing your baby. Listen to each other’s perspectives without judgment and try to understand where the other person is coming from.
##Respecting Boundaries
It’s crucial to maintain your boundaries while also respecting your husband’s wishes. It’s okay to have differing opinions, but finding a common ground or compromise is key. Remember, it’s about finding a solution that works for both of you and your baby.
##Advice from the Bhagavad Gita
In the Bhagavad Gita, there is a concept of Dharma, which means duty or righteousness. It teaches us to act in accordance with our inner values and beliefs while respecting the values of others. Keep this in mind as you navigate this delicate situation with your husband.
##Seeking Guidance
If you’re still feeling stuck, consider seeking guidance from a trusted third party, such as a counselor or clergy member. Having an outside perspective can help you see things from a different angle and find a solution that works for both of you.
##Final Thoughts
Remember, this is your first child, and it’s natural to feel overwhelmed and unsure about how to handle these types of situations. Just take a deep breath, communicate openly with your husband, and trust that you will find a solution that is in the best interest of your baby and your family.
I hope this advice helps you approach this situation respectfully and find a resolution that works for both you and your husband. Best of luck on this journey of parenthood! 🌟
Did he ever bring up the idea of raising a child in the Catholic Church before getting pregnant? I would explain your experience with the church and explain how no other part of life had been religious. I would also say you two can work together to find other ways to honor family that doesn’t include religious ceremonies
My partner is a non practicing Catholic, I’m atheist. It came up with our kids and I’m sue her dad was also pressuring her. I said she can do it if she wants but I will not be involved at all. They are now 9 and 6 and have probably only been in a church 4 times.
So… obviously baptism is a religious practice, and you aren’t comfortable subjecting your child to religious influences or pressures. Fair enough. But I think it is key to also recognize what your partner is saying about the cultural importance of baptism. It’s a chance for the family to celebrate the newborns birth, and make a commitment to the child (godparents specifically get focus here, but I think there is generally a promise from all in attendance). It’s also where the canonical baby photos come from.
I think it would go a long way with your husbands family to suggest a sort of “secular” baptism- maybe a barbecue or picnic where the family can gather to celebrate your newborn- where your baby can wear the white gown, and take pictures, and where you can make a little toast acknowledging how lucky your child is to have family that will always be there and be supportive.
Best of luck.
Baptising an infant in the Catholic Church means you are promising to bring the child up in the Catholic faith. In return, HE will forgive the child for his millenia dead ancestors eating some fruit. If he is not planning on doing that, then he is straight up lying to God. (I personally don’t think God would be hugely upset over this, probably just roll his eyes and move on, but some people might have an issue)
So the issue here is whether he is planning to lying to God (and his family) or if he’s lying to you. I personally wouldn’t have a problem going through with the Baptism, if it made my spouse feel better. But I would have a serious problem, if it also meant he was planning on rasing the child in a Faith he knew I disagreed with.
For many non-practising christians, baptism is just a family gathering and party to celebrate new life. It’s not about signing them up to a lifetime of sunday sermons.
As Steve said on Sex and The City. If you don’t believe, it’s just a little water on the head.
Catholic here: baptism incurs obligations. Part of the baptismal ritual is parents and godparents vowing to raise the child in the faith. Unless your husband actually wants and intends to raise your children as practicing Catholics, he’d be making those vows in bad faith, which IMO makes this not just a religious/cultural question but also a moral one. You’re right, under the circumstances as you describe them, it *would* be performative and dishonest to do this. What your husband is proposing to do is, from the perspective of the Church, lying to God. You might consider raising all this with him, under the circumstances refraining from baptizing your child would be the more honest and respectful thing to do.
I am Atheist, I married a Catholic, I allowed our children to be baptized for two reasons.
1. It is not permanent, it doesn’t require male gential mutilation, or some sort of permanent alteration to the child. Because it’s literally just saying a bunch of words and water I had no problem with it.
2. It had meaning to my wife and was important for her. And since like I said it didn’t require any alteration of the child themselves, be it, our son or our daughter. I was fine with doing it.
Ironically enough I did have a little bit of skin in it, as my family is Catholic, but we had some issues with relatives having a problem with my sister not getting married in a church. So I made sure that people who we would be designated as the godparents to my kids would not judge my children for any life choices or how they turned out.
As an atheist I genuinely see no problem with baptizing a kid, it’s not an alteration as I’ve said before. It doesn’t require them to be or do anything. It’s literally just something done for that specific Church. You can change your position on it, you can convert, you can leave it, that’s all fine.
Hey so atheist here raised catholic baptism communion confirmation the works. I did the baptism for my 2 kids more out of its expected than anything but my kids have never had any other sacraments. For me it was just easier than hearing it forever from the old people. For me it wasn’t a battle worth fighting it was an hour on a random Saturday
There really isn’t a compromise here, they either get baptized or they don’t. One of you is going to have to deal with it.
I’ve had similar experience. My spouse was born and raised a Catholic although he has never gone to church from the time we’ve started dating (14 years ago) he still claims to be catholic. I on the other hand was raised in a evangelican household but even then my parents weren’t as religious as they are now.Â
The smartest thing my husband and I did was have a 1 on 1 regarding religion. We agreed that if we married it would not be held in a church out of respect for my parents and family. However, my husband was dead set on baptizing out future children. I agreed only if he can find someone to do it without me having to take any classes bc it would be hypocritical of me to pretend I believe in a religion I really don’t. He agreed and we’ve stuck true to our word. He’s currently looking for a church to get our babies baptized rn lolÂ
Friends of ours had a naming day. They hired a celebrant, said some meaningful words to the baby, had names adults (like a godparent) and had a lovely day with family and friends. It was great and non religious. Everyone was happy.
