Baptism and Chrismation

 

Are you interested in Orthodoxy?

You are not alone. Each year the number of Western Christians finding a secure, stable and transforming life in Orthodoxy is growing. The British Orthodox Church is made up almost entirely of converts from a wide range of Christian backgrounds, other religions and no faith at all. We have all come together to find the fulness of the Christian life in Orthodoxy.

We are very glad that you have taken the time to visit our website and we hope that these resources will help you understand a little more of what Orthodoxy is all about, experience something of our spiritual life, and even discover how you can be a part of real Christianity for yourself.

Orthodoxy has so much to offer the modern world. It has a stability of faith and doctrine that rejects our preoccupation with the immediate. Orthodoxy does not change its moral base to reflect the mores of those around us, rather it demands that we ourselves be transformed day by day. So the practice of any form of homosexuality, or indeed the practice of heterosexuality outside marriage, is not condoned. There is no agitation for the ordination of women. The Bible remains the central pillar of Church teaching, and the traditional doctrines about Christ are vigorously defended. Our life in the Church has the aim of transforming us, we do not seek to make the Church merely reflect our own spiritual mediocrity.

If you have any questions then please make sure you ask them. We will do our very best to support your spiritual pilgrimage as best we can.

 

Perhaps you have been praying Orthodox daily prayers and have spent some months receiving instruction. Now you must consider if you wish to make the final step of becoming an Orthodox Christian in the British Orthodox Church, or indeed in any of the other Orthodox Churches.

In the tradition of the British Orthodox Church and the Coptic Orthodox Patriarchate it is necessary that a catechumen be baptised and chrismated, such a baptism is a fulfillment of whatever baptism may have been received in another Christian community. It does not deny what the roots and the foundation of faith which have been received in such communities but it recognises that the fulfillment of Christian initiation is found in Orthodoxy.

Likewise Chrismation, the anointing with oil for the gift of the Holy Spirit, does not eliminate all that has gone before, it builds on it and brings it to fruition. The British Orthodox Church is most careful to ensure that our members regard their time in other Christian communities with thankfulness and gratitude. We would not be members of the Orthodox Church now if it had not been for these other communities.

When the priest and catechumen have discussed this step and agreed that the time is right then the service of baptism and chrismation will be arranged and after it has been conducted the catechumen will be a new member of the Orthodox Church. It is not necessary to know everything before being baptised, indeed who can ever know or understand everything. However it is necessary for us to understand the step we are taking and what membership in the Church requires of us.

After baptism and chrismation we have as long as the Lord gives us to grow in knowledge, faith and experience.

Perhaps this step seems to be offensive and seems to require a rejection of our past lives and ministries. We should remember that all converts to Orthodoxy have followed this path, submitting to the teaching of the Church, whatever was required, so long as the possibility of becoming Orthodox was before us. It is the fulfillment of what we have desired, not the rejection of the past. It is wholly positive, a coming home. If we cannot submit to this then what other things will we refuse to submit to, yet it is not an instruction to oppress us but to bless us and fulfill in us all that we could ever have wished for.

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