Thursday, February 8, 2007
Atheist or Believer?
Andrew has wrtiten a good response to infant baptism here."Infant baptism or not?" This has been the issue in my family for 2 generations. My grandmother decided against infant Baptism, so my father and his sisters (my aunts) were never baptised as infants. However, being half Filipino, Catholicism was always somewhere in the picture, my father went to a Catholic school and I remember my grandmother trying to admit my aunt(s?) into the CHIJ, Town Convent. Having grown up beside St. Joseph's Church in Bukit Timah, I remember how I was taught to pray to St. Joseph by placing my hands on his feet. I also learnt how to make the sign of the cross and say grace before meals. During Lent, I remember walking the life-sized Stations of the Cross. I also recall watching 'Jesus of Nazareth' on Good Fridays; my father would screen them.
Having said this, I must mention, that I too didn't receive the Sacrament of Baptism as an infant.
When I was 13 wanted badly to be in 'Full Communion' with the Church (not that I ever felt less a Catholic... Ok, so I did... I wanted the receive the Eucharist). At that time, my uncle and his family were journeying through RCIA, I wanted to join him. I father decided against it. I was so angry that when he did change his mind, I didn't want to attend it out of defiance. A year later, at 14, I consulted my Parish Chuch, to see if I could join RCIA. I was told that I was too young and I needed Parental approval; I didn't want to approach my father after the first incident. Another year went by.
Still deep longing for the Sacrament of Baptism, I decided to attend the Anglican Parish of The True Light. I knew that they'd give the Sacrament to anyone who expressed interest, regardless of age. True enough I was Baptised and annointed that very year at the age of 15 by Rt. Rev. Bishop Moses Tay, in the old Catholic rite of Baptism. When I turned 16, I sought Rev. Fr. Edmund Chong, who was the assistant Parish Priest of St. Joseph's. I did an 'express' RCIA and was finally admitted into the bossoms of Holy Mother Church at Easter.
It was a long journey but it sure was worth it. Perhaps it was a blessing in disguise... my journey alone only served to strenghten my conviction that the Holy Roman Catholic Church is the One, True, Apostolic Chruch founded by Jesus Christ.
My year with the Anglicans also enabled understand that the present disarray of Anglicanism is, in itself, clear evidence of the need for a defined focus of authority in the life of the Church on earth, and that such a magisterium is to be found in the person of Peter and his successors in the Holy See; The Pope. (See Can the 39 Articles Function as a Confessional Standard for Anglicans Today?)
Now, I aspiring to the Sacrament of Holy Orders. Do pray for me.
Copiosa apud eum redemptio,
Deo Juvante
Feast of St. Jerome Emiliani, Priest & Josephine Bakhita, Virgin
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