Good thoughts from kidology.org -

1. We ought to have convictions.

On difficult topics, I would rather someone have a strong conviction that I disagree with than for them to be wishy-washy. James 1:8 says that the double-minded man is unstable in all his ways. Not taking a position IS a position, just not a strong one. We ought never to look down on a person with convictions, but rather, should admire them for having convictions even if we disagree with their conviction!

2. People who disagree with you probably love God as much as you do.

Too often, when Christians disagree, they jump so quickly to judging the other at a level that is above and beyond the issue of disagreement. Suddenly, the other is addressed or talked about as though they are less of a Christian or are somehow less spiritual because they think differently. Too often I hear attacks like, ”You must not want to reach kids…” or ”Then you don’t care about…” Don’t be a Pharisee and mistake outward actions for proof of inner spirituality. People can have the same love for God as you and come to a different conclusion on a controversial subject.

3. Differing opinions in areas not spelled out in Scripture are not so much a result of a lack of unity as they are evidence that we were all created differently.

Discussing our opinions and convictions forces us to think and to challenge our assumptions and presuppositions. Throughout our history as God’s people, disagreements have helped us to define and clarify what we believe. Embrace conflict, for it refines you. Proverbs says that as iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another. What many fail to notice is that for iron to sharpen iron, it must clash or rub against the other!

4. Remember we are family, and will be spending a lot of time together in the future (eternity!).
   • Be genuinely interested in Truth.
   • Be willing to listen as eagerly as you are willing to talk.
   • Be willing to change your mind.
   • Argue ideas passionately, but never attack the person.
   • Argue in such a way so that when you get to Heaven and find out who was right, you won’t be embarrassed when you run into them!

I started a little discussion group when I was a Bible college student at Moody. It was called C.H.A.T. and it stood for Christians Happily Arguing Theology. We met monthly for a C.H.A.T. session. We would pick a different subject each time and argue about it (end times, election/free-will, infant baptism, gifts of H.S., etc.). Below is our list of basic rules or ideas that kept our arguing ‘happy’. If you broke these rules, you were asked to leave and were not invited to the next C.H.A.T.

EMILY POST , I am not. The knife and fork, came late into most of the root systems of my family tree and the scars on the face of some of my ancestors bear witness. Napkins came in first with our bushranging. I am not normally held out to be any model of courtesy, manners or proper behaviour by anyone. But I do claim an expertise of sorts on rules of conduct and relationship for spiritual affinity.

We are talking godparents and such like. The people who stood by your side at baptism. Who, on your behalf, renounced Satan and all of his works and pomps. Who swore, more or less, to stand by your side through life, offering good counsel, help and even the occasional interference, focused on keeping you on the right path.

Even in these godless days and these days without formal baptism, or naming ceremonies as some of the godless call them godparents are not uncommon, for purposes venal as well as spiritual. By any standard they are people, often not strictly relatives, who are designated as special in relation to the children, and in a hoped-for future relationship with them.

A more secular and ruthless Post once told the parents of a child in whom the devils still resided that one should chose a childless person, especially a gay one, and especially a rich one, for godparenthood. Not only was there a better than even chance the person would take his or her duties as spiritual guide and friend seriously, but, with any luck, she or he might leave the child some money. This is what one might call the 19th-century English upper-class model. In that dread period, members of the aristocracy, despite their manifest advantages tended to die earlier than the working class, but would, during their lifetimes, tend to inherit several times, often from relatively remote relatives. It was worth one’s while to cultivate relatives, even remote ones, with whims about who, out of someone in the family, might collect the goodies.

It was not on that account that my parents chose my godparents, though I cannot deny having benefited very materially from them, if not in their will. Win and Stan, one the sister of my maternal grandfather, and the other the brother of my maternal grandmother, married late in life and had no children, but they were selected as my spiritual sentinels on the grounds of my mother’s fondness for them, and (probably) on the open rectitude of their lives (especially Win’s), not in any hope or expectation, as it were, in the life thereafter. Anyway, one of them was my mother’s own godfather, and had been road-tested for avuncular feelings for personal and spiritual welfare, somewhat more difficult given that my mother grew up as one of 12 (among about 50 other nieces and nephews), all reasonably demanding of personal attention.

