Joat42 wrote:n7axw wrote:I was baptized as an infant, told the stories of Jesus on mom's lap while being read to. I did the Sunday School and confirmation bit and attended Lutheran college and seminary. Then I spent 40 years in the ministry of the church. I am grateful for all of it. I've had a good life surrounded by loving people who encouraged me to care about others and be open to and curious about the world around me.
My point still stands, you weren't given a choice.
If someone came dragging an adult into a church, and there where no way for you to communicate with that person, would you baptize that person even if you don't know his or hers wishes?
Now replace the word adult with infant.
Your concerns are somewhat mirrored in the Baptist heritage who postpone Baptism until adulthood.
What I am going to say next usually gets me in trouble with people who don't embrace faith. But that's ok, I guess. Faith is not a matter of intellectual choice. It is more a matter of seeing and hearing, of perception. Augustine made the comment, I believe in order to perceive. Children can experience that as well as adults. Rather than being something thought through, it is experienced as it is revealed. In introducing their children to that, they are giving them a precious gift to strengthen and guide them through life.
To turn your comment back the other way, would you wait until the so called age of reason to start teaching your children how to set priorities and make value judgments and choices? Would you wait that long to give them a moral compass? The truth is, kids are having choices made for them all the time. In fact they learn far more from our example than from what we deliberately try to teach them.
Don
-