confirming those baptized as adults
(promoted from a comment made in another journal)

Once in a while, I note that some people think our ceremony of confirmation in the Gnostic Catholic Church is superfluous or oxymoronic. As best as I understand it, the argument goes that since we don't inflict involuntary infant baptism on our members, they don't need to be "confirmed." I disagree with this critique, and not only (or even mostly) because of the tradition of confirmation as a cardinal sacrament of both apostolic Christian and Neognostic churches.

In primitive Christianity, adult converts went through a ceremony that included an initial exposure to the creed (and in which they also typically received bread and salt sacramentally), to inaugurate a catechumenal period in which they would prepare for full membership through baptism.

In EGC, our "baptism" takes the place of such a catechumenal ceremony, while our "confirmation" serves the role of the antique baptism, at least with respect to communal ties and individual status. It makes sense that we who are directed to "worship...with fire and blood" should have a solar and martial confirmation ceremony as the real admission to lay membership, while the watery and lunar baptism is a preliminary. (Of course, the old Piscean agenda would place the emphasis on water.)