To baptize or not to baptize?

So here we go again...my parents have been pressuring me and my man to baptize our son in the Catholic church. We are both culturally Catholic but have consciously drifted from the religion because of all its false teachings and pedophilia that goes on within the church. WE identify ourselves as spiritualist and love is our religion. However my parents feel that we are irresponsible sinners who do not want to commit our lives and sacrifice for "the lord" blah blah. My mother is extremely worried that we are raising our child without the fear of gods wrath which in her mind means that our son is going to be fearless and live a life of sin. Does this make sense?

Anyway, so my mother and father have threatened to take my son without my consent, literally behind my back, and baptize him. My mother stated that she would rather die than have her grandchild unbaptized! A little extreme don't you think?But it is understandable, my grandmother was a devout Catholic; however she actually lived by gods word. She was a beautiful soul who never judged anyone, she lived in peace and helped others. Aside from being brutally beaten on a daily basis by my grandfather, she was able to see the light at the end of the tunnel and still be a kind hearted and generous soul, all of which she owed to god. I admired her for her religious beliefs, because she followed them and was not hypocritical.

My father on the other hand is pushing us to baptize our son because he knows nothing else; he is set in his beliefs because that's the way he was raised. Wait never mind, he was raised as a Christian with an alcoholic mother who never took them to church. Maybe that's why he wants to baptize our son, he wants what he never had? Hm, sorry I was thinking aloud. Nevertheless, regardless of my parents reasoning, I don't think they have the right to threaten to take my son behind our backs and baptize him. They didn't even ask us how we felt about this issue of baptizing our son. They just assumed that because we are not religious and are always bad mouthing the church and pedophilia, and patriarchy, and because we like to go to anti-war protest that we were not going to baptize our child. Okay so maybe they have a point, after all my partner and I did vow never to let our children near the Catholic church. But you know what, things change. Ah who am I trying to kid, we are slowly succumbing to the PRESSURE! And I mean PRESSURE! And not only from my parents, but from our whole family! My aunts and uncles, cousins, in-laws, damn even the asian neighbor asked when we were baptizing Diego!

So after a short discussion over some pale ales, my partner and I decided hey what the heck, lets just do it. Let's not think too much about this ritual and just go with the flow. We feel that the pressure is to much to withstand. And I'll be damed if my parents sneak behind my back and baptize MY son. I'd rather we do it ourselves and make the best of it along the way, con una fiesta y todo! Why not? Who cares about what we believe in right? Who cares about our strong anti-church beliefs? My parents don't; even though we respect their beliefs and way of living. It's all bull shit. I knew that when I would have children that my beliefs would be compromised and that I would succumb to the pressure of my family. Damn! Being Chicana and being anti-church is f***ing difficult. And not baptizing your child is the worse possible sin in a Catholics eyes.

So the moral of the story is: stay strong and fight for what you believe in, do not allow anyone compromise your beliefs and pressure you into doing what you don't believe in. Yeah right! If you're brown then good luck! Asi son las cosas, that's the way it is. I'd rather keep the peace and be happy then wage a war on the catholic church and mi familia. After all it's a good excuse for everyone to get wasted and have a good time, right?

I'll let you know when the bolo is!!