Q. Should people baptize their child if they are Catholic, but don’t regularly practice the faith?

A. Obviously, it is to benefit of the child, the infant, to be baptized as soon as it is practically possible, after birth.

When a child is born to practicing Catholics there is no problem at all because the priest, the pastor, can look at the parents and know they are good Catholics and have confidence they will raise and educate the child in the Catholic faith. However, it is up to the priest to determine if it is in the best interest of the child to confer baptism on somebody who never has a chance to practice the faith and therefore might be in worse condition than if it were not baptized at all.

When people drift away from the faith, sometimes they will seek to have a child baptized for doubtful motives and the parish priest then has to make a judgment as to whether there is a well-founded hope that the child will be raised and educated in the Catholic faith. Sometimes from the conduct of the parents one cannot reach that conclusion.

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