Five years ago I had never once believed in God, not even as a child. I was a content atheist and thought it was simply obvious that God did not exist. I thought that religion and reason were incompatible, and eventually became vocally anti-Christian. Imagine my surprise to find myself today, just a few years later, a convert to Christianity who loves her faith (my husband and I both entered the Catholic Church in 2007). This is the chronicle of my journey.
Godparent etiquette?
My husband and I are finally getting moving on having the kids baptized. The main holdup has been, as I've mentioned, the fact that we don't really know many serious Catholics to consider for the role of godparent. And since the role of godparent is to guide the child in their faith, especially if something should happen to the parents, our kids really need good godparents. If something were to happen to my husband and me I have serious concerns about what would happen with my children's faith.
So anyway, we do have some good candidates for the godparents. However, I worry that since I'm not familiar with any of this that I might end up hurting some feelings. So I have a question for you guys:
If a person is married, and their spouse is also Catholic, is it insulting to the spouse if you ask them to be a godparent but not their spouse? For example: we'd like for my son DB's godparents to be my aunt and a good friend of my husband's (I'll call him "Carlos"). Carlos is married to a woman who is a good Catholic. We like her but we don't know her very well, so we weren't considering her as godmother. Will it be an insult to Mrs. Carlos to select someone else as godmother when her husband is godfather?
Thanks in advance for any thoughts on this.
So anyway, we do have some good candidates for the godparents. However, I worry that since I'm not familiar with any of this that I might end up hurting some feelings. So I have a question for you guys:
If a person is married, and their spouse is also Catholic, is it insulting to the spouse if you ask them to be a godparent but not their spouse? For example: we'd like for my son DB's godparents to be my aunt and a good friend of my husband's (I'll call him "Carlos"). Carlos is married to a woman who is a good Catholic. We like her but we don't know her very well, so we weren't considering her as godmother. Will it be an insult to Mrs. Carlos to select someone else as godmother when her husband is godfather?
Thanks in advance for any thoughts on this.
posted by Jennifer @ Conversion Diary at 6:13 PM
10 Comments:
I know that I didn't choose god parents properly, but I don't think it would be a problem. (My children actually have "Christian Witnesses" as half of the godparent sets.)
None of the godparents for our family are married to each other, usually one from each side of the family. Of course, I have a godmother who is now raising her children Jewish and a godfather who is now Russian Orthodox. My sister's godmother was not Catholic but now is (and a serious one), and her godfather told her he's an atheist now. (Nice, huh?)
Anywho...if you explain it kindly, I'm sure there won't be a problem.
That was a lot of erroneous information for that one sentence, wasn't it?
(If you doubt it, look back at some of the things you've worried about that turned out to be less serious than you thought. God is with you and will sustain you and give you the graces you need!)
-Christine (The Soccer Mom - having trouble loggin in)
Jen,
I can't post to a non-Beta blog right now because they haven't added those features to it yet. Sorry for posting as anon.
-Christine
No. My husband was asked to be a god parent to his friend's son, but I wasn't asked. My feelings were not hurt at all. The guys are friends from work and I don't know them all too well. Ask whoever the Holy Spirit is leading you to ask.
We chose our godparents for "family politics" reasons rather than religious reasons. I hate that we did it. We made sure, though, that when Big Brother was confirmed this spring, that his sponsor was chosen for the RIGHT reasons--and I have to say, it was a good choice.
We never had a couple be both godparents.
We are godparents, as a couple, to one child--and her dad is the one our son asked to be his Confirmation sponsor. It was a real honor to be asked as a couple and I have to say, of all my godchildren, this is the one I really feel that sense of "godparent responsibility" over.
But you do not have to ask both halves of the couple to be the godparents. I've never been insulted when someone asked my husband but not me....
Another thought--you have chosen one from your side of the family and one from your husband's (or his group of friends). The godparents will see that, and that will also help them not to feel insulted that their spouse was not asked to be the other godparent.
There are so many variables here that it's difficult to predict how someone will react. I think it depends mostly on what type of person/personality they are, but I would suppose that there could be a strong cultural influence that might make this somewhat hard to predict.
I don't think there is any reason the wife *should be* offended or insulted, and I highly doubt she would be. In fact she might think it odd if you DID ask her seeing as she's not close to you.
If someone were offended by this, it wouldn't be because you did anything wrong, but because they were being unreasonable.
In my own experience, it's usually the folks who are most slipshod in their faith that are offended by such things.
Anyone even moderately serious about their faith would likely respect that you needed to pick the people who you thought would be able to best support you in raising your children in the faith.
My advice is that you should pick based on that criteria, who you think would best support you and your children in growing in the faith, and not be overly concerned about how it's perceived.
My 2 Cents.
Sounds fine to me! A lot of people I know chose 1 friend or family member from each side (ie-husband's friend and wife's sister).
yes, I was offended. My husband was asked and I was not. Since the birth of their child, the parents called both of us Godparents. Then recently it was only my husband and other couple's wife. The parents said that's how their Catholic faith requires it...that the Godparents cannot be married to each other, and they claim they are following the true followings of selection. Hogwash...my husband is not even Catholic. Furthermore, there will be financial problems if we end up raising the godchild. I am the breadwinner of this family...how do you think my husband will be able to support this child without me? Choose carefully.
A co-worker in our office said she was slighted for not being chosen with her husband as Godparents. The child's parents told her to her face that they wanted 2 people who made the most money to be able to raise their child in the event something happed to them. Co-worker's husband is a neuro-surgeon and makes 6 figures, the Godmother from the other family is an attorney that also rakes in 6 figures.
In the town I grew up in, where just about everyone but me and the Jewish doctor's family was Catholic, couples did ask other couples as couples to be godparents. The families then considered this to be a relationship, as if their children were cousins, sort of god-cousins. This was a sociological thing though. I just posted it here because I thought it was interesting.
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