God does indeed move in mysterious ways and it is only just now, as I think about it, that I realise I did something this week for the first time ever, randomly at the time, but which makes sense now – I ironed my christening robe. I even put a picture of it on FB! Baptism! The truth is that this step of obedience was, for me, fraught with contradictions and real heartache.
I was baptised into the Catholic Church on 3 February 1957. I looked really cute in my beautiful christening robe, proudly held tight by my godmother in a photo I have to this day. This marked me as a catholic. Later on I took First Communion (yep, still cute, I have the picture to prove it!) and these two sacraments put me on the road to being a good catholic. The problem was that I rejected it all and found myself a Christian, a Protestant, with no equivalent photos. What to do?
I turned to Scripture. By now I was an older teenager (17 years old), well used to enquiring of God through His word. And I found baptism! More exactly, Jesus baptism and then His command for baptism of believers. I was amazed I had never heard a sermon about this in my church and decided to speak to the elders about it. I really challenged them, but they turned me away with ‘we are a mission, not a church, we don’t baptise’. I was devastated but, loyal as ever, accepted the verdict and said no more. I was so disappointed! I really wanted to make my commitment public in this way but short of going to another church, this was not going to happen.
The real pain came when I found out, years later, that the elders had changed their minds and baptised everyone but, by then, I was living in London. I was so mad that they had not bothered to contact me and invited me to join them! I was hurt. So much that I refused to consider baptism ever again. Surely my baby one was enough! It took years of persistent challenge from my husband before I agreed to be baptised. And, even then, it was a private service attended by just a handful of people. We lived in North Kensington then, so sometime around 1988/9 I think.
My baptism(s) could not have been more different to Jesus’! But, I think that, the act of ironing my christening gown, finally brought me peace about a practice that is so central to faith and became so complicated for me. God was there when I was named Maria Manuela, when I challenged the elders, when Tony Powell baptised me as an adult. They may have come at separate times across the decades, but I did have my moment(s) of decision, assurance, equipping, revelation and dedication. And, in carefully guiding my steam iron over the shiny satin undergarment, the gossamer like dress and the delicate lacy bonnet, I finally smoothed out the wrinkles of pain I carried for so long.
I look forward to my grandchildren wearing that gown! (subject to parental approval, of course!)
Hineni 