Has anyone else heard of this?  If it's true, this is not good. Here's the link for the following article. http://catholicism.about.com/b/2008/05/06/baptism-of-the-dead-its-not-for-catholics-anymore.htm?nl=1 Ted Scott's Catholicism Blog From Scott P. Richert, Your Guide to Catholicism. FREE Newsletter. Sign Up Now! Baptism of the Dead: It's Not for Catholics Anymore The About.com Guide to Genealogy, Kimberly Powell, has news of a very important directive issued by the Vatican Congregation for the Clergy on April 5, 2008. As the Catholic News Service reported, the Congregation for the Clergy has directed all Catholic dioceses "not to give information in parish registers to the Mormons' Genealogical Society of Utah." The reason is that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, commonly known as the Mormons, engage in a practice of baptizing the dead. Any Mormon in good standing may stand in as a proxy for a dead relative, engaging in baptism on his or her behalf. Mormons believe that such posthumous baptisms allow those who did not have the opportunity to be exposed to the Mormon gospel while alive to accept or reject that gospel. While Mormons base their belief in part on Saint Paul's remark about the baptism of the dead in 1 Corinthians 15:29, the Christian Church has, from apostolic times, rejected the idea of the baptism of the dead and pointed out that Saint Paul was actually making an argument about the resurrection of the dead. The statement by the Congregation for the Clergy is based on the need to combat this doctrine which Mormons present as Christian and states that each bishop should ensure that such a detrimental practice is not permitted in his territory, due to the confidentiality of the faithful and so as not to cooperate with the erroneous practices of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Kimberly, who is herself a Catholic, notes that the Mormons have preserved many parish registers that might otherwise have been lost, and she expresses some confusion over this decision, given that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith declared in 2001 that Mormon baptisms are not valid (because, while Mormons use the Trinitarian formula for baptism, they do not believe in the Trinity). But that is precisely the point: The Catholic Church does not believe that Mormon baptisms of the dead have any effect, but She does have an obligation to combat errors that are presented as Christian. Baptism of the dead is one such error, and the Congregation of the Clergy, in order to safeguard the true meaning of the Sacrament of Baptism, has decided that the Church must avoid the appearance of cooperating in that error. Tuesday May 6, 2008 | comments (2) Email to a Friend | Submit to Digg ____________________________________________________________________________________ Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now. http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ

Maybe the needs of genealogy will drive the RC Church to adopt a more assertive approach to providing ALL documents in electronic format in a centralized data base like FHS files. Bill Fax: 563-263-7186 -----Original Message----- From: poland-roots-bounces@rootsweb.com [mailto:poland-roots-bounces@rootsweb.com] On Behalf Of Thaddeus Ciechanowski Sent: Tuesday, May 06, 2008 4:51 AM To: Polish roots; Polish Genius Subject: [POLAND] New Catholic policy? Has anyone else heard of this?  If it's true, this is not good. Here's the link for the following article. http://catholicism.about.com/b/2008/05/06/baptism-of-the-dead-its-not-for-ca tholics-anymore.htm?nl=1 Ted Scott's Catholicism Blog >From Scott P. Richert, Your Guide to Catholicism. FREE Newsletter. Sign Up Now! Baptism of the Dead: It's Not for Catholics Anymore The About.com Guide to Genealogy, Kimberly Powell, has news of a very important directive issued by the Vatican Congregation for the Clergy on April 5, 2008. As the Catholic News Service reported, the Congregation for the Clergy has directed all Catholic dioceses "not to give information in parish registers to the Mormons' Genealogical Society of Utah." The reason is that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, commonly known as the Mormons, engage in a practice of baptizing the dead. Any Mormon in good standing may stand in as a proxy for a dead relative, engaging in baptism on his or her behalf. Mormons believe that such posthumous baptisms allow those who did not have the opportunity to be exposed to the Mormon gospel while alive to accept or reject that gospel. While Mormons base their belief in part on Saint Paul's remark about the baptism of the dead in 1 Corinthians 15:29, the Christian Church has, from apostolic times, rejected the idea of the baptism of the dead and pointed out that Saint Paul was actually making an argument about the resurrection of the dead. The statement by the Congregation for the Clergy is based on the need to combat this doctrine which Mormons present as Christian and states that each bishop should ensure that such a detrimental practice is not permitted in his territory, due to the confidentiality of the faithful and so as not to cooperate with the erroneous practices of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Kimberly, who is herself a Catholic, notes that the Mormons have preserved many parish registers that might otherwise have been lost, and she expresses some confusion over this decision, given that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith declared in 2001 that Mormon baptisms are not valid (because, while Mormons use the Trinitarian formula for baptism, they do not believe in the Trinity). But that is precisely the point: The Catholic Church does not believe that Mormon baptisms of the dead have any effect, but She does have an obligation to combat errors that are presented as Christian. Baptism of the dead is one such error, and the Congregation of the Clergy, in order to safeguard the true meaning of the Sacrament of Baptism, has decided that the Church must avoid the appearance of cooperating in that error. Tuesday May 6, 2008 | comments (2) Email to a Friend | Submit to Digg ____________________________________________________________________________ ________ Be a better friend, newshound, and know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now. http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ ********************************* Need to contact the list manager? Write to Marie at Poland-Roots-admin@rootsweb.com ---------------------------------- Discussion of Polish food, culture, and customs are welcome on the list as long as the discussion stays pertinent to the topic of this list: researching our Polish roots. ---------------------------------- Browse the list's archives here: http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/index?list=poland-roots Search the list's archives here: http://archiver.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/search?aop=1 ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to POLAND-ROOTS-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message