A Brief Thought on Wesleyans and Baptism Debates

Someone asked me, given the recent article in Wesleyan Life, how the son of a Wesleyan minister might never have been baptized. Many Wesleyans do not know that the Pilgrim Holiness Church was not strong on baptism.

For example, my grandfather was a Quaker minister before he switched when the Pilgrim church was officially formed in the early 20s. Asked to perform a baptism in his 50s, he decided he should be baptized too first. My mother was not baptized until she was in her 40s (and our family was good friends in Florida with the Coates, with a similar background). [1]

If you find this incomprehensible, there is a key factor in play. Few of us realize that we wear glasses when we read the Bible. This was true of the Quakers, but it's also true now of us as Wesleyans. America is Baptist country. It suits our culture like hand in glove. Quakers and Salvation Army folk are wearing a different set of glasses and don't generally baptize at all.

I believe in baptism as a norm. I love that you can still be baptized as an infant in the Wesleyan Church, following our Wesley roots. I love that we don't specify immersion, pouring, or sprinkling.

Wesleyan Church Wesleyans generally borrow their thinking from others. The more academic side says, "But we're Wesleyans; it needs to be more sacramental." The more populist side feels the forces of baptistification and says, "Acts, Acts, Acts."

And I feel like we Wesleyans have been doing just fine with our big tent position on baptism. Paul looks on at our current debates and says, "Were you baptized in the name of believer's immersion? I thank God I didn't baptize any of you (to your horror). Ok, maybe I did baptize a handful." We all think we're just reading the Bible and doing what it says. And so do the other 20,000 denominations.

Here was my attempt to capture what I perceive to be the Wesleyan Church position on baptism (now in this). Here is another piece I wrote before that, "The Skinny on Wesleyans and Baptism."

[1] As an artifact of her upbringing, I remember my mother noting in Mark 16:16 that while baptism is mentioned as part of being saved, the second part only says that those who do not believe will be condemned. In other words, it does not say that those who are not baptized stand under condemnation.