To the editor,
Tucked away on page A3 of the September Catholic Courier is an item about "Slight change set in baptism text." This is misleading. Within the quotes — from a decree from the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments — is a statement that could be considered monumental rather than slight. Instead of simply welcoming the candidate into the Church of Christ, the celebrant is to add "… Catholic Church, governed by the successor of St. Peter …"
Yet the Nicene-Constantinople Creed we often confess on Sundays and Solemnities affirms "one baptism for the forgiveness of sins." There is not one baptism just for subjects of the Roman Church because this would imply that there is another kind of baptism for members of the Church of Constantinople and many other Churches who baptize with water and the invocation of the Trinity.
Surely we faithful readers of this paper deserve from your editors and writers a fuller explanation of this surprising change.
Rev. Edwin Metzger
Rochester
EDITOR’S NOTE: The item in question was included as a news brief in the September Courier simply in an effort to provide timely Vatican news. We are republishing the full Catholic News Service article — which is only slightly longer — in the October print issue. Based on the concerns raised by Father Metzger and others, however, we have decided in the future to publish CNS articles on comparable Vatican instructions only when the articles include implementation guidelines from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
