Easter 2 - the Baptism of Poppy
“Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation.” 1 Peter 2.22
There’s a difference between the way that American Baptists baptize and British Baptists, although both baptize adults by immersion in water.
In my former life as a Baptist minister, I would stand up to my waist in water and with one hand on the collar and one on the solar plexus of the adult candidate, I would propel the person rapidly backwards until the water closed over their face.
It was dramatic and messy and time will not permit me to tell of my adventures in trying to raise a 24 stone lady from the bottom of the baptistry, or of the very chic white cotton Italian trousers I decided to wear one evening. As I walked down into the pool, they turned completely transparent.
My first baptism in an American Southern Baptist church was a revelation. No unseemly dunking and splashing for them. The candidate held a cloth over their nose and mouth and were very gracefully and slowly eased back under the water as the lights dimmed and the organ played seraphic music.
The pastor of the church explained to me that, as baptism represented being buried with Christ, it was more appropriate to lower the candidate lovingly into the grave, than to throw them into it.
Of course babies were baptised by total immersion for many centuries in the worldwide church and still are in some parts of the church. The normal procedure in the Book of Common Prayer given in the rubric says: “(If [the parents] shall certify the priest that the Child may well endure it), he shall dip it in the water discreetly and warily… But if they certify that the child is weak, it shall suffice to pour water upon it…”
Well baby Poppy may be strong as an ox, but Fr Alan will be pouring and not dipping. We’ll leave total immersion to the Archbishop of York who helped plunge 20 new adult Christians beneath the water last Sunday.
But there’s no doubt that baptism by immersion is a very dramatic re-enactment of the heart of our Christian faith.
The NT imagery of Baptism is of dying and rising in Christ; of being buried with him in death and reborn to a new life in his resurrection. This is why the language of the baptismal liturgy is so stark and uncompromising: ‘Do you reject? Do you turn? Darkness and light.’
And this is why traditionally we baptize during this Easter season in which we celebrate new life springing from the death of Good Friday; from the cold hard winter; from the empty tomb.
Baptism is also symbolic of the new life we dare to hope for, when, one day, we each pass through the uncertain waters of our own death.
In today’s Gospel, Thomas wrestles with this. Can the dead come back to life? If this is really Jesus before him, then everything is different. Yet still he doubts.
And Jesus doesn’t tell him to stop doubting – that’s not a very good translation – he tells him “be unbelieving no longer”. And John at the end of this passage says “these things are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ”.
Whatever else we do or don’t believe in Christianity; however many doubts we have - and some of us are plagued by more of theme than others –
This one, central, historical fact is more important than any other. It is the crux of Christianity, and if it is true, it is the crux of human history – God raised Jesus from the dead, in a resurrection body. It wasn’t just a ‘nice idea’ that the disciples dreamed up to give the Christian message a bit of vavavavoom!
I’m with my brothers and sisters down through the centuries, who although they were often wracked with doubt, nevertheless chose to believe. If I didn’t believe – well I’d have better things to do with my time. And as Jesus says to Thomas, ‘happy are those who have not seen [what you have seen] and yet believe” – that’s us! Easter is a time to celebrate that happiness, and baptism is a rehearsal of all that lies behind that joy and peace which Jesus has promised us.
But of course baptism is only a first step along the road to spiritual maturity. Peter reminds us in this letter, that just as babies quite naturally crave for their mother’s milk, so we should continue to long for spiritual nourishment throughout our lives. The Lent disciplines were a time for solid food, and I don’t just mean Rococo chocolate bars.
We have all been given the gift of new life in our baptism. Do we pursue this spiritual life and feed it with these other sacraments of bread and wine? Or do we starve our spiritual life, until it simply withers away to religious sentimentality?
Baptism is a reminder to all of us of our baptismal vows. It is reminder that if we wish to live life fully, then we must live by the power of the risen Jesus and in loving, daily dependence upon him.
“Like newborn infants, long for the pure, spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow into salvation.”