My mother’s feelings might have changed somewhat when she had her fourth baby in less than four years and her own grandmother suggested she “give” this latest addition to Win and Stan on the basis that they could never, poor things, have children of their own.

Had there been (I am sure there was not) any ambivalence in my mother about possession of and maternal feeling for the new mewing darling, it was more than dispelled by this suggestion, which had, in any event, in no way emanated from the putative adoptive parents.

Be all of that as it may, my godparents, as bossy volunteers rather than with any prompting, paid for a good deal of my boarding-school education at a time when my parents could not have afforded it, and maintained a keen interest in my intellectual and moral development even when, from their own viewpoints, I was beyond redemption. Mercifully, they were, by disposition, greatly inclined to argument as the ordinary means of discourse and counselling, and, since I could argue from somewhat different viewpoints from those with which they were familiar, I had some capacity to entertain them. God rest their souls; I owe them much.

All of us have three types of relatives. Those to whom we are directly related by blood (ie, have common ancestors) are physical affines. Those who are related by the marriage of ourself, or a physical affine, are collateral relatives. My wife’s mother, or my sister-in-law or my father’s brother’s wife are collateral relatives: we have no blood in common, but we are bound by a marriage in our family group. In more traditional times, the nature, and closeness, of that marriage would determine our own relationship, which would be, in effect, as though we were affines. Thus my wife’s sisters’ daughters are my nieces, and I owe to my father’s sister’s husband’s mother much the same sort of respect I would give a grandmother, or at least a great aunt. A good few old notions of incest not least bans on marrying close collateral relatives flow from this idea.

In physical terms, in most societies, aunts and uncles, have some auntlie and avuncular duties in relation to their nieces and nephews in some ways akin to those of parents. Indeed in some societies, including many Aboriginal groups, your father’s brother and your mother’s sister stand in equal relationship to you as your parents, and your father’s sister, and mother’s brother the “proper” aunt and uncle, are, in effect, your godparents, and play the critical role in arranging initiation and marriage.

The difference between an honorary parent and an aunt or uncle is that the former can nag you, as your parent might, remind you of right and wrong and of your duty, and periodically forgive or overlook your trespasses in the hope you have learnt something.

They are fiercely loyal to you and what they believe to be your best interests, but their core interest is the preservation of the group interests of your family.

By contrast, the true uncle or aunt, while recognising these considerations, is your advocate, making sure that all which could be said on your behalf is on the scale before any sort of judgment is made. They give you counsel but they also listen. They are on the one hand more, and on the other, less, forgiving.

A godparent, it might be said, is somewhat similar, if more focused on making sure you remember your moral and religious duties.

Jewish and Christian communities recognise spiritual as well as physical affinity, and treat them much the same. The primary spiritual affinity is through becoming a godparent, though there are some who would argue, in the modern age, the taking of positions of trust over children or those at a disadvantage, creates a position, and a duty, of spiritual affinity. One might suggest, say, that a doctor, a priest, a counsellor, a bank manager or a swimming coach has moral duties to his or her charge, and that abuse of that trust, and putting one’s own personal interests ahead of those duties, is a peculiarly bad moral sin and, often, civil tort or crime.

My son-out-law, organising the christening of his son, recently wanted to know how many godparents you can have. The more the merrier, I say. There was never a religious limit. Royal families have had 12 of either sex. All my children have at least four, and one, as well, has a fairy godfather overlooked at the original time.

Must they be religious, adherent or exemplars of the religious life? No, so long as they actually mean what they promise about being moral and physical lookouts for their godchildren’s spiritual welfare. If you just want to make someone feel special, or loved, or to make them think of your child in their will, go and find another name for the relationship, rather than appropriating another quite different and important one.

Our Source

Paul Martinez came all way from Orange, Calif., for a baby’s baptism.

He got one, too — in the dirty, icy waters of Lake Michigan.

Click here for a photo gallery of the polar plunge in Sheboygan

Click here for a video of the polar plunge in Sheboygan

“I scream like a little girl when the hot water goes out in my shower, let alone this,” said Martinez, 36, one of those who heeded the call to jump in the lake Tuesday as part of the annual New Year’s Day Polar Bear Plunge in Sheboygan.

