Baptism Class

I was not happy we had to attend baptism class. They waive the requirement if you attended it within two years, but it's been almost three years since we attended it last time. It was actually different from our last class, so it was like a new experience rather than repeating something we already did before.

There was a lengthy video that made two points I have not heard before. It cited the requirement of a sponsor from within the Church as rooted in persecution facing the early Church; new members needed to be vouched for because they wanted to prevent entry of people that might have ulterior motives. This does not quite explain why we need a letter from our godparent's church today, but it interesting to ponder the roots of this tradition.

The video also posed that practice becomes theology over time. I'm sure this has some validity - I did not think much about it yet. It went on to describe how opening up the church from persecution to endorsed by leaders in the early centuries lead to the acceleration of baptism and ended up with the young becoming baptized. The tradition of infants undergoing the sacrament, it claimed, prompted justification for the practice being the doctrine of Original Sin. I have not heard before that link, Original Sin doctrine inspired by the practice of infant baptism.