By: Matthew D. Dyer
In my previous post, I presented historical evidence showing that Christianity reached Britain during the Apostolic Age and that the British Church did not owe its establishment to the Roman Catholic Church.
There is considerable debate among Christians concerning the proper mode of baptism. Yet it is especially noteworthy that the early British Church practiced baptism by immersion. This provides further evidence that immersion was the ancient Christian practice preserved in Britain, while the later customs of pouring and sprinkling developed elsewhere and were introduced more broadly into Britain only after increased Roman influence. Whatever one’s position on the subject, the testimony of the early British Church deserves serious consideration. Consider the following statements recorded by the Venerable Bede:
Bede, Ecclesiastical History, chapter 20 (Documenting what took place in A.D. 429):
“…insomuch that the people being instructed by daily sermons, resorted in crowds to be baptized; for most of the army desired admission to the saving water; a church was prepared with boughs for the feast of the resurrection of our Lord, and so fitted up in that martial camp, as if it were in a city. The army advanced, still wet with the baptismal water; the faith of the people was strengthened and whereas human power had before been despaired of, the Divine assistance was now relied upon. The enemy received advice of the state of the army, and not questioning their success against an unarmed multitude, hastened forwards, but their approach was, by the scouts, made known to the Britons; the greater part of whose forces being just come from the font, after the celebration of Easter, and preparing to arm and carry on the war, Germanus declared he would be their leader.”
These were native Britons being baptized approximately 168 years before Augustine arrived.
Bede, Ecclesiastical History, II.14. (Documenting what took place in A.D. 627):
“…he did nothing else but instruct the people resorting from all villages and places, in Christ’s saving Word; and when they were instructed, he washed them with the water of absolution in the river Glen, which is close by…. These things happened in the province of the Bernicians; but in that of the Deiri also, where he was wont often to be with the king, he baptized in the river Swale, which runs by the village of Cataract; for as yet oratories, or baptisteries, could not be built in the early infancy of the Church in those parts.“
Bede, Ecclesiastical History, II.16. (Documenting what took place in A.D. 627):
“A certain priest and abbot of the monastery of Peartaneu,(Partney in Lincolnshire)a man of singular veracity, whose name was Deda, told me concerning the faith of this province that an old man had informed him that he himself had been baptized at noon-day, by Bishop Paulinus, in the presence of King Edwin, and with him a great multitude of the people, in the river Trent, near the city...”
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