“This is so not normal for me,” he said. “But I’m coming back every year. I’m addicted now.”

The event, which has been staged since 1971, drew a few hundred intrepid souls to North Beach on a sunny, 21-degree day that felt much colder with gusty winds. Many of the participants brought cameras or a support crew to testify to their folly.

“It’s … not … cold … enough!” went the group cheer before Justin Bohn, president of the Polar Bear Club, counted down by bullhorn to the 1 p.m. start.

Most agreed, however, that it was colder than last year’s plunge, when the high temperature was 46 degrees. Many of Tuesday’s participants emerged from the lake with algae plastered to them.

“Maybe we’ve got Milwaukee to thank for that,” said Tom Jens, 56, of Sheboygan Falls, a dairy farmer who was part of the first frigid dip years ago with fewer than a dozen pals from the University of Wisconsin-Sheboygan.

“We’ve had years where we’ve had more ice,” Jens said. “That would have been nicer. If you’re gonna go in, you might as well have it cold, right?”

Veteran “polar bears” grieved the loss of the Sheboygan Armory as the event’s base camp, saying it wasn’t the same to convene at Dave’s Who’s Inn, 835 Indiana Ave., and then drive several blocks to North Beach. The armory, within walking distance of the beach, closed about a year ago.

“At the armory, it was like a polar bear death march,” said Christian Lindau, 18, of Sheboygan, a sixth-year “polar bear.” “It was a big gathering point for a lot of people.”

Dave Repinski, the owner of Dave’s Who’s Inn, said his place became headquarters for before and after parties only within the past week. He said he plans to open the upstairs next year to families with children, which would give the tavern a capacity of 550.

Even with “bears” everywhere, hoisting beers and watching the Wisconsin-Tennessee Outback Bowl football game on TV, it was a mannerly zoo.

“These people are fantastic,” Repinski said. “Everyone has been in good spirits.”

Martinez accompanied his friend Paul Koene to Sheboygan Falls for the baptism of Koene’s 11-month-old daughter, Stella Rae. Koene, 39, who has lived in California for 10 years, extended a polar-bear challenge even though he never had taken the plunge.

“This morning he had the look of a dead man walking,” Koene said of Martinez. “It’s one of those things that if you do it, you check it off the list.”

Martinez said he called a former high school coach for a pep talk beforehand.

“Your lungs could collapse in your chest,” Martinez said the coach told him, perhaps intentionally adding fuel to Martinez’s raging fears, which proved completely unfounded.

“Polar bears” who have been around the block say that getting loaded is no longer part of their regimen.

“If we’ve got to drink to go in, then we shouldn’t be going in,” Jens said. “When you go in sober, you come out and warm up real quick.”

Steve Kovacs, 45, of Sheboygan Falls, has participated since 1984 but this was the first time he wasn’t in costume. Over the years, Kovacs and his friends have dressed as hillbillies, cavemen, sheiks, castaways, gangsters, cannibals and bums. In 1989, with a temperature of 10 below zero, they rented a limousine for 17 hours and partied hard.

“It became Halloween and New Year’s Eve rolled into one,” Kovacs said of the old days. “Getting older, getting kids and getting busy makes it a lot harder.”

This year, most of his fun came in seeing his wife wade into the water for the first time.

“I had no more excuses,” said Jen Kovacs, 34, who was pregnant for the last two plunges. “I wanted to see what all the craze was about.”

Our Source

Her investment paid off as 21 children — members of five generations — have worn it. Elisabeth, who was born Oct. 18, was the second in the fifth generation to wear the gown.

Marcia Huls, Elisabeth’s grandmother, said she expects the gown to be worn for future baptisms. Through the years, mother-of-pearl buttons on the back of it have remained intact, along with drawn thread work and embroidery.

Huls, who also wore the dress for her baptism, has cared for the dress for the past 15 years. It is washed before the ceremony, put on minutes beforehand and put away after the photos, she said.

