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{"id":18828,"date":"2011-07-29T00:06:40","date_gmt":"2011-07-29T05:06:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/community\/jesuscreed\/?p=18828"},"modified":"2011-07-25T19:46:29","modified_gmt":"2011-07-26T00:46:29","slug":"an-anabaptist-theology-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/jesuscreed\/2011\/07\/29\/an-anabaptist-theology-4\/","title":{"rendered":"An Anabaptist Theology 4"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

$\"\"$ <\/a>How widespread among Catholics, Orthodox or mainliners is a reconsideration of infant baptism in favor of (conscious) believer baptism? What do you think the NT teaches? <\/strong><\/p>\n

He observes that many contemporary anabaptist theologians, thinkers, writers and teachers simply don\u2019t focus on baptism or the Lord\u2019s supper; instead, they focus more on the social-ethical dimensions, like peacemaking and justice. Finger thinks this itself needs to be addressed by sketching a full-blown understanding of how Anabaptists have understood baptism (and the Lord\u2019s Supper, but today we deal with baptism).<\/p>\n

Essentially, the historic view is that preaching of the gospel led to faith and faith to baptism and baptism to eucharist. Hence, for the Anabaptist, baptism was a conscious act and not a passive act done upon someone (an infant) who was\/is not aware of what is happening.\u00a0 The focus was inward though there is a demand for the outward act. But their sense of faith was not individualistic; it was personal but also communal.<\/p>\n

And thus baptism, which has a rich history among Anabaptist writings, is a co-witness of inner faith and outer ceremony, spiritual reality and material expression, individual and congregational commitments, as well as a co-witness of the Trinity. So, then, what does Anabaptism say to the ecumenical discussion?Finger\u2019s focus is on the conscious element, and thus a query of infant baptism. He sees a number of congregations, including some Catholics and mainliners (he says nothing here about Orthodoxy), who are revisiting the question and seeing the postmodern value of baptism as a conscious act and that, with our social conditions changing from Christendom into a post-Christendom realities, infant baptism, while acceptable, is less desirable.<\/p>\n

Hence, Finger sees hope in others learning from the essence of the Anabaptist concious baptism mode.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"