Naming ceremony v Christening

safarigirl

I had a naming ceremony Baptism in the Unitarian Church for my daughter. This was to mark the birth and have a day for the in laws to welcome her into the world. I sent them a invation to a naming ceremony Baptism and they all came with Christening cards and said what a lovely Christening it was.
I thought i had made it clear i did not want to christen her into the Catholic Church.
My question is do Catholics in Ireland think naming ceremony means Christening? Not everyone of course in general i dont want to offend anyone, Do Catholics not understand what the word Christen means? I thought it was when you Christened a child into a religion, and naming ceremony the oposite of that.
Of course i respect the Catholic church and that of all religious faiths, i just cant believe that they dont acknowledge she has no religion. If she has no religion then how can she be Christened!??

georgieporgy

Catholics would/should indeed know what christening means. However in the case of your naming ceremony, the actions performed do mimic baptism to a degree insofar as water is poured on the baby's head and sponsors (godparents) are appointed. The people you invited may not be up to scratch on the finer points of theology and just assumed the Unitarian church is a another type of christian church.

It isn't of course. I admit though that I'm surprised your inlaws aren't aware of it seeing as your wife may have mentioned it to them?

soterpisc

If the ceremony involved water and a Church... Then yes probably everyone thought it was a Christening.


Also we don't name the Baby during Christening.. It was never a Naming ceremy

Plowman

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safarigirl

His family seem happy with it i guess, and there was me thinking i was making a statement i didnt want to christen my child!

Peregrinus

Your mistake, as far as I can see, was to call the ceremony a "baptism". The dominant meaning of the word is a religious ritual which symbolises or effects initiation into the Christian church. Nearly all the other senses in which the word is used are analogies from this primary meaning.

That, coupled with the fact that you actually held the ceremony in a church, was almost guaranteed to mislead your relatives and guests as to the signficance of what you were doing.