Initiation, Baptism, Christening at St James Anglican Church Morpeth in Historic Morpeth

To arrange a baptism, please contact Fr Roger Sharr on 02 49336218 or at sharrgilbert@bigpond.com.au

Baptisms are offered at several times during the year and by appointment.

What You Need To Know

It is a privilege for the priests and people of St. James' to share your joy at your child's birth into your family and into the larger community of Christ's Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church through the sacrament of Holy Baptism.

Baptism is not a naming ceremony even though the child's name is given during the liturgy and recorded for prosperity in the parish's Baptismal Register. Neither is baptism a kind of Christian magic that automatically casts a kind of good spell over your child's life.

Baptism is an initiation, a beginning, a first step in a life with God that the Church describes as "eternal". You ask the Church to help you form your child as a Christian and, in turn, the Church asks you to make promises on your child's behalf that will assist this good desire...

"Christians are made, not born" says the great St. Augustine.

There is no cost involved in the baptism of your child. However if you wish to make a donation to the Church, this will be used to further the ministy of the Church in this parish.

There is a song in man

There is a song in woman

And there is the child's song.

When that song comes

There will be no words.

Do not ask where they are,

Just listen to the song.

Listen to it -

Learn it -

It is the greatest song of all.

Spike Milligan 1918 - 2002

A Psalm for all seeking Holy Baptism

O Lord, you have searched me and known me.

You know when I sit down and when I rise up, you discern my thoughts from far away.

You search out my path and my lying down; and are acquainted with all my ways.

Even before a word is on my tongue, O Lord, you know it completely.

You hem me in, behind and before me, and lay your hand upon me.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is so high that I cannot attain it.

For it was you who formed my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother's womb.

I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; that I know very well

My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth.

Your eyes beheld my unformed substance. In your book were written all the days that were formed for me, when none of them yet existed.

How weighty to me are you thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them!

I try to count them - they are more than the sand; I come to the end - I am still with you.

Psalm 139