April 23, 2024

I often receive email confirmations.

“Your reservation for dinner at 7:00 for 4 people is confirmed.”

This is to confirm your order for… “

Hotel reservations, tickets for a play or concert–all are confirmed.

Verified

Acknowledged.

Validated

I appreciate those emails–knowing for sure that what I ordered or planned is now a step closer to reality. In a way that is what happens in a religious rite of confirmation.

The Rite of Confirmation

On Sunday our 16 year old grandson Peter was confirmed at Gloria Dei Lutheran Church, St Paul, MN, where my husband and I and our daughter and family belong. Our granddaughter Maren was confirmed there several years ago.

Trust me, it was a two-hanky day for this GrandNan.

Each of the 16 young people were asked individually to affirm their faith, responding “I ask God to help and guide me.” The congregation was asked to promise our support for these young people and to pray for them in their life in Christ. We responded “We do, and we ask God to help and guide us.

Each confirmand and their loved ones then came forward for laying on of hands and a blessing.

God of Love, for Jesus’ sake, stir up in Peter Agneberg Ostrem the gift of your Holy Sprit; confirm his faith, guide his life, empower him in his serving, give him patience in suffering, and bring him to everlasting life. Amen.

In this moment in time his faith was confirmed, affirmed.

Verified.

Acknowledged.

Validated.

And celebrated, too.

Beyond Confirmation

Here’s the deal, the reality. Participating in the rite of confirmation, like those email confirmations, is not enough. I have to show up at the restaurant or the hotel. Or when my online order arrives, I have to open the package and use it or gift it to someone or in my case, read it because what I most often order are books. Sometimes what I ordered isn’t the right thing or doesn’t fit or is no longer appropriate. Or perhaps the restaurant or hotel was fine, but next time, I’ll look further for a choice that fits better.

The metaphor is not perfect, but confirmation is not the end. True, it is the end of a period of formal study, but it is also a launching into the possibility of a deeper faith. It is an invitation to grow, to participate in an evolution of faith.

No one knows what that will mean for each of these young people–what will challenge their faith; what will reinforce it. No one knows how it will change. More than likely they will each experience times when their faith feels secondary to everything else in their lives; when their awareness of the presence of God is not foremost in their everyday lives. But, my prayer for Peter and the other young people confirmed on Sunday, is that the groundwork offered during the years beginning with their baptism and leading them to this day of celebration, this rite of passage, will sustain them and lead them to live as the people they were created to be.

An Invitation

Has there been a time in your life when you were asked to affirm your faith or a belief in front of a group of people? I would love to know.