I had exactly the same thought when I read that earlier Dave. So many times the quote is from a new age source.
Mary Macaleese has come out saying that baptising babies is a breach of their human rights, that they should decide for themselves. Crazy. https://www.independent.ie/irish-ne...breaches-babies-human-rights/a/163949917.html
She is putting her nose in where its not wanted as parents are the primary educators of their children, a God given right.
The world is tied up in knots. Abortion is quite alright but baptising babies may bring the authorities down on parents if McAleese has her way.
Scary how she has fallen. I don't know where she is going with her constant attacks on anything to do with the church or church practice. She is gone crazy.
Her son is gay so McAleese has chosen to dive deep in the woke liberal mindset that supports the actions of her son.
Poor ol mary is about as catholic as ian paisley was in his prime.Who ever gave her that doctorate would want to be looked at .
I remember her attacking Pope St John Paul for being anti women: https://acireland.ie/mary-mcaleese-challenged-on-misogyny-of-st-pope-john-paul-ii/
I remember an interview she gave about her faith when she was president. Maybe it was to get the likes of me support her. Must have been all hypercritical.
I don't agree with Mary McAleese. I believe parents have not only the right but the responsibility to make decisions for their children. We make decisions about their medical care, education, and so many other things before they're old enough to decide for themselves. So why would their spiritual well-being be any different? If we truly believe baptism is a gift of grace and the beginning of a new life in Christ, why would we deny that gift to our children? But I will say, I think she raises an interesting point, perhaps not the one she intended. How many of us who were baptized as infants have ever really made a conscious decision to embrace our baptism as adults? Sure, we renew our baptismal promises at Easter, but do we really understand what we're saying? Or what it means to live those promises? Through my journey in the Neocatechumenal Way, I've come to see baptism in a much deeper way. It's not just something that happened to me as a baby. It's something I'm called to live every day. And that hasn't always been easy. Far from it. I'm not suggesting we get baptized again. We are baptized only once. But I do think there is something to be said about rediscovering our baptism as adults, freely embracing those promises, and allowing ourselves to be born again in Christ. And I wonder how many baptized Catholics have really had that opportunity. So while I disagree with her argument, perhaps she's done us a favor by raising the question. Not whether we should baptize our children, but whether we as adults have truly embraced our own baptism. Maybe not what she intended, but as I've come to learn, God writes straight with crooked lines!
I'm not suggesting we get baptized again. We are baptized only once. But I do think there is something to be said about rediscovering our baptism as adults, freely embracing those promises, and allowing ourselves to be born again in Christ. And I wonder how many baptized Catholics have really had that opportunity. miker, The above is very true; for me at the age of 23. And of course, I should be evermore open to a deeper repentance. One can recite the Nicene Creed every Sunday with it penetrating only skin deep (I admit to that reality now and then).
Confirmation whilst a different sacrament is really the opportunity to embrace what we received in baptism. Unfortunately children's education in the faith is very poor and has been since Vatican 2. All we can do now is pray pray pray.
The more time goes on the more I understand that things started to go very bad around the time of Vatican 2. Of course the wolves were circling the sheepfold before then but after that they were right inside pulling the strings. Now of course the wolves run the sheepfold. Our Spiritual lives do not operate in a vacuum , either we are for Christ or for Satan. This becomes more and more true with each passing day.
As a reductio ad absurdum, one could just as easily argue that sending one’s children to school is a breach of their civil rights, and that they should be allowed to learn for themselves instead of being forced-fed adult propaganda. One could even logically argue that feeding them is a denial of their right to choose to be anorexic. Ms McAleese would have finished up wiser, if she had never attended school, methinks. She is one of these people who, because she received an education of a higher degree than most of her peers, thinks that she knows all there is to be known, whereas the truly intelligent quickly realise that the more they learn, the more are the vistas of what is unknown, and unknowable, revealed to them. Of course, this also requires humility, a trait without which Ms McAleese seems to have been born. Spare a thought for poor Jesus who is going to have to listen to her telling Him where He went wrong, when they meet!
I think it might be too that people often spend too much time talking about things and not enough praying about them. Too much idle chatter over cocktails.
