By SUE BLACKMORE - GUARDIAN
Added: Thu, 14 Oct 2010 19:29:14 UTC

At a family baptism I was appalled when the congregation was called to combat aggressive atheists – I don't want to fight

Thanks to Miranda Celeste for the link.

Last Sunday, I went to church! I more often spend my Sunday mornings gardening, but this was a family christening in a small seaside town in south Devon. I have known this church all my life, but it – and the morning service – had been transformed. The pews had gone, great glass walls were in place and the whole place seemed larger and brighter. The deeply religious atmosphere I remembered (though possibly falsely) was gone, too.

More different still was the service. I knew none of the jolly "songs", nor the cheerful responses, and I drifted off into reflections on the familiar stained glass, until the words I was hearing brought me up short.

What was this? I checked in the nicely printed service booklet. Yes, the baptism part began with a reading from Mark 10 13-16: "Whoever does not receive the kingdom of God as a little child will never enter it." Not that I want to enter it, and come to think of it I did receive it as a little child, but are Christians actually supposed to believe that if you are not baptised young then that's it? Or is this one of those things they quietly admit they don't really believe even though they are happy to hear their vicar read it out as though they should?

Read on

TAGGED: RELIGION