Church of England changes its mind on debaptism as the trend spreads globally

Despite a letter from Lambeth Palace telling the NSS that it would not sanction any form of official ‘debaptism’, one diocese is bucking the trend.

The Diocese of Croydon is where John Hunt went to demand that his name be removed from the baptismal records. The Archdeacon told him that if he got a suitable form of words from the National Secular Society and put it as an advertisement in the London Gazette, they would make the necessary annotation in the baptismal records. They wouldn’t remove his name entirely, they said, arguing that it was the record of an historical event and therefore could not be changed.

John Hunt duly put the advertisement in the London Gazette, sent a copy to the diocese and waited for confirmation that his record had been amended to show that he was no longer connected with a Church of which he heartily disapproved.

That confirmation didn’t come until the NSS went public with his story. Now Mr Hunt has received a communication from the Diocese of Croydon — where the original sprinkling was done — reading:

“I have spoken to the Archdeacon of Croydon and he has undertaken, in this particular case, to have it cross referenced with the baptismal entry and pasted into the back fly-leaf of the relevant register at St. Jude’s Church.”

So now John Hunt is the first person in Britain to be officially debaptised by the Church of England. But the “in this particular case” rider in the Church message seems to suggest that he might also be the last.

Meanwhile, in Argentina, Archbishop Hector Aguer of La Plata rejected the “campaign of collective apostasy” launched in the country. It is similar to the “Not in my Name” movement in Spain in which ex-Catholics or those who wish to renounce their faith present letters of apostasy to the diocese with the request that their names be removed from baptismal registries. Since the internet campaign was launched last month, 700 people have signed up online.

“Who are the people promoting this? And what is it that bothers them in particular? What kind of ideology is behind this campaign, as it clearly has been very cleverly put together?” the archbishop asked in his weekly TV show.

“What they really want is to protest the public and cultural presence of the Church,” he continued. “What really bothers these movements is that the Church still has influence on the Argentinean people… What bothers them specifically is that the faith has become culture and the purpose here is to uproot the faith from the culture in which the people live. For us this campaign must be a motive, a sort of incentive for the renewal of our faith, not only individually but prominently in daily life and in its cultural expressions.”

The panicky Archbishop called for a “recovery of the awareness that through baptism we are witnesses of Christ and we should manifest our faith in daily life, without the need for extraordinary actions but in the daily story of life,” in order to “strengthen our awareness as baptized and to give thanks to God for having received this gift of baptismal grace which makes us Christians and members of the Catholic Church.”

The movement to leave the Catholic Church is spreading also to Canada, where last week 26 people wrote to the Quebec newspaper Le Devoir saying that they were applying to be taken off baptismal registers because of their disgust at the Church’s recent outrages. They were particularly horrified at the reaction of the Church to the case of the 9-year old Brazilian child who was given an abortion after being raped by her stepfather. Everyone involved in that act of compassion was excommunicated by the Church. The Pope’s recent remarks on condoms in Africa were also cited as a reason to leave the Church.

In the Quebec City region, the diocese reported 50 requests for apostasy in the past month; usually it receives about 20 such requests in an entire year.

The protestors acknowledge that these numbers are a drop in the ocean but hope that the movement will spread and become significant. Sylvie Drouin, one of the signatories to the letter to Le Devoir, said it is time for Quebecers to question their almost automatic identification as Catholics. “Religion in Quebec is cultural. We are Catholic by culture,” she said. “The Catholic religion has led our society. We don't question it. It's like having white skin.”

She said: “We are not trying to turn the planet upside down, just to say loud and clear what we think,” she said. “[The Church] does not respond to our aspirations at all, and what's more it is embarrassing. Currently we are ashamed to be part of that.”

Here are the Vatican’s official instructions, actus formalis defectionis ab ecclesian catholica, about defecting from the Church, which it regards as an “act of apostasy, heresy or schism”. You’ll love the pompous language that only an over-mighty institution could possibly come up with. Is it supposed to be intimidating? Actually, it sounds slightly crazed.

Here’s the experience of another atheist who tried to get himself off the Catholic books

Latest:

Premier Christian Radio has started a campaign to counter the NSS’s debaptism certificate. They are asking 100,000 Christians to sign up to affirm that they still love Jesus and to demonstrate that Christianity is still relevant. Terry Sanderson will be recording a programme on the station next week about whether it is true that Christians are “marginalised” as the self-created fundamentalist mythology claims.

3 April 2009