What Is Confirmation, and Should I Get Confirmed?

You might have heard of confirmation, but do you know what it actually is?

Perhaps you think it’s the ceremony to become a legitimate Anglican? Or graduation from Sunday School? Or a second go at baptism for people who were too young to remember the first one? 

The short answer is that confirmation is an opportunity for a baptised Christian to publicly affirm their faith in Jesus, and for the bishop to pray for them, with the laying on of hands, that God would strengthen them by the Holy Spirit for a lifetime of following Christ.

Times have changed

Confirmation used to be more common in Australia as a cultural rite of passage. And this started to be a problem.

Melbourne Anglican youth minister Peter Corney published his first book back in 1966, Our Confirmation Scandal, to address this problem. Confirmation then was still part of mainstream culture. Children were baptised, attended Sunday school, and reached their early teens expecting to be confirmed as a matter of course. Numbers had begun to slip, but plenty of teenagers were still coming forward to meet family expectations.

Corney argued that these numbers were deceptive. Bishops would arrive at a parish confirmation service, see rows of young candidates, and take it as evidence that ministry to young people was healthy. But many of those candidates were simply passing through a ceremony and would soon disappear from church life. The real scandal, he said, was that the church had settled for ushering its young people through a tradition rather than genuinely evangelising and discipling them.

Australia has changed dramatically since then. The old conveyor belt of baptism, Sunday school, confirmation and nominal Anglican identity has largely gone. In a more secular and religiously diverse society, very few teenagers are confirmed because "that's what Anglicans do." In one sense this is the crisis Corney foresaw: the statistics can no longer hide the church's failure with the next generation.

Yet the collapse of cultural Christianity has also given confirmation a clearer and richer purpose. It is now an opportunity for a person to publicly own the faith into which they were baptised, affirm their trust in Christ, receive prayer from the bishop, and commit to a life of discipleship. Where Christian faith is a conscious choice rather than a cultural expectation, confirmation becomes a powerful declaration of personal faith and belonging.

It starts with baptism

Confirmation only makes sense when you see it alongside baptism. In baptism, a person is publicly joined to Jesus and welcomed into his people. Paul puts it like this: "all of us who were baptised into Christ Jesus were baptised into his death" (Romans 6:3). Baptism says: this person belongs to Christ.

In the Anglican, Catholic, Presbyterian, Uniting, Lutheran and Dutch Reformed churches, babies can be baptised. Perhaps this was you? You didn't say a word in your baptism. Your parents and godparents made promises on your behalf, and the church prayed that you would grow up to trust Jesus for yourself.

Confirmation is the moment you pick up those promises with your own hands. You stand up and say, in effect, "The faith I was baptised into is now the faith I personally hold. This is my Jesus. This is my church. This is the life I intend to live."

But if you were baptised as an adult, confirmation is still important. It's still a public reaffirmation of the faith you already professed, this time in front of the wider church.

What happens?

Confirmation candidates gather at the front of the church. They reaffirm the promises made at baptism. They declare their faith in Jesus Christ, usually in the words of the Apostles' Creed, which Christians have been saying for well over a thousand years. They commit themselves to following him. Then each one comes before the bishop, who lays hands on them and prays that God would strengthen them by his Spirit.

The bishop has no magical powers. There's no secret spiritual voltage passing through those hands. The bishop is there to represent the wider church, and to pray out loud, on everyone's behalf, that God would do what only God can do.

Why bother?

Perhaps you think confirmation is not that important, and that you have other more pressing matters to attend to. Why make it a priority? Because a few things happen at confirmation that are hard to make happen any other way.

Firstly, you get to declare your commitment to Jesus out loud. There is something powerful about putting your faith into words in front of your church, your family and your friends. Jesus said, "Whoever acknowledges me before others, I will also acknowledge before my Father in heaven" (Matthew 10:32). Confirmation gives you a moment to do exactly that.

