More on Blessing Children at the Altar

My previous post on this matter has generated quite a lot of feedback, both positive and negative, and most of it by far has been reasonable and thoughtful, which is appreciated all around I’m sure.

So, first, a reply to those who have suggested this opinion is a failure to let the little ones come to Jesus, which would be in direct contradiction to his severe warning against it. This criticism is, aside from its being audacious, an unintended slight on Baptism, it seems to me. I have thirteen grandchildren, eleven of whom I have had the privilege of baptizing myself. I have baptized countless other infants, including, for that matter, my own six sons. Have they not been brought to Jesus? Indeed they have, and in a far more direct and important way than by a pastoral blessing at the altar, though I hasten to repeat that blessing such baptized children is a wonderful thing for any pastor to do. The issue here is strictly whether doing it at the altar during the distribution is to be preferred or not.

If people truly feel so strongly about the importance of having a baptismal blessing given to the child by the pastor, that is a salutary thing, and can easily be done in a number of other ways. The pastor could visit the Sunday School, or even the home of the child. Or more simply, bless these little ones as they leave church. Why must it be in connection with the distribution of the Sacrament?

At this point I’m compelled to wonder, if perhaps unfairly, whether there’s a thought that blessing children during the distribution is better because they are closer to the Sacrament, closer to the Body of Christ. I hope not, because that would imply that mere proximity to the Body of Christ is somehow a kind of blessing in itself. I find this implication troubling, because we ought to know that the Sacrament of the Altar is a blessing to those who eat and drink it, and only because of that. Martin Luther decried the Papists’ abuses of the Sacrament, ranging from the use of a monstrance, to a Corpus Christi parade, or even to other abuses such as what was once not too uncommon, taking a Host home and placing it on one’s altar. To this day there are stories of people from Eastern Churches given a Host to carry with them on journeys. This all stems from the faulty notion that the Sacrament may be used for purposes other than what it was intended. Our Confessions have plenty to say about that.

But I suspect the better reason is more likely closer to what some responses have given, that perhaps it inculcates a sense of the importance of going to the altar for as a kind of prelude to this important thing, receiving the Sacrament, before eligibility. I have already suggested that staying behind can do that equally, if not more.

More problematic is the matter of distractions. It is true that distractions cannot be altogether avoided, and also that parents of young children do sometimes have to make such sacrifices. Better that they do than that they stay away altogether, of course. If, however, distractions at the altar can be kept to a minimum, that is a good thing. Crying children in the pews is one thing—I like to think of it as “holy noise”—but unruly children at the altar is another. While normally that does not happen, when it does, it can be quite unsettling for all. At such a time it is not only a distraction, in my view, but somehow comes close to denigrating the Sacrament itself. Not, of course, that the child is guilty of it, or even the parents, But there comes a point when the church must ask whether there is a more prudent way to do things. Having a child running to-and-fro between parents at the altar, or or slouching down at the rail as if to rest there, ore even reaching out for the chalice, all of which events I have experienced, is not good. We need to have this discussion, in my opinion.

To those who are at a loss as to how to look after the children left behind in the pew, who might also become unruly there, I offer with a nod that such a thing is not to be desired either. But I am not convinced that bringing them along is the only solution. There must be others. Perhaps we can be thinking about that.