Personally, as an atheist (raised Southern Baptist) that was married to a “Catholic” (same as you describe your husband) when the topic came up I said: “I don’t care, but I’m not arranging it. If you want to do this to make your mother happy I support that, but my contribution to this event has already been made. I will attend, in appropriate clothing.” Turns out he didn’t actually care enough to plan and coordinate the event, so it never happened. Put it in his hands. If he wants to make it happen and is willing to put in the work, then it’s clearly important to him. I’m in favor of supporting the things that are important to our partners.Â
It’s his child as well , just because he is critical of Christianity doesn’t mean he doesn’t still believe because he was raised catholic and him being Hispanic it is more cultural than religious, it’s his child as well so u need to find a middle ground
So the biggest thing my therapist helped me learn is it sometimes there isn’t a compromise to be found.
Discussing what you do in that situation is really important. Including figuring out who it matters “more” too.
For example, if this initial baptism feels critically important to your husband, perhaps you allow/accept it on the condition that there will be no first communion or religious classes.
I’m not really religious. I didn’t think my son’s father was either, but he insisted we baptize my son ASAP when he was born. Apparently he had an older brother that was born without a lung and other birth defects, who died within hours of birth. His parents and grandparents were really torn up over the fact that older brother didn’t get baptized.
So as a compromise, my brother baptized him in the hospital, the same day he was born. He’d gotten ordained online to perform my other brother’s wedding. Son was baptized, no real religious connotations, every one is happy.
Maybe you could do something like that.
We’ve had this same situation several times in my family. We were raised Catholic, parents still religious, but none of my siblings or I are still religious in any way. My little brother and his wife decided not to baptise. My older sister and her husband had a different situation because his family is also religious and there was a lot of pressure. They decided to do it (mostly for the families) and viewed doing it as a “family tradition” more than a “religious” thing. Like, doing it for cultural reasons rather than belief. My sister’s attitude was that it really wouldn’t matter in the life of her child or her, and the grandparents would feel better, so no harm no foul. My brother on the other hand decided that he didn’t want to “pretend” just for family members to feel better, and they opted out.
There is no wrong answer. Your husband’s position – “**He wants to honor his parents’/deceased grandmother’s wishes and says that baptism is cultural, not just religious.**” This makes sense to me. Most of my cousins did it for this reason. It’s been done in our families for generations. It makes everyone happy, it doesn’t hurt anyone, it doesn’t mean you have to raise the baby religious or anything. If you’re not religious, it actually doesn’t mean anything at all. In families like mine, this is just the easiest thing to do because you don’t have to deal with the older relatives constant comments and pressure. But it’s a bit weird to some people, which I totally understand. If you really strongly feel that you don’t want to, you need to let your husband know it makes you uncomfortable.
I come from a heavy catholic side, my husband a very Christian side. We received heavy pressure from both of our families to baptize our two kids. My husband and I are both atheists and firmly put our foot down that we will NOT be baptizing OUR kids.
We did not care if it was for appearances, to please the family even though we don’t believe in religion. If our family wanted to celebrate our baby we can do that without any religious implications.
Forgo the baptism and have a baby naming ceremony instead.
The family probably just wants to have a party/celebration anyway.
I didn’t start questioning my Catholic upbringing until my wife and I came to a minor disagreement over baptizing our first born. I wanted to do it only because I had it done myself and it was just cultural tradition thing in my mind. My wife went along with it but not particularly thrilled over it. Soon after, I kinda just started questioning things about my beliefs and general experience with church on Sundays, what it all meant, etc. The only way I can describe what came next was that it was like a mental house of cards slowly collapsed in my mind. Every question I would come up with would add another and another. It all just stopped making sense and I came to the realization that I didn’t need to follow these man made rules and ideas that were really only just that. And that, my friends, is why I have one son baptized and the other not.
Infant Baptism is a 2-yes, 1-no situation. It’s not just sprinkling water over the baby and pronouncing a Name, it is making a VOW to raise the child a certain way. How important is the integrity of your Given Word? Is he really up for making empty promises? Are you?
The only acceptable “compromise” is that the child can request baptism when old enough to give at least a marginally informed consent to make their own promises about the life they will lead.
My whole thought with this is : If you’re not religious it is LITERALLY just water. It does nothing and means nothing.
I get not wanting to do more than that and you would need to communicate those boundaries thoroughly so that no one takes a farther jump with this down the line.
Also a baptism is a very cultural moment for many families even if they aren’t religious but their families are.
I have a weird perspective on this. I’m an atheist. My parents are both atheists. My father was raised as a Catholic but had very negative experiences with the Church and wanted nothing to do with it. Consequently, they did not baptize me. However I’ve often been told that my grandfather was terrified that I would die and go to Limbo and never be saved. He died with that fear on his heart. I’m 50 now and honestly couldn’t care less that I’m not baptized but when I think of my poor grandad it seems like a few drops of water and some nonsense prayers would have been worth giving the man peace of mind.
I would think that if your husband is not religious that this is truly just a family honoring thing and ’tradition’
On the other hand I feel your point is valid- what will they want next?
I was raised Catholic, I left as soon as I could. Which for me was my mother saying I had to go to church till I made my confirmation, then I never had to go again. And I didn’t. My belief on baptizing babies is it’s not for them at all. It does nothing for them or to them and what’s the point? A baby won’t remember so it’s for the family.
I wonder if you could make a deal with your husband that you would do that for him and his family but he must agree that there would be no 1st communion or confirmation or ever going to church.
What my mom did, when my dad tried to insist that the children be baptized catholic because his family was catholic, is tell him that we could be baptized in a catholic church if he started attending a catholic church regularly.
Guess how many of us were baptized catholic.