# It's official: the Catholic Church is nuts! **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [February 15, 2022, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537 "2022-02-15T15:27:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Thing.Fish](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thing.fish/32/9168_2.png) [@Thing.Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing.Fish)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/41 "2022-02-15T22:23:41Z")
No, there’s a link to the Vatican’s responsa in the OP’s link of the GD thread (I also linked it directly in that thread), and it appears they agree with the Diocese that these people must be rebaptized. I have no idea how they would address either of your last two paragraphs. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/42 "2022-02-15T22:27:46Z")
> [@Thing.Fish](#): > > These are all funny jokes, but people do realize that’s not actually what they believe, right? Following all the rules _guarantees_ your entry into Heaven, but God also has the authority to cut you some slack. Obviously they can’t say for sure what He will do in any given case, but I doubt anyone really worries their loved ones have been cast into the fiery pit over this. Not what the families believe, but seemingly the diocese and judging from your post above, the Vatican. Why do they even care if not for worries about salvation for those concerned? What difference could it make else? ---
**Author:** ![Thing.Fish](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thing.fish/32/9168_2.png) [@Thing.Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing.Fish)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/43 "2022-02-15T22:47:40Z")
I don’t really want to be their defense attorney, but I believe their position is that, since the situation has become known, everyone involved is now obligated to correct things to the best of their ability. So although it would be sinful for people baptized by this guy to refuse to now get re-baptized, one may hope leniency is granted to those who died without knowing there was a problem. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/44 "2022-02-15T22:51:00Z")
It’s my understanding that LDS performs posthumous conversions, so there should be a mechanism for rebaptizing post-hoc. ---
**Author:** ![Thing.Fish](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thing.fish/32/9168_2.png) [@Thing.Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing.Fish)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/45 "2022-02-15T22:55:40Z")
I’m not really sure that the fact the LDS does something implies that there “should” be a way to do it. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/46 "2022-02-15T22:56:01Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > For one thing, baptisms can be performed in any language, and not all languages have the singular-plural distinction. If “I” is valid but “we” isn’t, then how could one ever determine whether a baptism in Japanese was valid? From what I gather, the issue is that this priest is using the wrong pronoun to make a specific theological point, that the rest of the Church disagrees with. I don’t think there’d be an issue if this had happened because the priest was just bad at Latin, much less if the language he was performing it in simply didn’t have that pronoun form. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/47 "2022-02-15T22:59:46Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > For another, the Church recognizes something called the “baptism of desire”, where the sincere intent to baptize or be baptized exists, but through no fault of the people involved, the proper ceremony wasn’t able to be carried out. Surely, all of the people baptized by this priest received the baptism of desire. This is what is confusing me. I couldn’t remember what it was called, but I remembered the general concept. At the very least, you’d expect it to apply to those who never learned the baptism was not properly carried out. I also remember the whole thing about how baptisms in other denominations would still count, and I don’t remember the word “I” being a requirement for those: just that you were baptized in the name of the Trinity. The part about other languages hadn’t even occurred to me. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/48 "2022-02-15T23:02:04Z")
> [@Thing.Fish](#): > > I don’t really want to be their defense attorney, but I believe their position is that, since the situation has become known, everyone involved is now obligated to correct things to the best of their ability. I wonder if part of this is also making sure that the parish understands that the priest was in error. If the priest had also been preaching that baptism comes from the community, this would be a good way of establishing clearly that this wasn’t a correct teaching. Otherwise, inattentive churchgoers might internalize the wrong message, and not connect it to whatever correction the church administers to the priest. ---
**Author:** ![Thing.Fish](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thing.fish/32/9168_2.png) [@Thing.Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thing.Fish)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/49 "2022-02-15T23:26:27Z")
[Here’s the responsa,](https://press.vatican.va/content/salastampa/it/bollettino/pubblico/2020/08/06/0406/00923.html#rispostein) in case anyone wants to read a bunch of paragraphs like > When celebrating a Sacrament, the Church in fact functions as the Body that acts inseparably from its Head, since it is Christ the Head who acts in the ecclesial Body generated by him in the Paschal mystery[6]. The doctrine of the divine institution of the Sacraments, solemnly affirmed by the Council of Trent[7], thus sees its natural development and authentic interpretation in the above-mentioned affirmation of _Sacrosanctum Concilium_ . The two Councils are therefore in harmony in declaring that they do not have the authority to subject the seven sacraments to the action of the Church. The Sacraments, in fact, inasmuch as they were instituted by Jesus Christ, are entrusted to the Church to be preserved by her. It is evident here that although the Church is constituted by the Holy Spirit, who is the interpreter of the Word of God, and can, to a certain extent, determine the rites which express the sacramental grace offered by Christ, does not establish the very foundations of her existence: the Word of God and the saving acts of Christ. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/50 "2022-02-15T23:28:16Z")
