Posted on 05/16/2015 2:51:31 PM PDT by NYer
From a reader…
QUAERITUR:
While discussing the ecclesial status of someone baptized by an SSPX priest (is the newly baptized person Catholic?), I had a troubling thought: what about someone who is baptized by a Catholic woman who has pretended to be ordained as a priest? Is that newly baptized person considered Catholic? I tend to think not, since these women have gone to non-Catholic bishops to simulate their ordination. I’d be interested in hearing your thoughts. Thanks for all your work.
Every priest has a story about a “grandmother baptizing in the bathroom sink.” Usually it’s a pious woman, motivated by sincere faith and love for a grandchild whose parents have sadly neglected their responsibilities, or even more sadly, those parents have fallen away from the faith. Therefore sweet, loving grandma baptizes little Claudius in the bathroom sink and now wants the baptism registered as a Catholic baptism. Ideally, grandma has a witness (e.g. grandpa, or Uncle Kenny who stood guard at the door of the bathroom lest his apostate sister get suspicious), and she has used the correct formula to baptize (we can oftentimes be more certain that grandma knows and uses the correct formula than Fr. Lovebeads at Our Lady Queen of Group Process). If so, then we can go ahead and record this as a valid Catholic baptism. In that case, there can be a ceremony in which some of the things that were not done in the inform, “emergency” baptism can be “supplied”.
Holy Church, mindful of Christ’s injunction, wants everyone to be baptized, and so makes it very easy to do. While a bishop, priest, or deacon is the ordinary minister of baptism, any member of the faithful – and even an unbaptized person! – who intends to do what the Church does can validly baptize. Everyone should know the baptismal formula and be ready to use it in emergency situations. Also, it is assumed that if the person, even the unbaptized atheist, uses the correct form and pours the water properly intends, by those correct acts and words, to do what the Church intends.
So, back to the case at hand. This case is not dissimilar from the familiar “grandma in the bathroom” scenario. Except in this case, grandma is a bit more deluded. She thinks she’s a priest.
It’s sort of like watching a little boy running around pretending to be a firetruck. Pretending doesn’t make it so, but its amusing to watch.
Presuming that grandma the wannabe stuck to the formula and didn’t introduce any crazy terminology into the Trinitarian invocation, and presuming that she had some broad (no insult intended) intention to do what the Church intends, the baptism is putatively valid.
Just as in the case of the grandma and the bathroom sink, the child should be brought to a real church in short order to have the remaining ceremonies supplied, and the parents should make a good, solid confession (including confessing schism and possible heresy) to be received back into the good graces of our Holy Mother Church.
Even the money-grubbing faith-healers play into his hands because the people they scams end up with the real thing, in their hearts, where it really counts.
I'm not at all clear what your question means, nor how it is relevant to this discussion.
One need not be a priest to baptize.
Are you a Catholic? Did you miss that this is a Catholic Caucus thread?
That’s great. I don’t know of anything else that the expression “It’s better late than never” fits so well.
(I know about this from reading parish records, not from family tradition.)
Or do as other denominations and consent to their ordination?
According to my priest, yes. The baptizer does not have to be religious if the form is correct.
I remember him mentioning times when baptism isn’t even strictly required. Lets say a person is waiting to be baptized and had been going through the preparations - attending church, professing faith, reading the Bible, changing their lives to conform to God’s word.
If that person were to die for their faith, as some Middle Eastern Christians are doing, and as many early Christian martyrs did, it is termed a Baptism of Fire - the desire and transformation were there, even without the actual baptism.
Being willing to die for Christ is showing a true conversion of the heart.
Per Pope Leo XIII:
Concerning the mind or intention, inasmuch as it is in itself something internal, the Church does not pass judgment; but in so far as it is externally manifested, she is bound to judge of it. Now, if in order to effect and confer a Sacrament a person has seriously and correctly used the due matter and form, he is for that very reason presumed to have intended to do what the Church does. It is on this principle that the doctrine is solidly founded which holds as a true Sacrament that which is conferred by the ministry of a heretic or of a non-baptized person, as long as it is conferred in the Catholic rite.
“Is baptism by fake women ‘priests’ valid?”
A similar question:
Are laws signed by fake presidents valid?
What’s keeping anybody from doing it? A secret satanist could baptize a bunch of people, register it and call it good. Cool. I guess if authority doesn’t matter then why have a pope or priests or any hierarchy for that matter. Make it a free for all. Let everyone make up their own versions of baptism. Groovy.
As far as the Catholic church is concerned, the answer is yes, provided they have the proper "intent". The proper intent is to intend to do what the Church does, that is, to administer Trinitarian Christian baptism.
Remember, the spiritual effects of a sacrament come from Christ, not from the minister of the sacrament, who is just an agent or intermediary. Neither does it come through the faith of the minister.
However, this gets tricky if the minister is, e.g., a Mormon or JW. Those sects use the correct words, but do not mean by them what the Church means (because they reject the Trinity), so they are assumed not to have the proper intent.
However, if someone were baptized by a Mormon, and had a signed letter from the Mormon indicating that he or she intended to administer orthodox Christian, Trinitarian baptism, I think it would hard to argue that that baptism was not valid.
In order to be valid, "their own versions of baptism" would have to include the words "N., I baptize you in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit" (or something very close to it), and would have to involve the administration of (something a reasonable person would call) water, probably either by immersion or pouring over the head.
As well as having the correct ministerial intent (see above), etc.
I did not know this was a Caucus thread, but I asked a legitimate question and I got legitimate answers.
Thank you all!
Was away from FR yesterday. Playing catch-up.
That is why any non-Catholic who is a baptized Christian that wants to become a Catholic going through RCIA is simply is “received” into the Church at Easter Sunday vigil.
Exactly. The person’s Baptism under the auspices of a Protestant Church is recognized by the Catholic Church.
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