Hindu Husband Upset and Angry for Baptising Kids

I would try to get a clergy from his religion and the priest who performed the Baptism together and discuss it with the two of you. If both clergy explain it you can both come to an understanding, hopefully.

I think it's more about the deception than the Baptism.

I don't think it matters what religion you are and what your views are... You deliberately went behind your husband's back.

If my spouse (PARTNER) did this to me, I would be livid as well.

I also think you diminish what Baptism really is.

For the sake of your marriage... Please get into counseling.

You are both parents to these children. You don't just go behind your partner's back on something like this. The trust you broke is as bad as some sordid affair.

You can try to fool your husband but please don't expect to fool us too. You are Catholic, so you very well know that Baptism is a sacrament and is not just a welcoming into church life. You had to select godparents for your children and you promised during the ceremony to raise your children Catholic. You owe your husband a huge apology although I don't think that will cut it. You also should not refer to him as "mentally disturbed".

I am neither Catholic nor HIndu, but I have to say that I think you are completely minimizing what baptism is. It is a promise to raise the children as Catholics. It is a solemn pledge taken before witnesses and in a house of worship. How is that to be translated as "Oh sure, they can practice Hinduism"??? No, it's not "some fools" poisoning his mind. You might have your own definition of what it means to be baptized or to be a Catholic, but that is not how the Catholic church views it. And even if you think they have to go through confirmation to be "true Catholics", the point is, you excluded your husband from a pivotal moment in his children's lives.

You absolutely deceived your husband and you are continuing to lie to him about what this ceremony was. You say you thought he would be bored hearing from the priest, but I suspect that you absolutely did not want him involved or having any idea what you are doing. You pulled a fast one and now you are looking for others to validate your deception.

You don't have a baptism problem. You have a marriage problem. You two absolutely should have resolved this issue before you had children, but even if you didn't, it could have been discussed and resolved after they were born. You didn't do that. You lied to him. And, you did it in a public ceremony, a mass and a baptism that included a whole lot of other people (including perhaps those who agreed to be your children's godparents) and that is public disrespect of your husband. That is your problem.

Get counseling - from a therapist, or someone with a background in pastoral/religious counseling. This is going to be a disaster for your relationship and for your children.

Since you are a Catholic, you KNOW the baptism is NOT a blessing. It's a sacred sacrament. How did your priest allow you to have your child baptized without his father's consent? I don't think I've ever seen a Priest do this without both parents consent.

What you did was wrong. VERY WRONG. You lied to your husband about something important. This isn't "oh honey, I'm sorry. I broke your favorite plate" this is "Hey, honey. I don't give a sweet patootie about your religion or what you think. I'm baptizing our kids and lying to you about it"

There are MANY successful marriages that have different religions. They communicate and share their beliefs so that their children are exposed and can make their own decisions when they are able.

What can you do? An apology would be a great place to start. Then a marriage counselor who specializes in multi-cultural marriages. You need to admit you were wrong. If you can't do that? Your marriage is doomed.

You should have given him the option to come and be a part of it. Being Catholic, you know that baptism is a sacrament, not just a blessing. What happens when Reconciliation and First Communion come around in a few years? You guys need to talk. Have a plan in place that both of you can agree upon.

Love Reverend ruby' s idea to involve a priest and clergy from his religion to help sort this out.

Of course he's angry. You lied to him and went sneaking around. Now you're trying to justify that behavior with excuses and reasons, including lying to downplay an important sacrament as nonconsequential.

Frankly, I'm surprised your priest even allowed it without the presence and/or consent of the child's father since you are married. Did you lie to the priest to get around that?

You did wrong, and you've harmed your relationship. Handle it like a grown woman and start with an apology. Then the two of you get into counseling because the two of you need to be on the same page about faith issues and come to compromise agreements that you both stick to. Don't be surprised if he looks at you differently for awhile. Your actions were not honorable, nor were they holy and made in good faith. You will have to earn back his trust.

I just skimmed through the religious aspect of this question. That's a bigger discussion that should have taken place as parents prior to this. Seek guidance from your clergy.

