Babies at Church?

KKmama
Tue, 25 Nov 2014 04:31:45 +0000

Why kids may not belong in worship:

Most of my first church members were an extended family, except for one couple who lived next door to the building. The wife had had a brief affair with the organist, but then elected to work out her marriage with her husband. A baby was born and the paternity wasn’t certain, but legally she belonged to the husband. When the child was a little over 2, she came along with her parents to an evening Lenten service, escaped from mom and dad and followed me up to the altar during the processional hymn, and began dancing in front of the altar. I was enjoying her enthusiasm, and let her be. The organist’s grandmother, very loudly spoke up: "She HAS to be ____“s (her grandson’s) child - she acts just like he used to do!”.

And then there was the Sunday in that same church when I had a difficult time preaching because directly in front the pulpit but several rows back a toddler was scribbling all over her grandfather’s face with a tube of lipstick. He didn’t realize that it wasn’t her finger, and was letting her be, thinking that she was occupied, silent, and content.

The services at that church often started late one year because I had to nurse my own baby before we could begin (worship started at 11, and I had a service at another church earlier in the morning).