Originally Posted by
mamicka
Yes, I know that. I just mean - so the OP decides to have DC baptized in the Presbyterian church. Does that mean that the DC will somehow be considered more Presbyterian? That baptism will be recognized by the Catholic church as no different than a baptism in a Catholic church. So what's the difference? So I guess what I mean by "just baptized" is - does it have to be qualified by the denomination? For example, does one have to say I was baptized Methodist or can one just say I was baptized?
The Catholic Church will recognize the Presbyterian (or other Protestant) baptism as licit and valid, but not exactly the same as a Catholic baptism. A child (or adult) baptized in the Catholic Church is a member of the Catholic Church, while the child who is baptized in a Protestant church is not. This is true even if the individual does not practice the Catholic faith as long as he/she does not explicitly and formally convert to another faith.
For example, my husband was baptized in a Catholic Church, but was not raised Catholic or in any particular faith(due to a situation similar to the OP). His family attended several different types of churches while he was growing up, but he never converted to or sought membership in any of them. Because of this DH is Catholic (according to canon law) even though he never practiced the faith and didn't really know much about Catholicism before he and I met. This presented us with an interesting situation during our marriage preperation. We were not considered a couple of mixed-faith and did not need to go through all the extra paperwork and classwork that is involved with that circumstance. However, we had many of the same social and spiritual issues that mixed-faith couples do and requested extra counseling to assist with those.
There are other instances where the different between a Catholic baptism and a Protestant baptism comes into play. So in the Catholic Church at least, yes it does make a difference. I don't know if it does in Protestant churches.
Gena
DS, age 11 and always amazing
“Autistics are the ultimate square pegs, and the problem with pounding a square peg into a round hole is not that the hammering is hard work. It's that you're destroying the peg." - Paul Collins, Not Even Wrong