Agreed to be a godparent, Now changed mind!

foreverskint

Hope someone can help us with a dilemma.

A while ago we agreed to be Godparents to a friend's New baby. Unfortunately somethings have now come to light regarding the parents of the child (which I can't go into) and we feel we can't morally enter into the role of godparents.

The Christening is in a couple of weeks time. How do we tell our friend?
Usually I am a person with all the answers, but on this issue, I am completely stumped.

Quackers

Wow thats a toughie!

I think that you are going to have to be honest.

Anything other than honesty is going to just create more problems.

I know you dont want to explain but is the something that you dont agree with going to affect the relationship that you have with the child? Is it going to interfere with your role as a godparent? If not, and you expect to remain friends with this person do you really have to say no?

Live and let live & all that - although I appreciate that your reason may make this approach seem totally wrong!

I think it will cause problems whichever way you approach this - 2 weeks notice isn't very much although thats not your fault if you've only just found out what you have.

Are you expecting to remain friends?

foreverskint

I don't think we will remain friends.

The problems involve the childs father (who is not her husband by the way ).

She was supposed to stop seeing him as her husband agreed to take on the baby as his. But she has continued to take regular trips to see this other man, leaving her other children at home with her husband.

I can't condone this sort of behaviour ( sounds a bit holier than thou I know!)
and feel that I cannot continue a friendship with her. My partner, who already has 2 godchildren, feels that this will just be a really bad idea, as we will be godparents to a child we will potentially never have any contact with.

lil_me

If that is the case I would just be honest, but thats me.

onestep

hmmm.. from a Christian point of view, you are making promises on behalf of the child - not the parent. If the parents are not being good role models for the child, then isn't it even more important that the child has a good role model for a godparent? Only you know what the parents have done/not done, will you still be friendly with these people? If what you have found out is so awful that you're going to stop being friends, then telling them you aren't going to be a godparent isn't such a big deal on top. If you are still going to be friendly with them, then being a godparent might be a way of helping the situation.

HTH

onestep

Quackers

foreverskint wrote:

I don't think we will remain friends.

The problems involve the childs father (who is not her husband by the way ).

She was supposed to stop seeing him as her husband agreed to take on the baby as his. But she has continued to take regular trips to see this other man, leaving her other children at home with her husband.

I can't condone this sort of behaviour ( sounds a bit holier than thou I know!)
and feel that I cannot continue a friendship with her. My partner, who already has 2 godchildren, feels that this will just be a really bad idea, as we will be godparents to a child we will potentially never have any contact with.

If you dont think you will remain friends then I think you should just be honest.

Its not holier than thou - its what you believe in and if you are not confident that you are going to have a close relationship with your godchild then you would be taking on the role just to please and not create conflict - all of the wrong reasons.

I hope whatever you decide goes as well as it can.

foreverskint

onestep wrote:

hmmm.. from a Christian point of view, you are making promises on behalf of the child - not the parent. If the parents are not being good role models for the child, then isn't it even more important that the child has a good role model for a godparent?
HTH

onestep

Yes you are right there, and if any children need a good role model it is these lol.

Mind you with my teenage daughter's behaviour at the moment i'm not sure I can claim to be a good role model either!

Thanks for your replies thus far.

I shall ponder my navel for a bit;)

onestep

just another thought - does the partner know she's taking the baby to see the father? is it just a parental visit, or are they having a relationship again? I'm not just being nosy (honest!); if the partner is OK with the visits, and it's platonic, then there's no problem. Of course, if there is something going on, then that's another thing entirely.

onestep

Quackers

onestep wrote:

just another thought - does the partner know she's taking the baby to see the father? is it just a parental visit, or are they having a relationship again? I'm not just being nosy (honest!); if the partner is OK with the visits, and it's platonic, then there's no problem. Of course, if there is something going on, then that's another thing entirely.

onestep

And if the husband doesn't know about the visits and you decide to be honest about your reasons its going to create more conflict. Not your problem I know but it would make me less confident about being able to tell them the real reason.

Mishy

I think that you have to decide what's best for you in the long run because if there is resentment with the parents now would this continue into later life.

Have you taken the friend to one side and told her how you feel?

Is there anyway you could sort this out so that everyone gets a fair chance to sort themselves out.

Good luck with what you decide to do? Only you can decide what you are going to do?

foreverskint

The relationship with this other man is ongoing and and I don't think the husband is aware.
Which I suppose is really where my dilemma lies.