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A godparent (also known as a sponsor),[1] in many denominations of Christianity, is someone who bears witness to a child's baptism and then aids in their catechesis, as well as their lifelong spiritual formation.[2] In the past, in some countries, the role carried some legal obligations as well as religious responsibilities.[3] In both religious and civil views, a godparent tends to be an individual chosen by the parents to take an interest in the child's upbringing and personal development, and to take care of the child should anything happen to the parents.[4][5]




Origins and historyEdit

As early as the 2nd century AD, infant baptism had begun to gain acceptance among Christians for the spiritual purification and social initiation of infants.[6] The requirement for some confession of faith necessitated the use of adults who acted as sponsors for the child. They vocalized the confession of faith and acted as guarantors of the child’s spiritual upbringing.

Normally, these sponsors were the natural parents of a child, as emphasized in 408 by St. Augustine who suggested that they could, it seems exceptionally, be other individuals.[7] Within a century, the Corpus Juris Civilis indicates that parents had been replaced in this role almost completely.[8] This was clarified in 813 when the Council of Munich prohibited natural parents from acting as godparents to their own children.[9]

By the 5th century, male sponsors were referred to as "spiritual fathers", and by the end of the 6th century, they were being noted to as "compaters" and "commaters", suggesting that these were being seen as spiritual co-parents.[10] This pattern was marked by the creation of legal barriers to marriage that paralleled those for other forms of kin. A decree of Justinian, dated to 530, outlawed marriage between a godfather and his goddaughter, and these barriers continued to multiply until the 11th century, forbidding marriage between natural and spiritual parents, or those directly related to them.[11] As confirmation emerged as a separate rite from baptism from the 8th century, a second set of sponsors, with similar prohibitions, also emerged.[12] The exact extent of these spiritual relationships as a bar to marriage in Catholicism was unclear until the Council of Trent, which limited it to relationships between the godparents, the child, and the parents.[13]

During the ReformationEdit

Luther, Zwingli, and Calvin preserved infant baptism against the attacks of more radical reformers including Anabaptists, and with it, sponsors at baptism.[14] However, Luther strongly objected to the marriage barriers it created, Zwingli stressed the role of parents and pastors, rather than the "witnesses", in religious instruction, and Calvin and his followers tended to prefer the sponsors to be the natural parents.[15] A single godparent was retained in baptism at Geneva and among French Calvinists, but some followers of Calvin, most notably in Scotland and eventually the English colonies in America, rejected them altogether.[16]

Numbers of sponsorsEdit

In the early church, one sponsor seems to have been the norm, but in the early Middle Ages, there seems to have been two, one of each sex, and this practice has been largely maintained in Orthodox Christianity.[17] In 888, the Catholic Council of Metz attempted to limit the number to one, but proliferation seems to have continued.[9] In early 14th-century Spain, as many as 20 godparents were being chosen.[18] In England, the Synod of Worcester (1240) stipulated three sponsors (two of the same sex and one of the opposite), and this has remained the norm in the Church of England.[19] The Council of Trent attempted to limit the numbers of godparents to one or two, but practice has differed across the Catholic world.[20]

Modern practicesEdit

Anglican CommunionEdit

The Church of England, the mother Church of the Anglican Communion, retained godparents in baptism, formally removing the marriage barriers in 1540, but the issue of the role and status of godparents continued to be debated in the English Church.[21] They were abolished in 1644 by the Directory of Public Worship promulgated by the English Civil War Parliamentary regime, but continued to be used in some parishes in the north of England.[22] After the Restoration in 1660, they were reintroduced to Anglicanism, with occasional objections, but dropped by almost every dissenting church.[23] There is some evidence that the restored institution had lost some of its social importance as well as its universality.[24]


Lutheran churchesEdit


Methodist ChurchEdit


Orthodox ChurchEdit


Reformed ChurchesEdit

In the Reformed tradition that includes the Continental Reformed, Congregationalist and Presbyterian Churches, the godparents are more often referred to as sponsors, who have the role of standing with the child during infant baptism and pledging to instruct the child in the faith.[33] In the bapismal liturgy of Reformed Geneva, "the traditional presence of godparents was retained".[34] John Calvin, the progenitor of the Reformed tradition, himself served as a godparent during forty-seven baptisms.[34] The Reformed Church in Geneva, in order to ensure confessional orthodoxy, "expected parents to select Reformed godparents."[35] Today, many Reformed churches invite parents to select godparents for their prospective neophyte, while other parishes entrust this responsibility to the whole congregation.[36][37]

Roman Catholic ChurchEdit

A child being baptized with her parents and godparents.



