Baby Blessing - Nonmember parents

[esogs]

We have a child who is going to be blessed in both the Catholic Church and the LDS church, by non-member parents.

As I understand it:

1. We can record the blessing and give the parents a blessing certificate, however, this is not sent to Church Headquarters, is a non-saving ordinance, and really does nothing to add the child as a member of the church.
2. I can however also ask the parents if they would like me to create a new record for the child, and they can agree by signature in which case we would:
a. Record the child as a new member (of record?)
b. If the child isn't baptised by age 19, the Bishop will review the status of the person and make the decision to either keep them on record or have them removed

Is this correct?

[aebrown]

Close. But with option 1, if you "record the blessing," then that does create a membership record, which is sent to CHQ. So option 1 is actually very similar to option 2 (and requires the same permission).

There's yet another option, which is to print a certificate without recording the blessing. That sounds like what you were hoping to accomplish with option 1. I'm not sure that's an approved option -- it would be the bishop's call.

[idjeeper2]

I would go with aebrown's other option, if it is okay with the handbook. What happens when the parents move? Either you are stuck with this record forever, or some other ward is going to get a household with a child as the head and no one there understanding why the home teachers keep coming to visit.

And, you might get a Stake President like my former one. His approach was that no record would be removed until every possibility of getting the person baptized had been exhausted. Meaning, the record would never be removed in my stake (unless the person wrote a letter requesting that).

On a different level, I don't really understand why the parents would want to do this but I guess it's their choice. I'd avoid creating the record if at all possible.