In the document, the churches agree that “the Baptism instituted by Christ is fundamentally a free gift of God,” and “accept the Baptism as basic link of the unity that is given by the faith in the same Lord.”

The churches have agreed that “re-baptism” is not necessary when a Christian changes affiliation from one church to another.

“This mutual recognition was well received in ecumenical circles, especially within the World Council of Churches,” said the Rev. Canon Francisco de Assis da Silva, provincial secretary of the Episcopal Anglican Church of Brazil. “This is the first time that the mutual acceptance of Baptism has been instituted by a multilateral agreement, including the Roman Catholic Church.”

The document was signed by

The Rt. Rev. Geraldo Lyrio (Roman Catholic Church)
The Most Rev. Mauricio Andrade (Episcopal Anglican Church of Brazil)
Pastor President Walter Altmann (Evangelical Lutheran Church of Brazil),
Pastor Moderator Manoel de Souza Miranda (Presbyterian United Church of Brazil)
Mons. Antônio Nakkoudda (Sirian Orthodox Antioch Church).

Original source:
http://www.episcopalchurch.org/81808_92100_ENG_HTM.htm

Thousands filled the stands at Coveleski Stadium Sunday, but it wasn’t for a baseball game, it was for a baptism!

Friends and family got to watch as their loved ones got baptized on the baseball field.

Individual names were called and people jumped into one of the three pools on the field.

They then ran to home plate, signifying their accomplishment.

Organizers admit it’s far from a traditional baptism, but say a space this big was necessary for the event.

Shelly Arredondo with Granger Community Church says, “We didn’t have a venue that could take on this amount of people. It’s very close to our community center, which is right around the corner and it just seemed like an ideal place to bring 1,500 people.”

This is the first time Granger Community Church has held their annual baptism ceremony at Coveleski Stadium.

Organizers say it was so successful this year, that they plan to do it again.

Original article found at:
http://www.fox28.com/News/index.php?ID=24684 ]]> http://www.fillintheblankie.com/blog/baptisms-and-christenings-information/2007/09/10/baptism-news-is-it-batter-up-or-baptism-up/feed/ 0 http://www.fillintheblankie.com/blog/baptisms-and-christenings-information/2007/09/09/baptism-news-baby-baptised-in-143-year-old-dress/ http://www.fillintheblankie.com/blog/baptisms-and-christenings-information/2007/09/09/baptism-news-baby-baptised-in-143-year-old-dress/#comments Sun, 09 Sep 2007 18:52:26 +0000 admin http://fillintheblankie.com/blog/baptisms-and-christenings-information/2007/09/09/baptism-news-baby-baptised-in-143-year-old-dress/

TRADITIONS & FAMILY HEIRLOOMS CONTINUE TO REMAIN IMPORTANT

By Stephen White 08/09/2007

Baby Jessica Power will be wrapped in 143 years of history when she becomes the 32nd relative to wear the same christening gown.

The seven-month-old will be baptised in the dress made by cotton mill worker Eleanor Thornber in 1864 for her first child Isabel.

It’s been passed down the generations and every baby christened since has had their name embroidered in the underskirt.

On Tuesday we told how Charlotte Middleton, 27, of Paddock Wood, Kent, became the sixth bride to wear the same dress, brought from the US, and passed down her family for 97 years.

Yesterday Jessica’s mum Claire Power, 35, said: “I am so proud that Jessica will wear it. I think it’s wonderful that a dress so old can be in such good condition and still used in this era.” Jessica’s dad Jason, 33, wore the broderie anglaise frock at his baptism in 1973 and his mum at hers in 1943.But Claire fears Jessica, who will be baptised later this month at Darwen, Lancs, might ruin it.

She said: “She is sick so many times, I’m worried about it going on the dress and, because babies have got bigger these days, I’m a bit worried it’s going to be gaping at the back!”

Original Article was posted at:
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/topstories/2007/09/08/baby-baptised-in-143yr-old-dress-89520-19753191/

Sunday, September 9, 2007

By Vivi Hoang
The Tennessean

What started out more than 1,500 years ago as a simple task — presenting a child for baptism — has become a revered but blurry mix of religious and secular duty.