Lying, deceiving and trying to justify your actions to your husband? Maybe don't call him mentally disturbed for starters.

Is this really legitimate?

I don't think the real problem is the baptism or religion. You deceived your husband and held a significant ceremony for your children without telling your husband. That's the problem.

Stop discussing whether the kids are Catholic, Hindu, Baptist or Mormon or anything else. Start by apologizing to your husband for deceiving him and by holding such an important event for his children without telling him.

Figure out how to deal with the fact that you are a two-religion family. Respect each other's beliefs. Never assume that he wouldn't be willing to sit through a mass or a parent teacher conference or a baseball game or anything else. Be polite enough to give him the option. And realize that his religion is important to him, as yours is to you.

You might both consider meeting together with your priest and his swami (I hope that's the right word - I am not too familiar with the Hindu religion, but I mean the leader of his temple or whomever he looks up to for religious guidance), and asking for guidance about how to raise children in a way that both religions are respected, that the children will value their heritages, that they won't be confused or conflicted, and that they will live in a peaceful and truthful and honest home. More difficult things have been accomplished. But only with honesty and respect.

You have a basic non understanding of what it is to raise kids within two faiths and two cultures.
Get some interfaith marriage counseling and you and Hubby both need to study up on the others religious beliefs and culture.

Um, yeah, baptism does make the kids Catholic.

Hang on, just reading this again. You could not have been married in the church if he didn't convert to Catholicism. Just doesn't happen! The Catholic church is very strict on these rules, to be married in the church both must be Catholic and I am actually pretty sure for your kids to be baptized you would have to both be practicing Catholics.

Seems odd to me he would be upset about the kids if he is Catholic himself

Are you also going to go behind your husband's back and get your kids confirmed and tell him it was some sort of extra blessing? I would be absolutely LIVID with you if I were your husband. Religious upbringing is something you BOTH have to agree on. You are 100% wrong and your husband is 100% right. And if you *really* can't see that, HE'S not the one that's "mentally disturbed".

Apologize, apologize, apologize. I don't even know what to tell you. His trust in you must be completely ruined.

Err, baptizing a kid is more involved than just runnin the kids over to the church and having some holy water sprinkled on them. I'm seriously questioning the validity of this post.

Wow! What you did was WRONG!!! Baptism is so much more than a "blessing" and you know that. If you don't, YOU need to learn your religion. However, I suspect you knew exactly what you were doing.

Mentally disturbed by this? NO he is PISSED OFF. Big difference my friend. If you married someone of a different faith, didn't y'all have discussions on what religion they would be brought up in, if any? If not, that was a mistake you both made.

What do you do? First, apologize and then discuss how to incorporate both religions into your children's lives. Next marriage counseling. You need to understand why you would do this and then react like HE is the one with the problem. No boundaries and no respect from YOU.

You married this man and didn't talk about what religion the children would be before you married him?

It seems that you don't actually feel much affinity towards your own religion, so you have downplayed the baptism in your own mind, thinking you could minimize it in his mind, but it didn't work. If you didn't really think that baptism was all that important, did you have it done because you want to hedge your bets and make sure your kids have a chance of going to heaven, just in case that is what baptism does?

You can try to explain what you think to your husband. Maybe he will get over this, maybe he won't. You haven't said how you two are raising the kids. How strict in Hinduism is he? Does he allow the kids to eat meat?

He married you in a church, so he must have some flexibility. You aren't planning on getting the kids confirmed, so you have some flexibility. Just tell him point blank that you aren't going to make your kids catholic, but you did have them baptized in a familiar setting so that they could have a blessing that you had yourself.

I do think that you two need some counseling because you have to come to an agreement on how the children will be raised. It's late to be saying this since you have more than one child, but if they will be raised as vegans, you MUST study this diet and make sure the children get proper nutrition. Vegan diet is hard. You aren't Hindu and probably don't know how to do this - mothers teach their daughters what to cook in Hindu/Indian culture, and your husband probably doesn't know how to teach you that. If your husband doesn't require a vegan diet, that's evidence of more flexibility. Just hope that he will think in terms of "catholic lite" when you try to explain that the blessing of baptism doesn't mean that the children are confirmed or that they can take communion. Remind him that they won't be taking CDC classes, which is the only way they can become confirmed.

