Thoughts at a Christening
Created | Updated Jul 15, 2012
Pastey is back with some thoughts on the lengths people will go to for a good education.
Thoughts at a Christening
A good friend of mine had his one year old daughter christened into the Catholic religion last weekend. Which I thought was a little odd.
He was brought up a catholic but has long since given up on the religion, mostly because he studied philosophy and religion at degree level and decided that it wasn't right for him. He's quite adamant about it too. So I enquired if his wife was religious, because I was pretty sure she wasn't. I was right, she isn't. So why get their daughter christened? Neither of them believed in the religion. The answer was simple: because it gave her a much better chance of getting into a good school.
The church near them is right next to a good primary school, and being a member of the church, even a non-attending one, gives the children a much better chance of getting a place in the school. Now, as you're all probably quite aware, I'm a cynic but this was a little far for me. Surely people didn't go that far? Turns out they do.
The church itself was rather nice. Built in 2000 in a more friendly, communal style. Rather than having an altar at the front and rows of pews facing it, the altar was in the middle of one side, and all the pews were in a semi-circle around it. Everybody seemed to be much closer to the front than in the older churches I've been in.
The next difference I saw here was the number of people. The church was full. Over the last year I've been to two other christenings, another friend and a cousin both had their children baptised. Both of them do go to church each week and are religious people. And at these christening there was only immediate family and friends, about thirty or so people huddled in a small area of a large church. This one though was packed. Standing room only at the back. I knew hardly anyone there, just a couple of mutual friends, so it didn't dawn on me at first why it was so busy. I knew my friend was a popular guy but this seemed a bit excessive. I was right though, it was. There were three christenings happening at the same time.
Not quite production line, but pretty close. "We are here to baptise Baby A, Baby B and baby C…." "Would the parents of Baby A, Baby B and Baby C please stand up…" The priest was trying to cram in as many christenings as he could. Surely they could wait until the next week? Nope, it seems that everyone in that area was trying to get their kid baptised.
I had a look at the rest of the congregation as the priest went through the motions, being brought up a catholic in a large Irish family I could probably do the service myself I've been to so many of them. But the people in the congregation really didn't look like they fitted there. The idea of "Sunday Best" seemed to be "What you wear to a nightclub" I wish I was joking. And the noise? Several times the priest had to ask people to be quiet. Almost every time he had to inform people how to act. If it wasn't a christening and he hadn't been saying several times how important children were, I'm pretty certain he'd also have asked a few parents to take their children under control or outside. There were a lot of children. Most of the congregation were families with young children, and most of the young children were running around, chatting, and at one point dancing in the aisles.
My initial lack of cynicism was cured. This whole congregation were purely there to try and get their kids into a better school. They had no idea about the religion, they had no idea about the church. They just knew that if you got your kid baptised, they stood a better chance of an education.
This gave voice to two ideas though. The first is that the Catholic church may well be in big trouble in a few years' time if the majority of its new members are only there for a school place. If it's not careful it could well just become an educational body that requires indoctrination. I did pose the idea to a fellow researcher who was also in attendance of starting a Cult of Cthulhu School and seeing if people would get their kids indoctrinated. We reckoned they would if the school was good enough. The second idea was for a new range of Christening cards. A nice picture of Jesus with kids on the front, and inside the happy slogan "Congratulations On Selling Your Child's Soul For An Education" I think they'd sell.
