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Do JW baptisms count?

F

filthyrottendirty

Member
The Christian forum on here is dead and even if it wasn't I don't have enough privilege to post there. So for a Christian can I get baptized by JW?
 
AlexanderG

AlexanderG

Active Member
I mean, there are 40,000+ denominations of Christianity, and no reliable method to tell which one is the "one true" interpretation, if any.

So, just pick whatever makes you feel comfortable and fulfilled, and then insist that you're right and that everyone who disagrees with you is using the wrong hermeneutics, isn't properly interpreting such-and-such, etc. That's what every Christian does, as far as the rest of us can tell. It's not like anyone else can gainsay the vague emotional feelings which you attribute to god to reassure yourself that you're correct?

Sorry if I seem snarky. It's just intriguing to me that you guys can simply pick whatever you feel like believing and then actually believe it. I don't think my own beliefs are a choice, because that's not how it works for me.
 
stvdv

stvdv

Veteran Member: I Share (not Debate) my POV
filthyrottendirty said:
The Christian forum on here is dead and even if it wasn't I don't have enough privilege to post there. So for a Christian can I get baptized by JW?
Click to expand...
In Holland we have "Freedom of Religion"
This implies that you are Free to believe what you want

IF you believe you can get baptized by JW
THEN you can go for it

Anyway, belief implies not knowing for sure
Hence just try it out, and if it feels bad then you know

Or ask Jesus if this is His Plan for you (before doing it)
I once said mentally to God "tomorrow I go for it", unless You ...
I got a clear message that my Plan was not His Plan

Best wishes to find the right solution
 
F

filthyrottendirty

Member
AlexanderG said:
I mean, there are 40,000+ denominations of Christianity, and no reliable method to tell which one is the "one true" interpretation, if any.

So, just pick whatever makes you feel comfortable and fulfilled, and then insist that you're right and that everyone who disagrees with you is using the wrong hermeneutics, isn't properly interpreting such-and-such, etc. That's what every Christian does, as far as the rest of us can tell. It's not like anyone else can gainsay the vague emotional feelings which you attribute to god to reassure yourself that you're correct?

Sorry if I seem snarky. It's just intriguing to me that you guys can simply pick whatever you feel like believing and then actually believe it. I don't think my own beliefs are a choice, because that's not how it works for me.
Click to expand...
You're making a lot of assumptions about me and other Christians. I don't "simply pick what I want to believe in" I believe the Bible and teachings that align with it. What do you believe?
 
Rival

Rival

se Dex me saut.
Staff member
Premium Member
mikkel_the_dane said:
No, they are not valid to you and those who believe like you.
Click to expand...
Like me? I'm a Kemetic Pagan.

If you want to become a Catholic after a JW baptism they will require you be rebaptised. Or the Orthodox Church.
That's their dogma.
 
Vouthon

Vouthon

Dominus Deus tuus ignis consumens est
Staff member
Premium Member
filthyrottendirty said:
The Christian forum on here is dead and even if it wasn't I don't have enough privilege to post there. So for a Christian can I get baptized by JW?
Click to expand...

You are completely free, of course, to receive baptism in any denomination that you feel drawn towards, including the Jehovah's Witnesses if that is what you believe.

If what you're asking more particularly, though, is how a baptism administered by the Jehovah's Witnesses would be viewed by mainstream churches, then I must agree with @Rival.

The Catholic and Orthodox churches, certainly, would not recognize your baptism according to Jehovah's Witness custom to be a valid reception of the sacrament, due to a lack of proper form and Trinitarian intention on the part of the ministers. Trinitarian faith calls for careful precision in language.

Granted, the Council of Trent in the sixteenth century defined that baptism administered by 'heretics' in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, with the intention of doing what the Catholic Church does, constitutes true Baptism (cf. DH 1617). For this reason, anyone can baptize a person - even a non-Christian can validly perform it - if they do so with the right wording and intent.

However in the case of Jehovah's Witnesses, their baptism ritual is not deemed to possess these requisite elements, given that the ceremony specifically denies the Trinity.

Thus, if you were to be baptised as a Jehovah's Witness and then sought to become Catholic, you would need to go through the catechumenate and the stages of the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults culminating in another (to our understanding, efficacious) baptism, along with the unbaptized from other religions or of no religion, because your JW baptism wouldn't have been recognised as a true one.

On the other hand, had you instead been baptized as a Lutheran, Anglican or Evangelical Protestant (for example) then this would not be necessary, because the Catholic Church would accept your first baptism in that other denomination to have been a valid one.
 
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