Thinking of Confirmation

Among my projects this week is participating in conversations with colleagues as part of the process of developing a new curriculum to be used in confirmation preparation in local congregations. The United Church of Christ has, in many ways, gotten out of the business of developing educational resources. Over the course of my lifetime we have gone from being a major producer of educational curricula, with a staff of writers and editors employed in the national setting of our church, to a dramatically reduced staff in the national setting with no people whose primary job focus is the production of educational materials. However, a decision has been made to develop a new resource for confirmation for the denomination.

I believe that I am the only person involved in these discussions about developing a new confirmation resource who was directly involved in the production of “Affirming Faith: A Congregation’s Guide to Confirmation,” originally published in 1996 and revised and re-published in 2008. I was one of the writers on the 1996 team. That probably is of little consequence, as institutional memory is not one of the highest priorities in our church’s national setting at present. I do, however, think that I have a bit to offer to the process because I can remember previous conversations.

A lot has changed in the church since 1996. My personal experiences have given me a bit of a gauge of that change. The first confirmation class we led as pastors of 1st Congregational Church in Rapid City, South Dakota had access to the then brand new resource that I had participated in developing. When I compare that experience with our first confirmation class in 1st Congregational Church of Bellingham a little over a quarter of a century later, I can see both similarities and differences. Having led dozens of confirmation classes in those decades gives me a perspective that other members of our team do not have.

The rite of confirmation grew out of a leadership shortage experienced by the early church. After Christianity became a legally accepted religion of Rome, the church began to expand dramatically. Congregations could not find enough priests and bishops to support that rapid growth. Out of necessity, new Christians were baptized in ceremonies with lay leaders. There weren’t enough bishops to be present at every baptismal ceremony. When a bishop did come to visit the congregation, the bishop was asked to “confirm” the baptisms that had been performed since the last visit.

In modern times, however, confirmation has become the entrance point into full membership in the church. Because of the unique history of the United Church of Christ, we have congregations where infant baptism is regularly practiced and we also have congregations where baptism is more commonly performed in adolescence. For some young people, preparing for confirmation is also preparing for baptism. For others, who were baptized as infants, confirmation is the time of becoming a full voting member of a congregation. In both cases, it seems reasonable to have a process of preparation during which a bit of the history and theology of the church is shared.

Contemporary congregations have adults who are regular participants who have not gone through any confirmation preparation classes. They may have attended a meeting in preparation for joining a local church during which faith was discussed, but many simply started attending worship and ended up getting involved in church programs without ever attending any classes. Our congregations have regular participants who have gone through formal membership and other participants who have never officially joined the church. We have members who have been baptized and others who have not. When we gather for worship, we are a group of people with a wide variety of experiences within the church. Some of us have been in the church for all of our lives. Others are new to church attendance and may be new to any religious practices.

For most of my career as a pastor, I have argued that the rite of confirmation should be seen as a repeatable rite. Unlike baptism, which our part of the church has held as a once in a lifetime experience, with no need to be repeated, confirmation could be seen as the process of entrance, and of re-entrance into the life of the congregation. A person might choose to confirm their faith when moving from one congregation to another. A person might choose to confirm their faith after going through a major life-altering experience such as marriage, divorce, the birth of a child, or the death of a loved one. From this perspective, it would make sense to invite youth to confirm their faith while they are still living at home with their parents, but also to invite young adults to confirm their faith when they begin participating independently from their families of origin.

The resources for preparation for the rite of confirmation, then, need to take into account the wide range of ages and experiences with which people come to the rite. Instead of seeing confirmation as a class aimed at middle and high school students, with a graded curriculum, perhaps we could see it as an ongoing series of conversations in which we engage over and over again.

My understandings of the nature of God and of the role of the church have changed as I have grown and matured. I don’t believe that confirmation is about teaching a “correct” dogma, but rather about engaging in conversations about the essentials of faith such as the nature of Christ, the presence of the Holy Spirit, and the relationship of the creation to the Creator.

Developing resources for confirmation preparation in these times is a challenging process. As was the case back in the 1990’s, I do not expect that we will produce a finished product, but rather engage in the process of developing resources that can be adapted and changed as circumstances require.

I’m looking forward to the conversations and I hope that they are only the beginning of an on-going process that will continue long after my time has passed.

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