# 25th anniversary of my baptism



## SRoper (Sep 20, 2006)

Today, September 20th, is the 25th anniversary of my baptism. It took a while before my faith was confirmed, but I don't have a decision card, so I can't celebrate that day.

I was baptized in the Federated Church (UCC) in Chagrin Falls, OH. I thought maybe some people would be interested in the pamphlet they gave my mother when I was baptized, so I transcribed it below. Kind of sad what happens to a historically Reformed church after so many years of liberalism. Actually if you get past the first paragraph it isn't too bad.



> INFANT BAPTISM AT THE FEDERATED CHURCH
> The Meaning of the Sacrament
> 
> In the Roman Catholic and in some Protestant Churches the Sacrament of Baptism has been conceived and taught to be an act of cleansing from "œoriginal sin" passed down from Adam. This, however, is not the meaning of the rite in The Federated Church of Chagrin Falls. While we have never standardized dogmas and doctrines, preferring to operate from a simple Covenant of Church Membership, our traditional view has been that children are born into the world quite acceptable to God, and that there is no need to have the child baptized to cleanse it to insure its approbation before the Heavenly Father. It seems to us that Jesus calling the little children to him and using them as an example of the Kingdom of God supercedes the Garden of Eden myth with its more primitive concept of God.
> ...


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