Question from a non-Christian: Are baptisms in one Christian church generally recognized by other Christian churches? If one is baptized in one church, and later in life joins a different church, is it necessary to be re-baptized in the new church? More to the point: Even those these baptisms are now seen to be void in the Catholic Church, might those same baptisms still be seen as valid by other Christian churches? Can these congregants simply join a Protestant church and ¡Presto! their baptisms and all their subsequent sacraments are valid there? ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/51 "2022-02-15T23:34:55Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > For one thing, baptisms can be performed in any language, and not all languages have the singular-plural distinction. If “I” is valid but “we” isn’t, then how could one ever determine whether a baptism in Japanese was valid? A tangent, but Japanese does have plural forms when it comes to people. For instance, “watashi” for “I” vs “watashi tachi” for “we”, or “anata” for you-singular vs “anata tachi” for “y’all”/“youse guys”. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/52 "2022-02-15T23:37:36Z")
A baptism is valid regardless of who performs it, so a baptism performed by a Protestant minister would be no different from one performed by a Catholic priest. I think it mostly works the same in reverse, with the proviso that there’s a lot of Protestant churches out there, and they’ve got a pretty wide set of beliefs. A lot the white supremacist Christian Identity churches teach that the Catholic church is literal tool of Satan, so I’m guessing they wouldn’t count a Catholic baptism as valid. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/53 "2022-02-15T23:39:56Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > Are baptisms in one Christian church generally recognized by other Christian churches? [In short, no.](https://www.reddit.com/r/Christianity/comments/42rr43/the_best_religious_joke_of_all_time_emo_philips/) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/54 "2022-02-15T23:42:52Z")
The Catholic church recognizes baptisms from most other sects, but the reverse does not necessarily hold. In fact, this is the key point of schism for the Baptists, who hold that baptism is only valid above the age of reason. ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/55 "2022-02-15T23:42:54Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > I don’t think there’d be an issue if this had happened because the priest was just bad at Latin In that case, he’d have to write it _correctly_ a hundred times, or else… ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/56 "2022-02-15T23:44:47Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > Question from a non-Christian: Are baptisms in one Christian church generally recognized by other Christian churches? If one is baptized in one church, and later in life joins a different church, is it necessary to be re-baptized in the new church? I can speak for the Southern Baptists I grew up with in saying that a Catholic infant baptism _definitely_ would _not_ be recognized as valid. To them, baptism comes after being “saved”, and that only comes after reaching an (undefined) age of accountability when you are able to understand what you are actually saying when you recite the sinner’s prayer. (I think it is usually thought to be around 12 years old.) I don’t know how they are now, but evangelical churches in my younger days had sneering contempt for infant sprinkling. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2022, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/57 "2022-02-15T23:50:12Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > A tangent, but Japanese does have plural forms when it comes to people. For instance, “watashi” for “I” vs “watashi tachi” for “we”, or “anata” for you-singular vs “anata tachi” for “y’all”/“youse guys”. Yup, or “boku tachi”. You beat me to the nitpick. Ninja desu ne! ---
**Author:** ![penultima\_thule](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penultima_thule/32/3833_2.png) [@penultima\_thule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/penultima_thule)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2022, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/58 "2022-02-16T00:00:50Z")
What, what, what? … Maginnis Magee JP was not baptised into the Catholic faith? This is a cultural disaster! [A Bush Christening](http://www.middlemiss.org/lit/authors/patersonab/poetry/christen.html) by A.B. “Banjo” Paterson > [@](#): > > _And Maginnis Magee has been made a J.P.,_ > _And the one thing he hates more than sin is_ > _To be asked by the folk who have heard of the joke,_ > _How he came to be christened “Maginnis”!_ ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2022, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/59 "2022-02-16T00:06:17Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > The Catholic church recognizes baptisms from most other sects… Not only that, but the Catholic church recognizes a baptism performed in an emergency (like at the scene of an accident) by _anyone_, even a non-Christian or an athiest. At least that’s what I learned in Catholic school. So for example, I’ve been hit by a car and I’m bleeding to death on the side of the road. An athiest, a Jew, and a Communist, instead of walking into the nearest bar, saunter over to me. I give them instructions and the baptism is totally kosher, no matter which one does it. Cool, huh? 🕶 ---
**Author:** ![ekedolphin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ekedolphin/32/10003_2.png) [@ekedolphin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ekedolphin)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2022, 12:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537/60 "2022-02-16T00:07:14Z")
Non-denominational Christian weighing in with my church’s two cents: We practice infant baptism, which our pastor always specifies does _not_ guarantee salvation. It’s more for the parents, to symbolize that they intend to bring their child up in a Christ-like manner, and for the community to recognize that we have a responsibility to “enfold this precious child in our love”. Infants who are baptized in our church sometimes choose to be baptized again once they’re old enough to consent and understand what it means. In the past, they’ve gone through a Pastor’s Class. We occasionally have adult baptisms, as well. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/its-official-the-catholic-church-is-nuts/959537.md?page=4)