Re-Baptized

I was 13 years old when I was baptized. In the church tradition that I grew up in, baptism was the most pivotal moment of your life, the exact timestamp of your salvation. And if you died a moment before, there was no guarantee you'd be spared from Hell. It was essential that you were baptized at the precise moment you made the choice to give your life to Jesus. So on a Saturday night in 2007, while my parents and I were hanging out with another family, I mentioned to my friend that I thought I wanted to be baptized.

And then, the frenzy began.

We rushed into the living room, interrupted the adult conversation to tell my parents, called my grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and friends, piled in the car and made our way to the church. The preacher met us there with a key, turned the lights on, and led me and my dad through the pews, past the communion table, and into the “green room” of the church. I put a poncho over my shorts and tee shirt, and my dad slid on the fishing waders that were tucked away in the storage closet. We stepped into the baptismal, my dad asked me the standard questions, then he plunged me back into the lukewarm water. This was the moment. Every sin I had committed in my 13 years of life was washed clean and I was gifted a fresh start. When I came out of the water, our family and friends began singing a hymn (clapping was a big “no” for us). I felt joy and relief but also, somehow, fear?

I was forgiven, I now had a shot at heaven. For that, I was grateful. But the anxiety was setting in. Now I really really couldn’t mess up. I committed to read my Bible every day for the rest of my life and never miss a Sunday of church (spoiler: I have not kept this up). The pressure was on. I felt envious of every person who got baptized when they were old— they had fewer years to screw up and lose their spot in heaven. As we drove from the church to my grandparents house to celebrate my baptism, I prayed that God would allow me to die in a car accident on our way there. Surely I couldn’t have sinned too much in those twenty minutes since I emerged from the water, so I would definitely make it straight into heaven. But, to my dismay, I made it safely to my grandparents and the stress grew.

I began counting my sins and setting them on a scale, praying that my good deeds would outweigh my bad. Baptism was the only shot I had at this blanket forgiveness. And, as you could imagine, this pressure could only build for so long before it combusted.

In the following teenage years, my view of baptism was forced to evolve. This was the first time that I had to challenge one of the core tenets of my faith. I was able to recite plenty of verses that made it clear that baptism was a requirement for salvation, no questions asked. I could debate with anyone who thought a sprinkle was sufficient or that a baby could be baptized. But, my fear persisted and I was forced to ask questions: What happens if someone dies on the way to their baptism? Are they still going to heaven? What about someone who was baptized in a different church? Could you be baptized more than once? What if someone has a genuine faith but missed the baptism part? Slowly, something that once felt black and white was becoming grayer and grayer. I wrestled with how to hold this rigid belief about baptism alongside the idea that maybe God is merciful and loving, too? The dance continued and I eventually allowed the greater arc of God’s love to trump this stagnant view. I could get on board with the evangelicals that baptism was an “outward symbol of an inward change.” Maybe I could accept that an unbaptized person might experience a genuine faith. The walls kept expanding.

Fast forward to two months ago, J and I stood at the 800-year-old baptismal in our Episcopal Church in New York City and baptized our 11 month old daughter, Rosey. We were surrounded by our parents, friends, pastors, and fellow parishioners. We recited a beautiful liturgy from the Book of Common Prayer. We renewed our own baptismal vows (you know, easy things like renouncing Satan, seeking and serving Christ in all persons, etc). Our pastor scooped water onto Rosey’s head and declared the truth that she is fully known and loved and accepted by God. She took it like a champ until the last scoop of water, when she lost her ever living mind and screamed so loud you would have thought it was an exorcism. It was holy and human and divine, all at once.

An infant baptism… teenage Torrey wouldn’t know what to do with this. She would be deeply concerned that I had missed the mark, left the fold, lost the faith, [insert any phrase about becoming too much like “the world” here]. But, thank God that “His ways are higher than mine” because I could have missed this—this beautiful moment, the overwhelming love from our community, these holy words. I haven’t walked away from God by leaving behind my black and white view of baptism, but I’m being ushered into a fullness and a freedom that I had yet to know. This baptism was a moment for Rosey, of course. A moment for me and J as parents, yes. But, it was also a moment for myself, for my own faith, offering a renewed sense of God’s promise to lead me to places that I would have never expected to go and to meet me with his expansive love.

There are many beautiful words found in the Liturgy for Baptism in the Book of Common Prayer. But this line that we prayed for Rosey has stuck with me:

Give Rosey an inquiring and discerning heart

the courage to will and to persevere

a spirit to know and to love you

and the gift of joy and wonder in all your works.

[An inquiring and discerning heart] Let her ask questions. Lots of questions. Give her the courage to examine what we take for granted as a given. Help her sift through the sand to find the gems hidden between and beneath. May she hold a loose grip on most things and an even tighter one on the essence of her identity as beloved.

[The courage to will and persevere] When life feels like a trudge rather than a dance, let her just. keep. moving. Give her the vision to know that the worst thing is never the last thing (thank you, Buechner). To trust that there is always, always, always a new day.

[A spirit to know and love you] Let her live with a desire to explore the person of Christ and look for him in churches and scripture and playgrounds and classmates. To know that He can be found everywhere and in everyone. May love be her first thought when she wonders what God is like.

[The gift of joy and wonder in all your works] Give her eyes that are searching for delight in each moment, big and small. Fill her with awe at the lights and sounds and smells all around her. May she experience laughter so full that tears fall from her eyes and smiles so big that her cheeks hurt.

These words are the very essence of the life that Rosey was baptized into. So maybe the water of baptism is a symbol of her new life, and a dedication or offering, and a moment of salvation, and a prayer for wonder and joy and questions and courage. Maybe it can be all of it, all at once.

The moment of the water trickling over Rosey’s head, or my submersion into the baptismal, or the dunk in the backyard pool is holy because it is a marker of the life to come with God. So, when we sit by the river or give our babies a bath or walk through the rain or swim in the ocean, we have the chance to pray these prayers over again. To continue to ask God to give us all of these things—an inquiring and discerning heart, the courage to will and to persevere, a spirit to know and to love God, and the gift of joy and wonder in all His works.