Jesuit Baptizes Baby With Water From The River Jordan

Baptisms are a wonderful time for Christian families to welcome their newest family members into their faith. But for Dennis and Pauline Joaquin, parishioners of St. Mary's Church in Dartmouth, a trip taken this past spring meant they could provide a little something extra for their granddaughter's baptism ceremony — water from the river Jordan.

The Joaquins decided to take the trip to Jerusalem after their son, who is currently studying to become a deacon, told them about an organized travel group that would be visiting the holy city.

"We're quite religious, and it was just wonderful to follow the footsteps of Jesus Christ, from his birth to his crucifixion," said Mr. Joaquin of his travels.

Following those footsteps included a strict security regime that took some getting used to, said Mr. Joaquin.

"Security is a serious thing there. I wasn't accustomed to it being so stringent," he said, recalling the many checkpoints his bus tour went through. "We had an experienced priest with us, who was a resident of Jerusalem. They knew him and he was like a mediator, and they didn't bring any of us off the bus, but you could see it happening on the other buses."

The tour group visited places of importance, including Jesus' birthplace and the river Jordan, where visitors witnessed people being baptized. When someone mentioned that water could be taken from the river and brought home, Mr. Joaquin was struck by the idea that he could put the water to a more personal use.

"It was absolutely not planned, I thought of it when we were going there," he said. "We thought we could bring it back and have it so that my granddaughter would be able to use that water."

After filling two water bottles full, the Joaquins finished their trip; but their arrival at JFK airport almost saw their own country's security take the bottles away.

"To get them into this country," he said, laughing at the memory, "caused me to go and get pulled out of line asking, what is this for?"

After contacting St. Mary's for permission and being informed they needed to boil the water before it was used, the baptism day arrived. For the Rev. Francis J. Moy, S.J., this was only the second time he had performed a baptism using water from the Jordan River.

"I said this is perfect. I mean, water is water, but symbolically this is a great symbol. Symbolically, St. John the Baptist baptizes Jesus in the river, of course it's not a Christian baptism as we have it, but it is a cleansing that was done by the Jews once a year. They ... felt they could be absolved of all their sinfulness by being blessed and having water poured on them from the river. From that, Jesus picked up on that the concept of Christian baptism."

Only a little water was used during the actual baptism and according to Mr. Joaquin, it was Father Moy who asked if all the babies present for that day's baptismal would be allowed to use the water.

"Why would we mind?" said Mr. Joaquin. "So we shared some. Before [Father Moy] started, he announced that was going to happen, and everyone clapped. It was a nice gesture. Two relatives of babies being baptized came over and thanked us after the ceremony. And my son got some thank-yous from other people."

Link (here)