Three...is the Magic Number

On Saturday, my friend Kim the New Greek Orthodox had her son baptized into the church. Needless to say, it was very different from the minute-and-a-half-tops baptisms I'm used to, being a baptist. Theirs was a separate ceremony, and, let me tell you...it was jam-a-needle-in-your-eye fun! On my feet for two hours in heels (yes...heels. I'll admit it. Stupid). The preist was weird weird weird, and people were kissing his hand. Eew. And everything...everything was done in threes. But enough whining. There were some things about their ceremony/religion that I appreciated.

Their religion is preist-led. So, while they tend to diefy their head figure, they also don't let their church membership get higher than 250. That's kind of cool. They all meet in little houses. That's community. They also set aside certain times of the year to go meet in the different house churches. Way cool. That's the kind of community I'm looking for.

This whole process of her catechism has made me think about what it must be like to go through so many hoops and classes and services just to be something that wasn't even what I chose myself. For instance, if I wanted to be Greek Orthodox, I would go through all of these hoops and become Greek Orthodox, and get baptised into the faith, like the three adults before her child did. I would have chosen it for myself.

But the thing is, Kim didn't choose this for herself. She fell in love with a guy, and he was Greek Orthodox, and since she didn't really have any prominent beliefs to speak of, she agreed to raise their son G.O. and has chosen to go through the catechism to be baptised in that faith.

But the thing is, I wouldn't want to go through with something like that, even for the man I love. Because I can't love my man more than my God, or my priorities are out of whack, and my marriage will not be successful. But does that mean I will only marry a southern Baptist boy? What about if I marry someone from another denomination?

Things for me to think about...