Baptism question

Heart4youth · #1 26th April 2012, 01:44 PM

I am a youth leader at a non-denominational church that just branched off of Calvary Chapel. I am 27 year old woman and my father in law is the youth pastor. I was asked by a youth on Tuesday if I would baptize her. She is shy and has only connected with me so far and at youth is basically my shadow. She will likely not want my father in law to do it. My father in law was instantly excited when I told him what she asked me and we were going to ask the pastor if I could do it soon. The pastor was very abrupt with me when I asked (my father in law was still walking up and had missed the first part of the convo.) My pastor said I am not to be doing the baptisms! I don't understand. I've been told Calvanists are a very male dominated church is this why? I don't really know what to do. He then told my father in law he wants him to do the baptisms. And my father in law agreed missing a part of the convo he did not know what had just been said. I just talked to him today and he was like WHAT? You can to! Now I'm torn between two of my coverings... what do I do? My FIL wants to talk to the pastor and sort it out between the two of them but I feel like I just back stabbed my pastor and so I almost want to talk to him my self and explain to him that I feel capable and that I disagree with his decision. I even kinda want him to go to the elders and ask their opinions at this point. Is this me being prideful and controlling? What would you do or say?

dfreeland311 · #2 29th April 2012, 12:52 AM

Originally Posted by Heart4youth

I am a youth leader at a non-denominational church that just branched off of Calvary Chapel. I am 27 year old woman and my father in law is the youth pastor. I was asked by a youth on Tuesday if I would baptize her. She is shy and has only connected with me so far and at youth is basically my shadow. She will likely not want my father in law to do it. My father in law was instantly excited when I told him what she asked me and we were going to ask the pastor if I could do it soon. The pastor was very abrupt with me when I asked (my father in law was still walking up and had missed the first part of the convo.) My pastor said I am not to be doing the baptisms! I don't understand. I've been told Calvanists are a very male dominated church is this why? I don't really know what to do. He then told my father in law he wants him to do the baptisms. And my father in law agreed missing a part of the convo he did not know what had just been said. I just talked to him today and he was like WHAT? You can to! Now I'm torn between two of my coverings... what do I do? My FIL wants to talk to the pastor and sort it out between the two of them but I feel like I just back stabbed my pastor and so I almost want to talk to him my self and explain to him that I feel capable and that I disagree with his decision. I even kinda want him to go to the elders and ask their opinions at this point. Is this me being prideful and controlling? What would you do or say?

I don't know about your specific domination, but a lot of churches want an 'official' pastor to baptize people due to the sanctity of the occasion. I don't mean you're not 'holy' enough to baptize somebody, I just mean the church want a person with an official ordination to baptize a person. That tradition goes back hundreds of years and has been a dividing point among churches.

MAS0N · #3 28th May 2012, 07:46 PM

I understand why a pastor would want to do all the baptisms for a church for validity purposes. For unity's sake it's best to go along with leadership rather than cause conflict.

Biblically speaking, any believer can water baptize someone. Jesus commanded us to- Matt 28:18-20

hedrick · #4 28th May 2012, 08:34 PM

You mention specifically Calvinism, so I'll answer for Reformed theology.

I see two issues: you're a woman, and you aren't a pastor.

Reformed theology doesn't say a pastor has special powers beyond anyone else. However baptism is an act of the Church, so normally it's done in a service for worship, with a pastor doing it. At least for the PCUSA, if there's an exception that can't be done in a normal worship service, it would require at least a pastor and one elder, so that there's at least some representation of the congregation.

Reformed theology tends to be big on Church order.

Now, as to being a woman: Calvin was specifically opposed to women baptizing. But that's mostly because he was opposed to having women as pastors and didn't approve emergency baptisms (the main context in which a woman would have done a baptism in the 16th Cent). So the real issue is that you aren't a pastor. Whether you are eligible depends upon the denomination. Some Reformed churches have women as pastors, some don't.

I think in our own congregation (PCUSA) we'd have a baptismal service with you doing much of the liturgy, but have a pastor (of the person's choice) do at least the minimum amount to make it official.

Reformed Christianity may emphasize church order a bit too much. I'm pretty sure that in NT times baptisms weren't quite so controlled. But our motto (at least Presbyterians) is "everything decently and in order."