Secondly, you get connected to something bigger. The Church is a lot more than Merri Creek Anglican. Having the bishop present is a reminder that you belong to a body of believers across the country, across the world and across the centuries.

Thirdly, you get to mark the moment. Following Jesus is a lifelong commitment, and lifelong things should have milestones. Weddings, anniversaries, birthdays: we mark the moments that matter. So you can think of confirmation as a ceremony for a milestone in your discipleship.

Fourthly, you get prayed for. This might be the best bit. Confirmation is an honest admission that following Jesus for the rest of your life is going to take more than your own willpower. So the whole church stops and asks God to strengthen you.

Lastly, you get to make inherited faith your own. If you grew up in a Christian family, there's a real difference between "my parents' faith" and "my faith". Confirmation is where that line gets drawn.

Where is confirmation in the Bible?

You won’t find confirmation in the Bible. It is a later church practice, and so we should not treat it as something necessary for salvation. But the things confirmation is trying to express are thoroughly biblical: publicly confessing faith in Christ, affirming the promises of baptism, being prayed for by church leaders, and asking God to strengthen a believer by the Holy Spirit. In Acts, there are several occasions where  apostles lay hands on believers and pray for them, although these passages are not identical to modern Anglican confirmation. So confirmation is best understood not as a biblical command, but as a helpful Anglican way of giving public, prayerful expression to biblical realities.

What confirmation isn't

It’s important that we understand that confirmation is not how you become a Christian. You become a Christian by trusting Jesus. Confirmation is also not a second baptism. It's not spiritual graduation, and it's certainly not a certificate proving that you've become a first class christian. It's not a thing you do because you've turned fourteen. And it's not a way of earning God's approval. 

When I was a kid, we had to be confirmed before you could take communion. That was more of a custom at the discretion of the minister rather than an official rule, and it’s not very common anymore. It’s certainly not a rule in our church.  

The gospel doesn't move. "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God" (Ephesians 2:8). Confirmation adds nothing to that. It celebrates it.

"But my faith isn't strong enough"

Good. You're exactly the right person.

Confirmation isn't for people who have no doubts. It's for people who know they can't follow Jesus in their own strength, which is why the whole thing revolves around asking God for help.

The most important question to ask yourself is, "Do I trust Jesus, and do I want to keep following him?" If the answer is yes (even a wobbly yes) then confirmation is for you.

What age should I be?

The Anglican prayer book does not place an age limit. The original 1662 Book of Common Prayer does not stipulate a numerical minimum age for Confirmation. Instead, it uses the older category “years of discretion.” The Confirmation service is titled:

“The Order of Confirmation, or Laying on of Hands upon those that are baptised, and come to years of discretion.”

It then defines readiness principally by understanding rather than age: candidates should be able to say the Creed, the Lord’s Prayer and the Ten Commandments, and answer the questions in the Catechism. The Catechism similarly says children should be brought to the bishop when they have reached a “competent age” and can do these things.

So historically the Prayer Book’s logic is essentially: are you old enough to understand and personally affirm the Christian faith into which you were baptised? For a lot of teenagers, that's exactly the stage they're at, and confirmation gives them a chance to separate "my family's Christianity" from "my own decision to follow Jesus." But if you're an adult and were never confirmed, you haven't missed your chance. Confirmation is just as meaningful at 26 or 46 or 86 as it is at 16. 

Who should think about it?

You should seriously consider confirmation if you've been baptised and you trust in Jesus. If you want to affirm your faith publicly. If you were baptised as a child and now want to own those promises yourself. If you came to faith as an adult and want to mark it. If you'd like your church to pray for God's strength as you keep following him.

An invitation

Confirmation won't make you a better Christian, and God doesn't love you any more or less because of it. But it can be a wonderfully significant moment: standing before your church, confessing that Jesus Christ is your Lord, and having the whole church pray that God would strengthen you to follow him for the rest of your life.

If you would like to be confirmed in our mid-October confirmation services, please reach out.