Baptismal encounter

When I came to prepare for today's Christening, I couldn't find the vials containing the Oil of the Catechumens and the Oil of Chrism. I had this vague recollection of having seen them bundled into the Blessed Sacrament aumbry in the Lady Chapel and thinking that wasn't appropriate at the time. I made some enquiries, but drew a blank. The aumbry key was not to be found. What I had forgotten when I started hunting was that I had removed them to a separate place on my last visit. 

Eventually I found them in a box labelled 'Our Lady' sitting quietly on a sacristy shelf. How memory can play tricks on us! The aumbry key, identifiable by a tassel attached to it, was as Caroline the sacristan insisted, in the main vestry safe, but instead of being visible, inits usual position, it was hiding in one of the chalices at the back of the safe.

The next obstacle was finding a baptism certificate. There were none in the study or in the sacristy, and it's possible the stock had run out and not yet been replaced, but nobody could remember. Then, by accident in with the baptism register in the safe, I found an old booklet of baptism certificate forms, dating back, I'd guess to early in the twentieth century, although the stub relating to the first entry was dated 1954. 

Amazingly, there were two loose certificate forms in the empty booklet and I was able to use one of them. The story of their daughter Mia's vintage baptism certificate gave her parents a little amusement, or was it bemusement? The church has only had one baptism register, in its life. The first entry dates from 1866, when ministry to English holidaymakers and residents here began in a hotel private chapel, ten years before the church was constructed.

The certificate, like the register, is simpler than modern equivalents, having no column for date of birth, and no separate column to account for the 'rank, profession or occupation of the mother as well as the father. That's a change for the better from my perspective.

The parents and brothers of Magnus the father arrived an hour early from Italy, and by that time all was ready, so I had time to chat with them about the history of the British in Switzerland, St John's and the nature of the Church of England's reformed catholic character, or you could say equally, its evolved protestanism I guess, as things have changed so much as a result of the liturgical revisions which have taken place during my lifetime. The mother Sarah's family are Belgian Catholics and Magnus's family are Church of Sweden, protestants, yet the baptism service nowadays would be equally familiar to everyone, both in form and content, largely due to ecumenical agreements made on Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry in the last half of the twentieth century. Great, and hopefully lasting achievements on the path to the reconciliation of churches worldwide.

I greatly enjoyed celebrating the baptism with these two relaxed and happy families. They expressed their appreciation, as they took their leave, and Sarah gave me a box of Lindt liqueur chocolates as a personal thank you gift. Then I walked to the lakeside apartment of Geoff and Joy for an apero, and met a couple from Texas who are newcomers to St John's. I ended up staying until nearly ten, well after the couple had left, as we got into some deep conversations about the changing face of the church and its ministry. Fortunately, my sermon for tomorrow was prepared before I came, and already printed. Now it's just a matter of getting to sleep in the heat.