Baptisms Down

A news link on New Oxford Review reports that baptisms are declining in many churches... from the Southern Baptists to the Roman Catholics. One of the main reasons this is happening, acccording to the article, is because of interfaith marriage: people marry outside of their Christian tradition - or even outside of the Church - and decide to let their kids get baptized when they feel the time is right. They let it be their childrens' choice. Hmmm, I wonder if they would take one of their sons and say, "Well, let's not raise him as a boy or a girl. When he is old enough he can make his own decision as to which sex he wants to be." Or, "Let's not raise little Johnny to be financially secure and responsible, but instead we'll let him decide if he wants to be poor or middle class." That's what these parents are doing with the grace of God in baptism. They are robbing their children of it. If there is friction about whether or not the child should be baptized, then the couple should not be getting married in the first place. Christians should not marry unbelievers (or even "nominal" Christians) anyway - even as the children of Israel were forbidden to intermarry with the Canaanites. Too many churches do not teach what the scriptures teach in this area, and the world and the Church is worse off for it. In the evangelical/baptist world, I suspect one of the reasons for the downward trend in baptism has something to do with the whole "getting saved" theology. Why get baptized when you don't need it to get "saved". Since their faith is not incarnational, or even anti-incarnational, they see no need for sacraments. The Christian faith is mere assent to certain intellectual propositions, and living a morally upstanding life.