What does a godparent do? In most cases, whatever they, and their godchild’s parents, think best. The role may be centuries old, but it’s far from anachronistic. People customize everything from their rides to their ring tones to suit their tastes these days, and how they treat godparenting is no different, keeping the lifelong position going strong and its prospects healthy.

“It’s this resilient, tenacious tradition that has lost its past,” said Lisa Kimball, a lecturer with the University of Minnesota who studies godparenting. “It’s lost its connection back to its history. What is its role today? People are inventing it.”

Modern-day godparenting

The custom has survived the ages but evolved into one fraught with inconsistency.

“There’s a sense of familiarity and honor,” said Kimball, an Episcopalian and godmother to an astounding 13 godchildren. “But at the same time, there’s an absent discourse. It’s very public when it gets started and it drifts into privacy, so it may or may not be sustained. There’s often either a deep connection or pained distance. That’s the paradox.”

So what is the role of the modern-day godparent?

People are fashioning it as a quilt of institutional knowledge, tradition and social expectation, Kimball said. The role has largely developed into one of companionship and mentoring, not always with a spiritual component.

“Godparents are there for their friends’ children to talk or give advice when they don’t or can’t talk with their parents,” said 45-year-old Regina Hambrick of Nashville, Tenn., who’s been by her godson’s side since his birth. “My godchild Michael is now 21 years old, and we are still close.”

Patsy Sermersheim’s best friend, Donna Hazlett, chose her to be the godmother to her first son because she felt Sermersheim could best tell her son who she was if something happened to her.

Sermersheim, 46, sadly found herself having to carry out Hazlett’s wishes when Hazlett was killed in a car accident seven years ago at the age of 38.

“I wrote him a very long letter all about who his mom had been and how she had grown and changed,” said Sermersheim.

While it’s typical for godparents to feel honored to take on such a role, parents Ashley and Michael Jaeger, whose son Elijah was baptized recently at St. Edward Church in Nashville, felt honored when their chosen godparents accepted.

“You actually handpicked and chose these people to do this for you, and you’re so grateful they accepted and they want to be there and want to be part of your life and your child’s life,” Ashley Jaeger said.

John and Jana Blackwell of Smyrna, Tenn., godparents to two unrelated girls ages 5 and 13, characterize their job description as gift-givers, boo-boo fixers and book-readers. Those seemingly ordinary tasks will change as the girls age, but the crux of what they do remains the same, 40-year-old Jana Blackwell said.

“We are there because the parents that created them knew that, at all times, there needed to be people that represented faith and love in a family of God that knows no bloodlines,” she said.

Spiritual role models

The Christian godparenting tradition developed out of the Catholic church, which to this day has very specific rules that govern it. A godparent’s job is two-fold: to present the person being baptized and see to the child’s spiritual upbringing.

Whoever the parents choose must be at least 16 and Catholic, said the Very Rev. David Perkin, vicar general of the Catholic Diocese of Nashville.

“In this part of the South where it’s predominantly non-Catholic, many times parents of a child to be baptized represent two different Christian denominations,” Perkin said. “The Catholic church law requires there be at least one Catholic godparent … at least one, and preferably two.”

If there are two, the pair must be a man and a woman, he adds.

For Franchatta Howard of Nashville, the choice was clear. She picked her cousin Tracy Coleman and Coleman’s husband, John, as godparents to her two sons, who are now 2 and 4.

Howard said she considered several couples but settled on the Colemans because they have similar upbringings and values, are spiritually grounded and good role models.

“It’s a good support system,” 29-year-old Howard said. “I know that if (my sons) need something and I’m not readily available, I have two dependable people that can step in and make conscious, sound decisions.”

Article was originally published at:

Posted by tmatt
It took several days to get the basic facts together with a photograph, but we can pass along the happy news that the Divine Ms. M.Z. Hemingway (and hubby) are the proud parents of a baby Lutheran.

We have gone back and forth on whether their daughter’s name needs to jump straight into the world of Google and I, as the taskmaster at this blog, have decided to simply stay consistent with female Hemingway style and use the initials.

Thus, let’s say that E.P. “Eve” Hemingway was born last Thursday at 11:02 p.m. The vital statistics — 8 lbs., 8.5 oz., 20 inches.

