{"id":8568,"date":"2003-02-15T14:02:37","date_gmt":"2003-02-15T19:02:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8888\/2003\/02\/15\/unchristening\/"},"modified":"2003-02-15T14:02:37","modified_gmt":"2003-02-15T19:02:37","slug":"unchristening","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/2003\/02\/unchristening\/","title":{"rendered":"Unchristening"},"content":{"rendered":"

Disgruntled Catholics have come a step closer to washing
\noff holy water they were baptized in as tiny children. Upon request, priests in
\nItaly must note alongside baptism information the will of adults to leave the
\nRoman Catholic Church. Bowing to pressure from lobby groups who call the act ‘unchristening,’
\nthe Italian Bishops Conference (CEI) recently outlined the procedure. <\/font><\/p>\n

Both sides disagree on the scope of the phenomenon —
\none activist group claims 10,000 people have presented unchristening requests;
\nthe Church says it is trying to do right by a ‘few dozen’ people who wish not
\nto be counted as Catholics. <\/font><\/p>\n

Statistics, however, show a large number of slumbering
\nor disinterested members of the country’s predominant religion — although 98%
\nof Italians are baptized, only 36% attend mass regularly and over 14% never
\nattend at all, according to 1999 data from Italian National Statistical Institute
\n(ISTAT). Baptism records are used for Church statistics and influence whether
\nlast rites and religious funerals are administered.<\/font><\/p>\n

Cardinal Camillo Ruini, CEI president, made it clear
\nthat the Church considers the issue an entirely bureaucratic one. "You
\ncan’t cancel a sacrament any more than you can cancel the act of being born,"
\nhe told newspapers. <\/font><\/p>\n

…Bureaucratic or not, the policy change is a David-versus-Goliath
\ntype victory for small but persistent groups like the Italian Union of Rationalist
\nAtheists and Agnostics (UAAR) that has been campaigning for unchristening since
\n1995. At first, they made little headway with parish priests who refused requests
\nto modify or cancel baptism records.
\n<\/font>[Full
\nStory<\/a>]<\/p>\n

If you don’t believe in God why in the world would you spend time campaigning
\nfor unchristening? If if was a nonexistent superstition and nothing else, then
\nwhy bother? If your an atheist and believe that your earthly time is all that
\nyou have why spend it in a bureaucratic battle with what your think are non-rational
\npeople? <\/p>\n

People who reverted back to paganism in the 4th century had their own rite.
\nJulian the Apostate<\/a>
\nto try to wash away the waters of baptism, washed himself in a bath of bull’s
\nblood. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Disgruntled Catholics have come a step closer to washing off holy water they were baptized in as tiny children. Upon request, priests in Italy must note alongside baptism information the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8568","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-song-parody"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8568","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8568"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8568\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8568"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8568"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.splendoroftruth.com\/curtjester\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8568"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}