Christening/ baptism should I or shouldn't i?

GracieP

lostinrates wrote: »

Well, if my friend is right its not for nothing and has had certain health risk reduction factors. (and I have no baasis apart from that friend's study to debate that with, I dare say people try and use similar justification for more brutal less ''benign'' operations). I also have no idea why it was common in UK non-jewish families...like my dad and previous ''squeezes''.

Medical circumcision happens for numerous reasons. Mainly because the foreskin is clearly tight and will cause problems at a later age. both of my grandfathers had their foreskin removed in their late teens because it was too tight and kept ripping when erect. Both of my brothers were circumcised as babies at the recommendation of their doctor due to examination and family history. My brother-in-law was also circumcised as a young adult for the same reason as my grandfathers.

Additionally most soldiers being sent to desert regions are circumcised because getting sand caught in the foreskin can cause serious infections. It's very likely why religious circumcision is common in religions with desert origins.

There is also a certain amount of evidence that occurences of certain male cancers are lower in the circumcised. And a belief that circumcision is more hygienic (unsubstantiated afaik). In the US something like 80% of men are circumcised, most for medical reasons.

Mojisola

Person_one wrote: »

The health benefits are negligible, proper hygiene will achieve the same, and grossly exaggerated by people in the US who have a vested interest in keeping it going. I blame puritan attitudes towards sexual pleasure, if it feels nice when you touch it then it must be evil. Nearly all males are circumcised as standard there.

Babies have died and lost their penises due to infant circumcision.

I don't think it's a good idea. It's more important to teach little boys to keep themselves clean.

Unless there's a medical reason, the decision should be left for the young man to make for himself when he's old enough.

Person_one

GracieP wrote: »

Medical circumcision happens for numerous reasons. Mainly because the foreskin is clearly tight and will cause problems at a later age. both of my grandfathers had their foreskin removed in their late teens because it was too tight and kept ripping when erect. Both of my brothers were circumcised as babies at the recommendation of their doctor due to examination and family history. My brother-in-law was also circumcised as a young adult for the same reason as my grandfathers.

Additionally most soldiers being sent to desert regions are circumcised because getting sand caught in the foreskin can cause serious infections. It's very likely why religious circumcision is common in religions with desert origins.

There is also a certain amount of evidence that occurences of certain male cancers are lower in the circumcised. And a belief that circumcision is more hygienic (unsubstantiated afaik). In the US something like 80% of men are circumcised, most for imagined medical reasons.

I corrected your post for you.

Circumcision is fine when performed for genuine medical reasons, or electively when the patient os old enough to give informed consent. On an infant for no good reason? Barbaric.

Brighton_belle

GracieP wrote: »

Additionally most soldiers being sent to desert regions are circumcised because getting sand caught in the foreskin can cause serious infections.

Well that takes the notion of serving Queen and country to a whole new level! I can't quite believe all 'our lads' currently in Afganistan etc submitted to this,lol.

poet123

GracieP wrote: »

Again you are making assumptions based on your suspicions, rather than the facts. According to EU law the church has to annotate it's baptismal records and the cost must be borne by them otherwise it's in breach of numerous Data Protection Acts. They bear the costs because they choose to use the register politically.

I asked questions. However, with regard to the political usage of the baptism register, it is no more than countless other organisations do, and there are other sources to check the figures they put forward ie Census data.

GracieP wrote: »

I had an application put in for a defection in that period. (The annotation is a statement of defection, so you can no longer be counted among the membership, btw. I'm not sure what point you think you were making there?)

l

Why don't you tell me what point you are assuming I am making?

GracieP wrote: »

It was through the NGO "Count Me Out" which is an organisation established to do the brunt of the costly administrative work. However the church kept blocking my application. Actually going out of their way to block it. I was not resident in the country I was baptised in but when the parish priest requested a meeting with me in order to allow my defection, I flew there in order to meet with him. This meeting is not necessary to the defection but is a common delaying tactic. He did not convince me to disallow my defection and said he'd proceed with it, but he did not and requested another meeting. Again I acquiesced, again at cost of money and time to me, and again the discussion went the same way with him agreeing to amend the register. But he didn't and when it was chased up by Count Me Out they said they needed to see me again. At this point a group action was to be taken to force the defections as the same thing had happened to 1000s of people. The Church were clearly actively delaying following the law. And in this time Canon Law was changed and they say they can no longer make the defections. This is in defiance of actual law so either one or a number of court cases are being planned.

If it is against the law you will succeed.

However, my point stills stands that % wise and taking account of those leaving the church by this method and those converting to the faith will have liitle overall effect on the political clout. This is clearly a personal issue, not a political one.

GracieP wrote: »

Seriously, you don't know about how this works. You don't know about why it works as it does. You don't know about the laws surrounding this, or the thousands of people and numerous organisations who are involved in it. That's fine, most people don't. But maybe when you find yourself in a debate about the subject with someone who does know these things, you ask rather than assume? Nearly every point you make is prefaced with I doubt, I suspect, I think, but you don't know. I do, I've been through the process, my closest friend worked for a diocesan office, I've been a political lobbyist.

