Baptism by clergy before ordination (e.g. St Athanasius)

[Paul Cowan]

I am reading the life of St. Anthanasius and wondered how not just a nonclergy, but a child can perform a true baptism


Saint Athanasius the Great, Archbishop of Alexandria, was a great Father of the Church and a pillar of Orthodoxy. He was born around the year 297 in the city of Alexandria into a family of pious Christians. He received a fine secular education, but he acquired more knowledge by diligent study of the Holy Scripture. In his childhood, the future hierarch Athanasius became known to St Alexander the Patriarch of Alexandria (May 29). A group of children, which included Athanasius, was playing at the seashore. The Christian children decided to baptize their pagan playmates.

The young Athanasius, whom the children designated as "bishop", performed the Baptism, precisely repeating the words he heard in church during this sacrament. Patriarch Alexander observed all this from a window. He then commanded that the children and their parents be brought to him. He conversed with them for a long while, and determined that the Baptism performed by the children was done according to the Church order. He acknowledged the Baptism as real and sealed it with the sacrament of Chrismation. From this moment, the Patriarch looked after the spiritual upbringing of Athanasius and in time brought him into the clergy, at first as a reader, and then he ordained him as a deacon.

Granted he grew to become a most holy person, but how does his "play acting" with his young friends bind the children in this case pagans? Were the pagan playmates also "playing" or were they aware of the gravity of what they were doing?

Paul

[Isaac Crabtree]

Isn't the point of the mystery that Christ is at work in our baptism? I've heard that anyone can baptize, because it is really Christ who does it. This subject is particularly close to my heart, because recent events in my wife's and unborn son's life have led our priest to tell us that as soon as he is born alive, to give him holy baptism, if he (the priest) is not there.

Btw, there is another story from the lives of the martyrs where a play mocking Christians portrayed a baptism... but it illumined the one who received it who began preaching Christ to the audience. At first they laughed because they thought it was part of the show, but then things got serious and the person gave up his life as a martyr after his most unusual baptism.

[Father David Moser]

It is permitted for any Orthodox Christian to give baptism in the name of the Father Son and Holy Spirit in an emergency. As soon as possible after that emergency, the one who was baptized must be brought before a priest who will say the prayers that had been omitted due to necessity over the one so baptized and give the sacrament of Chrismation. I have done this in a couple of cases - one was a child baptized by his father in a situation where there was not priest available and the other was a grown woman who had been baptized in secret by her mother during the soviet years but never taken to the Church (as it was against the law at that time). Many years later, as an adult, she came to me and I finished what her mother had begun with the sacrament of Chrismation and the reception of the Holy Mysteries. A short time later, her father, himself a former non-believer, came to the Orthodox faith and I had the honor of baptizing him as well - and he and I became very good friends (although I could only communicate with him through an interpreter or with my almost non-existent Russian) until he died a couple of years ago due to cancer.

Remember O Lord, the soul of Thy departed servant Georgii.

Fr David Moser

[Andreas Moran]

It was very common in the Soviet Union for baptisms to be hastily and imperfectly performed even by priests, and, in my wife's family's experience, for chrismation to be omitted. Though my wife was baptised (after a fashion) by a priest in great secrecy at age 14, she was not chrismated until she came to England in 2003. Yet after 1988 (when it was safer), she had communued of the Mysteries since she had been unaware of the incompleteness of her reception into the Church until it was discussed some seven years ago.

[Paul Cowan]

It is permitted for any Orthodox Christian to give baptism in the name of the Father Son and Holy Spirit in an emergency. As soon as possible after that emergency, the one who was baptized must be brought before a priest who will say the prayers that had been omitted due to necessity over the one so baptized and give the sacrament of Chrismation. Fr David Moser

It would appear in this story the second half of the requirement was met. However, the story describes the children as playing and this was not an emergency. I can see where St. Anthanasius may have been led by the Holy spirit to do this thing, and "things" outside the norm have been done throughout history, so this is one of those quirky one-timers that was accepted as proper?

Paul

[Owen Jones]

Just my personal opinion, mind you, but the church in Athanasius' day was a little less bureaucratized than it is today and so the Holy Spirit was given a little more lattitude.

[Cyprian (Humphrey)]

It seems that the point is that any baptized Orthodox Christian CAN baptize. That does not equate into saying that in our modern day and age, any baptized Orthodox Christian SHOULD baptize.

Outside of serious emergencies and persecutions, we SHOULD let our clergy do the baptisms. But we should also understand that, in necessity, any baptized Orthodox Christian CAN baptize.

It's the difference between SHOULD in most circumstances, and CAN in emergencies, and extreme situations, that is the issue.

[Vasiliki D.]

It would appear in this story the second half of the requirement was met. However, the story describes the children as playing and this was not an emergency. I can see where St. Anthanasius may have been led by the Holy spirit to do this thing, and "things" outside the norm have been done throughout history, so this is one of those quirky one-timers that was accepted as proper? Paul

My own thoughts of course and I hope one day God enlightens someone from this group to find a good patristical comment on this question - because it is something I thought about when I read the story of Saint Athanasius as well ....

the possibilities that ran through my mind were:
a) Like Owen said - pre Synodical Canons, hence, the Holy Spirit would have worked differently!

b) Saint Athanasius is a great in our church so if you take time out of the equation and place him into eternity ... he would be able to baptise in the Name of the Trinity since he is a Saint and a GREAT Saint from all eterntiy - a ONE OFF SPECIAL as you said ... perhaps,

c) A one off by God to show how great he would become in the future?

Fantastic question....

[M.C. Steenberg]

Dear friends,

Setting aside for the moment (apologies, Paul) the question of St Athanasius (perhaps I can come back to that later), I did just want to make a brief comment on the possibility of any baptised Christian baptising another: namely, to repeat that this is only in the case of emergency, where it is not possible for a priest to perform the baptism, and there is a real and immediate risk (e.g. of death) that prevents waiting until such a time and place as a priest would be available.

Circumstances make these conditions fluid at times (e.g. in periods of great persecution), but the rule is for the preservation of right order and the safeguarding of responsibility in the baptismal sacrament and relationship.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

[Paul Cowan]

As Orthodox we immerse in triple immersion and not sprinkling. But in the case of an emergency when it is not possible such as in a hospital room or other place with no amount of water, how might a layman perform this sacrament? Are there degrees of permissability of deviance to "the rules" of how things are done?

ie: take a cup of tap water into a hospital room of a dying child and making the sign of the cross over the cup dip your finger in it and 3 times on the forehead of the child say 'I baptise you in the name of the father X, and the Son X and the Holy Spirit X'. and the child is baptised unless/until clergy come?

Paul

[Dimitris]

ie: take a cup of tap water into a hospital room of a dying child and making the sign of the cross over the cup dip your finger in it and 3 times on the forehead of the child say 'I baptise you in the name of the father X, and the Son X and the Holy Spirit X'. and the child is baptised unless/until clergy come?
Hallo!

In Orthodoxy we use the passive form: "The servant of God, yyy, is baptised in the name...."