And finally, tell him that his friend who thinks that baptism makes people catholic doesn't know your feelings and thoughts and experience with being Catholic. Pretty much every Christian religion baptizes - either babies or adults. But baptism doesn't make one a Christian - it's not enough to do that. There's more to it, and hopefully once you take your husband through the entire program of catholism to get to the point that you can take communion, he will understand that being baptized doesn't make someone catholic.

In a baptism ceremony, you profess your faith in God and promise to raise your child as a Christian. If you didn't understand this, you need to talk to your priest because it sounds like you don't understand your own religion at all.

Sigh. I hope this isn't a real question. If it is, you are seriously ignorant of your own religion. Baptizing your child without fully disclosing what the means to your spouse is beyond wrong. I am Catholic and my husband is Jewish. Before we got married, we agreed that our children would be raised Catholic and would receive the Sacraments, attend religious education classes and go to Mass. He agreed, and was there at their baptisms, First Communions and Confirmations.

You can, I guess, believe whatever you want but in the eyes of the Church, in Baptism, you are giving your children the gift of your faith. From that moment, they ARE Catholic. Confirmation is their opportunity to confirm that as young adults, they choose the faith for themselves.

If I were you, I would first set up a meeting with your pastor to discuss your own confusion and get some understanding of what parts of Hinduism your kids can participate in without compromising their Catholic faith. Then when the meaning is straight in your head, you owe your husband a HUGE apology and you two need to really agree on a path forward. For my husband and me. it was fairly easy as our religions come from the same background and it is not a problem, from a theological standpoint, for my kids to attend Temple services and celebrate Jewish holidays. They can freely participate in Jewish worship ceremonies without compromising their own faith (the same would not be true in reverse - you cannot be Jewish and truly participate in Mass or holidays because Christianity goes against the beliefs of Judaism).

Hi Alicia,

What can you do?? Fall on your sword and apologize profusely for what you did. It was beyond disrespectful and I hope it doesn't illustrate a regular pattern in your marriage or your parenting with him.

My husband is Jewish and I am a member of the Bahai' Faith. Imagine him whisking my 8 day old baby son to some bris behind my back to have him circumcised by some old crusty mohal with shakey hands.... We discussed the religion thing long before we were married, much less starting our family. Neither of us wanted to convert and so we're raising our DS in both and when he's of age, he can make an educated decision without judgment or consequence from either of us.

This isn't a question of his lack of understanding of the Catholic Faith. This is an issue of betrayal and disrespect to him and his personal identity. You need to validate his feelings and stop trying to minimize what happened here. I'd also suggest you do some soul searching of your own and determine what your thought process was that made it okay for you to do such a thing. Imagine him doing something parallel with your kids. Where is your empathy? Forgive me if I sound harsh, believe me, I'm cleaning this up from what I'm actually thinking. But you are so far over the line with this one the line should look like a dot to you.

I hope the two of you can get past this. And I also hope you two coparent together much more successfully in other areas. S.

You went behind his back and performed a religious ceremony dedicating your children to the Catholic Church behind his back. That was incredibly disrespectful.

http://www.aboutcatholics.com/beliefs/a-guide-to-catholic...

You need to get educated about your own religion. You need to APOLOGIZE to your husband NOW about being so disrespectful.

The baptism isn't going to make them magically unable to be Hindu. The point is, you blew him off.

You BOTH need to sit down and decide what you're going to do re. the upbringing of your children. I can't believe you already didn't.

They deserve to know about both.

You can't "make" someone a Catholic or a Hindu or any other religion. A child is not capable of committing to a religion. An individual needs to accept a religion and practice that religion to be of that religion. This is really something you and your husband should have discussed well before having children. I personally would educate the children in both religions and allow them to choose when they are ready to decide.

Being racially different, ethnically different, huge age-gap difference, socio-economically different, education level different, class different, religiously different, etc. in marriage is not as easy as folk think. One of my favorite movies growing up was "Not Without my Daughter" with Sally Fields. It was based on a true story. It is old now but still relevant.

