Church in the UK
What is confirmation?
Confirmation is a service in which someone who has been baptised, often as a baby, affirms the Christian faith for themselves. A bishop lays hands on them and prays that God’s Spirit will strengthen them.
Who it is for
- People who were baptised as infants and now want to make the promises their own.
- Adults who are being baptised, who in the Church of England are usually confirmed at the same service.
- Christians from another tradition who are joining a church that practises confirmation.
What happens
In the Church of England, a bishop leads the service, often for candidates from several parishes together. The bishop asks each candidate whether they turn to Christ and whether they believe in God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Candidates answer for themselves. The bishop then lays a hand on each person’s head and prays for them by name.
Many people find it a moving occasion. It is a public statement of the faith that the Bible asks every believer to make:
If you will confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
Preparing for it
Candidates attend a short course, usually run by the vicar over several weeks, covering what Christians believe and how they live. There is no upper age limit. Many candidates are teenagers, and many are adults who have come to faith later in life.
Confirmation and communion
Traditionally in the Church of England, confirmation was the point at which a person began to receive Holy Communion. That is still the norm, although many parishes now admit baptised children to communion before they are confirmed.
In other churches
- Catholic Church. Confirmation is one of the seven sacraments. Children baptised as infants are usually confirmed in their teens, and adults receive it together with baptism.
- Methodist Church. A minister confirms people and receives them into membership.
- Orthodox churches. The equivalent, called chrismation, is given immediately after baptism, including to infants.
- Baptist and Pentecostal churches. They do not practise confirmation, because believers’ baptism is itself the person’s own profession of faith.
Is it in the Bible?
The word is not. The practice draws on occasions in the book of Acts when the apostles laid hands on newly baptised believers and prayed for them (Acts 8:14–17), and on the Bible’s expectation that each person will profess faith for themselves.
How to arrange it
Speak to the minister of your church. If you are not yet part of a church, begin there.