Congratulations on the birth of your child!

The priests and people of Our Lady of Pompeii Church look forward to welcoming your child into the church and into our parish family.  We wish to do everything we can to provide a significant moment in the Baptism Ceremony for you and your child.

In arranging a Baptism at Saint Anthony’s, the first step for parents is to contact one of the parish priests.  The Introduction of The Rite of Baptism for Children in the Roman Catholic Church (hereafter referred to as Rite) speaks of the need for parents and priest to come together before Baptism:

Before the celebration of the sacrament, it is of great importance that parents moved by their own faith should prepare to take part in the rite with understanding.  "The parish priest should make it his duty to prepare them for the coming celebration."

Sunday is the preferred day for all Baptisms.  "To bring out the paschal character of Baptism it is recommended that the sacrament be celebrated during the Easter Vigil or on Sunday, when the Church commemorates the Lord's resurrection."

Moreover, the Rite states: "as far as possible all recently born babies should be baptized at a common celebration on the same day."   The reason for a group celebration of Baptism is to show that while by birth a child enters in to an individual family, by Baptism the child is born anew into a larger family, the Church, which is the family of God.   "In this way it is clear that the faith in which the children are baptized is not the private possession of the individual family but is the common treasure of the whole Church of Christ."

For this reason we provide a solemn celebration of the sacrament involving several families most Saturdays before noon. We encourage all families in the parish to plan Baptisms at this time.

The Rite further directs, "except for a good reason, Baptism should not be celebrated more than once on the same day in the same church."

Accordingly, while we would discourage individual (private) Baptisms for the reasons indicated above, we would continue to schedule such when families have a good reason for such a request; but in keeping with the directives above, we would not schedule more than one on any particular day.

These directives from the ritual are formulated to insure that our Baptism celebrations express well and beautifully the theology of our Church in regard to the importance and meaning of Baptism.