There is little I can tell you. Is there a liberal thinking Hindu person in your circle to act as mediator?

I completely echo the posts of Diane B., Elena B., TF Plano/Allen, and Wild Woman. I could not have said it better myself. I cannot blame him for feeling so angry and disrespected. Imagine if someone went behind your back regarding something that is important to you about your child's well-being, and your beliefs, say, circumcision. How would you feel? You would feel tricked and deceived if someone knew your beliefs and still went against them. You would probably question every single thing this person has ever told you during your marriage and wondering what else he is hiding from you and lying about. You may even consider him to be selfish and self-serving. This is probably what your husband is wondering right now.

Then, not only did you not apologize about going behind his back and doing something you BOTH did not agree on beforehand, but you undermine his way of thinking by being dismissive and saying it is "not a big deal" (when in fact, it is), and you even say he is mentally disturbed for being so angry. I have seen marriages fail due to issues like this (see post below from Fuzzy, as an example). I am not sure what you were thinking when you did this, and then acting defensively, as if he were in the wrong and is being petty takes the cake. I hope you can work things out. Marrying someone of a different religion takes planning, not just for the ceremony, but for the future, when kids are involved. Why this was never discussed during your courtship and engagement is beyond me, unless this was an unexpected pregnancy and the resulting marriage.

I have to say I agree with your husband on this one and fully understand why he is so hurt, and would be even more hurt by the fact that you can not even admit you went behind his back if I was him. A baptism is not just a blessing, and clearly you knew he would be uncomfortable with what a baptism really is or you would not have lied to him in the first place.

As for what you can do, you can start by not only apologizing but by actually taking ownership of what you did. If you keep insisting you did nothing wrong your apology is nothing but empty words. If someone baptized my children behind my back I would feel like I could never trust then alone with my children again, but you are their mother so clearly he needs to get to a place where he once again feels he can trust you not to push your religion onto the children over his. Now is the time for open honest communication and to try to find some kind of middle ground you can both be comfortable with when it comes to their children continuing religious education.

I think it is time for you and him to sit down with your clergy person and let husband ask as many questions as he needs to.

I do think you did this on purpose behind his back. I think that you feel very strongly that if something happened to your children that they would go to hell if they weren't baptised like this. That is a valid concern for someone that has been taught this their whole life.

I'm not catholic nor do I believe that an infant would go to hell if they died without being baptised. I just can't wrap my head around that. It's an individual choice. The whole reason we came here with free agency. Baptizing a baby who has no say isn't fulfilling why God made the atonement plan.

But I digress. You went behind your husband's back and had your children baptized. He has every right to be pissed off at you. If your clergy person is easy to talk to and can explain things well then he can talk to your husband. Perhaps, since he didn't give his permission, the baptism isn't valid anyway?

I don't know how that works in your church but maybe it would make him feel better? Then he could come and be part of their baptism on his own.

Apologize. You were wrong. You should have told him about it ahead of time. Suggest & sincerely so, he take a turn to include more of his customs into the child's upbringing.

Next time communicate. Give him the chance to be included in all facets.

You never go behind the other parent's back to baptize a child, especially if you are of different faiths/cultures. Baptism is a very, very important event in a child's life and should be done openly. Baptism is not a blessing. What I don't understand is how could you lie about something that is so important in your children's life? Faith is nothing to be ashamed of and by hiding this from your husband may have caused your children to be really confused about religion. This is an once in a lifetime ceremony and you took away your husband getting to see his children baptized. My last question is, Was it your children deciding they were ready to be baptized or did Mother make that decision for them? Baptism is a very personal thing between a person and God. It should be taken seriously. I think you went behind your husband's back and did this because you thought if you jumped ahead and had the children baptized, then they would chose to be Catholic instead of being Hindu. THIS WASN'T YOUR CHOICE TO MAKE, IT WAS YOUR CHILDREN'S. YOU MAY HAVE TAKEN RELIGION OUT OF THEIR LIVES BY SNEAKING AROUND. I can't see how they can say they are Catholic and practice Hinduism at the same time.