The baptism rites are planned, if you know the Hemingways, at the logical place at the logical time this weekend.

The proud parents sent this lovely quotation out with the digital birth announcement (meaning that the announcement was digital, not the birth):

“You showed Your mercy before I could perceive it. You came to me with Your Kindness before I could long for it. Your generosity encompassed me before I could offer thanks for it. You not only marvelously formed me in my mother’s womb, but also drew me out from the womb. You have been my hope since I was at my mother’s breast. I was cast on you from birth. From my mother’s womb you have been my God.”

— Johann Gerhard, “Thanksgiving for Life and Birth,” Meditations on Divine Mercy

And don’t forget that this would be a great opportunity to check out the baby-related GetReligion.org swag at our CafePress store. Wink, wink.

M.Z. is trying to get lots of sleep. Please be patient with the other GetReligionistas as we carry on without her and, for those of you who do such things, keep this happy family in your prayers.

Original article can be found at:
http://www.getreligion.org/?p=2650

Editor’s comment:
You need not be a Hemmingway to write an ultra-thoughtful baby gift message — you just need the right place and medium to express your own prose. Check out http://www.fillintheblankie.com for a non-digital opportunity to put beautiful words on an ultra personalized baby baptism blanket that can be passed down for future generations of Hemmingway’s to come. Double, wink, wink.

Congrats!

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Rena A. Koontz and Jesse Tinsley

Plain Dealer Reporters

Three-month-old David J. Telban Jr. was baptized in old clothes.

The hand-me-down baptismal gown is a right of passage in his family. It was made 100 years ago in Yugoslavia by his great-grandmother, Mary Telban, when she was 16. Her first two children didn’t live to wear it, but since 1910, family members say it has been worn for 34 baptisms.

“My grandmother made this dress a hundred years ago, and everyone in our family has worn it,” said the ecstatic father, David Telban Sr., after his son was baptized Sunday. “I wore it, my father wore it, my sister wore it . . . it’s been passed through our whole family as a tradition.”

Family historian Kathy Telban, Mary Telban’s granddaughter, said Mary’s first child, Marie Telban Kovacic, was the first to wear the baptismal gown in 1910.

Marie came to Cleveland from Yugoslavia in 1928. Like her mother back in the old country, Marie Telban worked as a seamstress at the Grdina Bridal Shop.

In 1936, she married Edward Kovacic, who four years later was elected to Cleveland City Council. At some point – either when Marie first came or she had her first child – the gown made its way to Cleveland and was used for Marie’s firstborn.

In all, kin throughout four generations have worn the gown. It’s about five feet long from neck to hem. Seamstress Nancy Kovacic, who married Marie Telban Kovacic’s son, keeps the gown, making repairs when necessary.

“In the last few years the lace bodice has shown some wear,” Nancy Kovacic said. “I’ve had to repair some tears, but I haven’t replaced anything. It is all still the original fabric. It’s not yellowed at all. It’s pure white.”

The gown is made of lawn, a lightweight, sheer and delicate cotton fabric in a plain weave. Kovacic said the gown is sewn in layers of ruffles and trimmed in lace.

The outfit buttons up the back and “is very hard to get on the baby. Some of the babies couldn’t get the neck buttoned,” Kovacic said, laughing.

There is an underskirt that the baby wears beneath the lace dress and Mary Telban also made a coat and an extra dress for after the baptismal ceremony. Kovacic said that is long, too.

“Most of the mothers take the pictures and then take the gown off the baby,” Kovacic said. “The babies are lost in it. All you see is their little head.”

About 40 relatives and friends gathered for the baptismal Sunday in the oratory of Our Lady of Angels Church on Rocky River Drive to see yet another family member don the beloved gown. Little David was at first a little fussy being put into the gown, but turned quiet as family members took snapshots.

The baptism was also special to the Rev. John J. Cregan.

“I’ve baptized a lot of prisoners, policemen and firemen,” Cregan said. “But of my 46 years as a priest . . . never anyone with a gown 100 years old.”

original article can be found here:
http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/cuyahoga/1187167414257600.xml&coll=2