HARRISBURG, Pa. – A mother cannot be barred from having her minor daughter baptized simply because her former husband – the girl’s father – objects to the sacrament being administered in a Russian Orthodox church, a Pennsylvania appellate court has ruled.
A three-judge panel of the Superior Court overturned a judge in Mercer County, on the Pennsylvania-Ohio border, saying there was not sufficient evidence that a baptism would harm the child to warrant the court’s intrusion into the dispute.
"It is quite the leap of logic to convert (the father’s) ire … at the prospects of (his daughter) receiving the sacrament of baptism to proof of a `substantial risk’ of harm," Senior Judge Zoran Popovich wrote on behalf of the panel in a ruling issued Monday.
David and Jana Hicks were married in a Presbyterian church in 1987 and later attended evangelical and Pentecostal churches in Ohio and Pennsylvania. They divorced in 1998, according to court papers.
The parents have since shared custody of the girl, who was not identified in the court documents. She attended Roman Catholic services – and, since 2001, Russian Orthodox services – when she was with her mother and continued going to an Assembly of God church in Hermitage, Pa., when with her father.
Neither parent objected to the multidenominational religious training until the father learned that the mother planned last year to have the girl baptized at a Russian Orthodox church in Cleveland. The mother also was engaged to a Russian Orthodox man and has since married him, according to her attorney, Stephen Mirizio.
After the father contested the planned baptism in court, Mercer County Common Pleas Judge Thomas R. Dobson ruled in June that the girl could not be baptized in any church without her parents’ mutual consent but that she could decide for herself when she turns 13. The judge said he picked the age somewhat arbitrarily, but that, "13-year-olds, as a rule, are mature enough to make that decision."
Dobson said the girl, who is now 9, would be harmed by stress resulting from her parents’ religious differences.
"The choice of which religion to have their daughter baptized into is viewed by the parties as a battle for the immortal soul of the child," he said. "Neither party appears willing to lose to the other party. … No good can come to any child placed into such an emotional situation." [Source]
I wonder what David Hick’s view on baptism is. If he sees it only as a sign with no real meaning as many Protestants do then I wonder what his theological difficulty would be? Assemblies of God mainly concentrates on the Baptism of the Holy Spirit as evidenced by speaking in tongues. They don’t see water baptism as regenerative, but do require full immersion for a "valid" baptism so maybe he sees this as problematic. To claim harm from a baptism, even if you consider it an invalid baptism, seems rather strange.
5 comments
The Orthodox always baptize by full immersion, as do Eastern Catholics.
This has nothing to do with what harm will come to the child because of a religious rite, but everything to do with making sure one parent doesn’t “get one over” on the other. This poor child is caught up in a terrible battle between two people who should be able to put her welfare ahead of their sick need to make sure the other doesn’t win.
I am one who firmly belives that Baptism is absolutely required for salvation, but there is such a thing as Baptism of Desire which I think would fit the bill in this case. Neither parent should call themselves a Christian of any sort if they are willing to drag the child through the courts over this.
Yes, that’s perfectly true, Lily, but unfortunately they’re in a position now in which one of them will inevitably appear to win and the other to lose. As a matter of practical fact, either the girl will be baptized (Mom wins) or she won’t be (Dad wins). I can’t see that there’s anything gained by putting off her baptism. If the child should die unbaptized it would be an extremely nice point of theology whether baptism of desire could be considered to have taken effect, if the mother’s desire to baptize her was insufficient to be worth persisting to achieve it. (I don’t think there’s any such thing as Baptism of Meaning To But Putting It Off.) I can’t see that the father has a leg to stand on legally: if he can’t prevent the child’s going to church with her mother, he can’t prevent her undergoing a rite of that church. It would be the same as the mother’s saying that she could go to the AOG church with him but couldn’t receive a blessing. I must say, however, that it would have been more seemly for a judge called Zoran Popovich to have recused himself from ruling on a case which appears to pit the Russian church against another denomination. It would be too easy for the father’s lawyers to claim bias, and that isn’t the sort of problem judges usually want to set themselves up for.
Could not the child recieve baptism at both places. the Eastern Orthodox now and the AOG upon reaching 12 years of age. By the way I am a protestant who enjoys your blog.
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