“You’ll only be baptized once in your life, so it is a very special experience,” my grandmother said, speaking at my eight year old daughter’s baptism last week. After her talk concluded, we made our way down the hallway to the baptismal font and while the children clustered near the font, I helped my daughter through the tiled maze that connects the women’s restroom with the font where her grandfather was waiting in his white clothing.
Once in the water, her grandfather baptized her in the LDS fashion – full immersion – and brought her up from the water with a beaming smile on her face. The orange, blue and yellow feathers she had begged me to let her put in her hair after the school year ended were vivid stripes on her wet head. Her dimpled smile widened as she made eye contact with her brother. She started to walk toward the steps leading out of the font. However, since her grandfather had used her nickname, middle name and surname, not her given first name in the ordinance, he was asked to baptize her again. Once more his hands grasped her wrists. Once more she looked up through the glass divider.
“That’s not how the Baptists do it,” said one of my daughter’s great-grandmothers under her breath. The Baptist one. I chuckled silently.
But my daughter didn’t seem to mind. When I reached her in the changing room after the second immersion, towel in hand, she said, “Grandma said I could only be baptized once, but I got to be baptized twice, Mom!”
The double dip was just one of several special moments in her big day. She was pleased with the talks given by her great-grandmother and her young cousin. She basked in the attention from all the grown-ups. She liked seeing her name on the program and proudly carried the new set of scriptures that bore her name – the nickname – in silver script on the front.
For me, this baptism brought connection. And reminders of connection. Three years ago, shortly before my son was baptized, my former husband and I sold the home we had raised our children in and began the arduous process of untangling what we had braided together for more than ten years. Of course, we were not the only people impacted by the divorce proceedings. Braided into this shared life were relationships with friends and extended family members as well. Our son’s baptism brought family members from both sides into the same room at a time of great turmoil. Many tears were shed, many questions asked between former in-laws during the after-ceremony celebration. Our family pictures, though not fraudulent, were most definitely posed. And yet it meant something to me that we could set aside the turmoil for a child’s special day.
At my daughter’s baptism, three years and some settling later, her non-member father, Methodist grandparents, Baptist great-grandmother, Catholic great-grandmother, Mormon grandparents, Mormon great-grandmother and Mormon mother (me!) again sat, sang and smiled together. My daughter’s best friend, an Episcopalian, even drove with her family 13 hours to surprise us and celebrate the special day.
As my daughter promised to take upon herself the name of Jesus, each of us was reminded of similar promises we had made, and whether such promises had been made in a cathedral, an LDS meetinghouse or a Protestant chapel, the commitment to discipleship carried and carries with it a charge to be like Jesus. The simple message of an LDS child’s baptism service is powerful and profound – do your best to be kind and loving and compassionate.
With a family as divided by distance, religion and divorce as ours, it is only through kindness, love and compassion that we can create any kind of meaningful connection.
Have any of you experienced healing or connection through religious ritual?
Erin, a beautiful experience captured beautifully in words. Every time I hear about a child’s baptism I remember these lyrics by Van Morrison:
In the days before rock ‘n’ roll
Hyndford Street, Abetta Parade
Orangefield, St. Donard’s Church
Sunday six-bells, and in between the silence there was conversation
And laughter, and music and singing, and shivers up the back of the neck
And tuning in to Luxembourg late at night
And jazz and blues records during the day
Also Debussy on the third programme
Early mornings when contemplation was best
Going up the Castlereagh hills
And the cregagh glens in summer and coming back
To Hyndford Street, feeling wondrous and lit up inside
With a sense of everlasting life
[ “On Hyndford Street” ]
Oh, brilliant! Love those lyrics. Thank you so much for the song recommendation. I’ve never listened to this tune & I’m going to … today!
Unlike any other song I know by Morrison, this one is spoken–it’s more a John Donne meditation. It’s from the album “Hymns to the Silence” which is a 2 CD album with a broad range of musical styles, from R&B to gospel to rock. This CD and “Enlightenment” are 2 fantastic spiritual journeys in music.
Really lovely Erin. I love the image of the braid — it sounds like you’ve unbraided the strands of your lives and rebraided them in a new, but still beautiful, configuration.
One of the happy realizations of the baptism for me was this sense that we have moved forward. I could compare it pretty clearly to the ceremony three years earlier and really chart some of the gains we had made. I could remember, too, some of the three years … but it hasn’t all been pain – and, through the pain has come growth.
Great post. I think you’re right–ritual is about connection (in all sorts of ways).