inquiring and discerning: part deux

still trying to learn french, by the way. still think it's just awful. and speaking it kinda hurts my nose.

umm, google's valentines day nameplate is a little bit horrifying:
...it'll get you.

maybe it's a holiday weekend special, combining with friday the 13th. happy pre-lupercalia, anyway!

a while ago, i mentioned that my overarching purpose in creating this blog was summarized in the phrase "inquiring and discerning." the time has come (the walrus said) to elaborate.

the episcopal church practices infant baptism, so i was baptized at roughly six months, at the same church i attend today. obviously, as an infant i was incapable of grasping what was going on; the purpose was to bring me into the family, so to speak -- to induct me into a community that would help raise me, and to which i could one day make a commitment myself, if i chose to do so.

i went through classes and was confirmed when i was twelve. (due to unfortunate and unforeseen circumstances, i now feel very strangely about my actual confirmation. this is an issue i hope to resolve someday soon -- and a topic for another entry.) the only thing i really remember from class was going through the baptismal covenant. it's in the book of common prayer, and it's in two parts.

first is the apostles' creed, your basic affirmation of faith. it looks pretty detailed, but it also leaves so many questions that we got into that whole conference of nicea mess (the one where we decided jesus was divine). as an outline, it's pretty thorough, though the nicene creed is what we actually say every week in church.

the second part is five vows, the response to each of which is, "i will, with God's help":

Will you continue in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in the prayers?

Will you persevere in resisting evil, and, whenever you fall into sin, repent and return to the Lord?

Will you proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ?

Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?

Will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being?

so, in the roughest of terms, 1) i will be part of the christian community/go to church; 2) i will resist evil, admit when i fail and ask for forgiveness; and 3) i will talk about these things and practice what i preach. 4 and 5 i find nearly impossible to summarize. if you can't phrase something better than your source, you're best off just using quotation marks. i will 4) "seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving [my] neighbor as [my]self," and 5) "strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect the dignity of every human being," without exception.

i like the vows, and i like the response: any time human beings can bring themselves to simultaneously take responsibility and ask for help, i think it's probably a positive thing.

during a baptism, the following prayer is said sometime after the baptismal covenant:

Heavenly Father, we thank you that by water and the Holy Spirit you have bestowed upon these your servants the forgiveness of sin, and have raised them to the new life of grace. Sustain them, O Lord, in your Holy Spirit. Give them an inquiring and discerning heart, the courage to will and to persevere, a spirit to know and to love you, and the gift of joy and wonder in all your works. Amen.

any time i've had a doubt or a concern or shaded feelings about organized religion, i've consistently come back to this baptismal covenant. it doesn't erase the doubt or concern, certainly, but it reminds me that there are two sides to every coin. these things are the purposes, the positives, the reasons i got invested in this whole tangled worldview in the first place. if it was easy or straightforward, there would be nothing to challenge, nothing after which to inquire, nothing to discern: it would be a waste of human potential, ability, consciousness and (i believe) free will.

i know all the arguments for adult baptism, and they're legitimate and all, but here's the thing about infant baptism that makes me sure it's a sound practice: babies squirm and cry and grab at things they're not supposed to touch, and nobody can say, "listen, baby, this is a church service and you're supposed to be proper and well-behaved right now." the point isn't how the baby is dressed or whether the baby knows the right things to say or is polite or makes a face if water dribbles into its eye. the point is, it's marked as part of the community, and when it screams and squirms and wonders what the hell is being poured onto its forehead, it's part of our responsibility to help them understand. and if we don't know, it's our responsibility to ask and find out. the point isn't the structure or the formality; the point is inquiring and discerning, seeking and serving Christ in all persons, following jesus' example to the greatest of our ability.

if i had to summarize my beliefs in thirty seconds or less, i would direct the person asking to those five questions and that one sentence. it's far from a complete answer, but together they sum up what i think is probably the point of it all. it comes down to, "try to be a good person yourself, be good to all other people, recognize when you're not doing those things, and think -- with both your head and your heart." even if i'm horribly wrong and that conclusion makes me a heretic, i still think it's a pretty damn good guiding philosophy.