Spiritual kinshipEdit

In some Catholic and Orthodox countries, particularly in southern Europe, Latin America, and the Philippines, the relationship between parents and godparents or co-godparents has been seen as particularly important and distinctive.[40] These relationships create mutual obligations and responsibilities that may be socially useful for participants. The Portuguese and Spanish compadre (literally, "co-father") and comadre ("co-mother"), the French marraine and parrain, and the archaic meaning of the English word gossip (from godsib, "godsibling"), describe these relationships.[41] By extension, they can also be used to describe a friendship.



Literature and folkloreEdit


Non-Christian traditionsEdit




Brit milah—the sandek holds the baby boy


Chinese traditionsEdit

Some Chinese communities practise the custom of matching a child with a relative or family friend who becomes the godmother (乾媽) or godfather (乾爹). This practice is largely non-religious in nature, but commonly done to strengthen ties or to fulfill the wish of a childless adult to have a "son/daughter". In most circumstances, an auspicious day is selected during which a ceremony takes place, involving the godchild paying his/her respects to his new godfather/godmother in the presence of relatives or friends.[44]

Alternatively, as it is already common in Chinese kinship to use kinship terms among people that are not related (e.g. addressing a respected coworker as "brother" or one's father's friend may be referred to as "uncle"), an older friend or family friend with a deep friendship and a sufficient age gap will also informally address the other as his godparent or godchild, a gesture often initiated by the older person.

See alsoEdit


  1. ^ Roth, John K. (1 December 2005). Ethics. Salem Press. p. 595. ISBN 9781587651724. 
  2. ^ Fitzgerald, Timothy (1994). Infant Baptism. Liturgy Training Publications. p. 17. ISBN 9781568540085. 
  8. ^ P. Kruger, ed., Corpus Iuris Civis, vol. 3, Codex Iustinianus (Dublin and Zurich, 1970), v, 4, 26, p. 197.
  28. ^ Godparents at Retrieved 2010-16-05.
  32. ^ Instructions for Weddings, Divorces, Baptisms, Funerals, and Memorials "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2009-01-17. Retrieved 2009-01-06. .
  33. ^ McKim, Donald K. (21 April 2014). The Westminster Dictionary of Theological Terms, Second Edition: Revised and Expanded. Westminster John Knox Press. p. 304. ISBN 9781611643862. 
  34. ^ a b Manetsch, Scott M. (2013). Calvin's Company of Pastors: Pastoral Care and the Emerging Reformed Church, 1536-1609. Oxford University Press. p. 383. ISBN 9780199938575. 
  35. ^ Maag, Karin (13 January 2016). Lifting Hearts to the Lord: Worship with John Calvin in Sixteenth-Century Geneva. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. p. 162. ISBN 9781467444002. 
  36. ^ Maddox, Cindy. "Baptism & Communion". First Congregational Church - United Church of Christ. Retrieved 12 August 2017. You’re welcome to invite one or two Godparents to take part in the baptism service, though this is optional and matter of personal choice. 
  37. ^ Wehrheim, Carol A. (2006). The Baptism of Your Child: A Book for Presbyterian Families. Westminster John Knox Press. p. 24. ISBN 9780664502850. 
  38. ^ Code of Canon Law Can. 872-4 [1].
  39. ^ Wofford, Taylor (September 2, 2015). "Transgender Catholics Can't Be Godparents, Vatican Says". Retrieved September 23, 2015. 

External linksEdit

  •   The dictionary definition of godparent at Wiktionary