I do know that your view may not be an anomaly but it is certainly not the norm. People move away from the church on a observance level or totally, that they have been baptised is not as big a deal to them as it is to you, and for you to present your stance as prevalent or even common is to misrepresent the facts.

GracieP wrote: »

The figures are something I have on hard copy, because I know 2 of the people preparing a case for the EU courts. But if you go to the defection body of each nation of Europe you will see their figures for suspended defections, then you add them together and get a 6 figure sum. Additionally in North America and Western Europe, membership of the Roman Catholic Church is falling more dramatically than it has since the Reformation. The Holy See have a correction of this trend at the top of their concerns.

Trends come and go, and there are still a lot of Catholics worldwide, in fact the world figures show an overall increase as shown here, but clearly that doesn't suit your argument.;)

"At a global level the number of baptized Catholics increased from 1.045 million in 2000 to 1166 million in 2008, with a relative change of +11.54% an increase only slightly ahead of the world's population growth, which stands at 10.77% . The highest increase is recorded in Africa (+33.02%), followed by Asia (+15.61%), Oceania (+11.39%) and America (+10.93%). Europe remains substantially stable (+1.17%). In 2008, Catholics were 17.40% of the world's population, they were 17.28% in 2000. The biggest increase was recorded in Africa, from 16.47 to 17.77% with a change of more than 33%, followed by Asia, with a growth of 15.61% and passing from 2.90% of the population to 3.05%."

And;


The 2011 Pontifical Yearbook was presented to Pope Benedict XVI on the morning of Feb. 19 by a delegation led by his “number two,” secretary of state Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone and members of the Central Office of Church Statistics.
The book contains information on all Church jurisdictions and organizations, religious and cultural institutes and structures worldwide. Some information was released about novelties in dioceses and other church jurisdictions created in 2010 yet the main focus is on statistics from 2008-2009.
The standout figure of the new yearbook is the jump in the number of newly baptized Catholics over the two-year period.
In the 2,956 church jurisdictions in the world, the number jumped by 15 million from 2008. The total number of living baptized Catholics on the globe in 2009 reached 1,181,000,000.

Ultimately you must do as you see fit from a personal standpoint, as must others, but please try to avoid the political rhetoric that you use to support your claims....as it actually has the opposite effect when shown to be lacking in substance.

100,000 (your figures) seek to disassociate themselves, more than that seek to convert/are baptised, therefore your action is not going to affect overall figures. An empty gesture from a political pov, clearly not from a personal pov.

stiltwalker

I am an unbaptised atheist but my OH is Christian (C of E) and initially I was very against having our children baptised however it was important to OH and I agreed provided he took them to church regularly as the hypocracy of making promises with no intent to keep them was worse than them being baptised as they will make their own choice as to whether they are confirmed at the appropriate age. Our village vicar was also happy for me not to join in and make the promises myself as I was not a believer indeed he appreciated that I wanted to respect others beliefs and not be hypocratic just to have the party, he did however good naturedly say if I ever wanted to discuss things I knew where he was! Then followed up by saying it was in the job description. OH kept his promise and regularly take DD so wil be allowed to baptise DS in the autumn.

Absolutely

I was brought up by a Mother who attended church twice a day regularly until she got to her 40's. She never made us go, she never forced her beliefs on us, but I was raised in a Christian way.

When I had my first child, I was undecided whether to have her christened. She said to me "if she was very ill, would you have her christened?". I thought about it, and admitted inwardly that I would.

So I did have all 3 of my children christened. And unfortunately one is very ill.

Maybe I'm a bit of a hypocrite, but I know after my son's diagnosis 2 years ago, if he hadn't have been christened, it's something I would have then had done.

It's a silly thing to do based on fear, or the "what if" scenario, but that's my experience of the whole thing.

Difficult choice in this day and age. I know people that have had their children baptised and attend Sunday School because a certain secondary school around here only accepts those children with enough ticks in the appropriate boxes.

Meh! It's a minefield....:rotfl:

lostinrates

Person_one wrote: »

Circumcision is fine when performed for genuine medical reasons, or electively when the patient os old enough to give informed consent. On an infant for no good reason? Barbaric.

Thanks for this, and the other posts like it. In my head I changed circumcision to the less intimate ''ear piercing'' and agreed. To its time I think to review why I would have had a son circumcised: I guess its confirmation of how powerful one's own ''norms'' are if unchallenged. Thank you for the food for thought.

Lotus-eater

I like the fact that all the people that are talking about circumcision are females

lostinrates

Lotus-eater wrote: »

I like the fact that all the people that are talking about circumcision are females

DH and I had a long talk about it. He's now trying to decide if he would have opted for circumcision as an adult, though he holds he's glad he was circumcised as a child. I thought I might ask my father about it too, but it might be a bit awkward?