Pope tells grandmother not to ‘insist’ on grandchildren’s baptism

VATICAN CITY (LifeSiteNews) — Writing to a grandmother distressed about her children’s lack of attention to religion for their own children, Pope Francis told her to “accompany” them but not to insist they baptize their children.

In the inaugural edition of a new Vatican magazine, Pope Francis downplayed an Italian grandmother’s concerns about her grandchildren not receiving the Sacrament of Baptism. The Pope’s reply came in direct response to a letter from a woman named “Oliva” and will form a regular feature in the magazine.

Oliva recounted how the youngest of her three grandchildren was “not baptized, because her parents, who were married civilly, drifted away from the Lord during their teenage years.”

The young girl, now aged five, appears to have remained away from the Church with Oliva recounting that the girl’s parents have “no desire” to “seek Him [God] and make Him present in their lives.”

Such a scenario, Oliva wrote, “is a source of great suffering for me because I know how important it is to have the Lord by our side, to pray to Him, to listen to Him and to receive His love.”

“I imagine my granddaughter without this great gift, without the Sacrament of Baptism, she is so curious about the story of Jesus with so many questions of her own. What will Jesus think of all this?” she asked.

The grandmother wrote that she continued her prayers for the young girl’s parents to return to the practice of the faith and placed her problem before the Pope, seeking his “comfort and advice, confident that the Lord will show us the right way to help our granddaughter.”

Francis empathized with Oliva, but urged her not to insist that her grand-daughter be baptized.

He first highlighted baptism as “the door that allows Christ the Lord and the Holy Spirit to dwell, to take up residence, in our person” and noted the importance of baptizing infants rather than waiting until later life.

Francis also noted that “Baptism still cannot be imposed on parents who do not want it for their children,” recommending instead that grandparents, “by your example, can open many hearts that seem closed.”

He urged Oliva to “carry on the dialogue always … with hope, with meekness and with charity.”

But he specifically also recommended that she did not insist upon the grandchild’s baptism: “Accompany your children, talk to them, but without insisting with the proposal of Baptism. Free love is more persuasive than many words.”

The Pontiff cited the example of St. Monica and her “unceasing prayers” for the conversion of her son, St. Augustine.

St. Monica famously prayed for many years for Augustine to return to the practice of his Catholic faith, following him from country to country in order to be near him and attempt to lead him away from his notably non-Catholic lifestyle. After initially intending to cease contact with him due to his abandoning of the faith, St. Monica was given a vision in which she received reassurance that he would return to the faith, which he eventually did many years later.

The Catholic Church teaches that baptism “is the basis of the whole Christian life, the gateway to life in the Spirit,” and the sacrament which makes one a member of the Church. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, n. 1213)

It is a matter of faith, a teaching held de fide, that baptism is necessary for one’s salvation.

The Catechism of the Council of Trent urges the utmost importance of baptizing children as soon as possible, in the section entitled “Baptism Of Infants Should Not Be Delayed”:

The faithful are earnestly to be exhorted to take care that their children be brought to the church, as soon as it can be done with safety, to receive solemn Baptism. Since infant children have no other means of salvation except Baptism, we may easily understand how grievously those persons sin who permit them to remain without the grace of the Sacrament longer than necessity may require, particularly at an age so tender as to be exposed to numberless dangers of death.