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Disregarding
the cool weather and colder water of Elk Fork of Salt River,
three candidates from the Mt. Airy Baptist Church southwest of
Paris were baptised in the river Sunday shortly after noon. The
location was just south of the historic old Union covered
bridge, shown in back. ground above, with the low water crossing
over which water was rolling during the ceremony shown in the
foreground, with a small part of the larger than usual crowd
shown at right.
Rev.
R.W. Spratley. pastor at Mt. Airy, is shown in left center of
photo. as he raised Jamie Barnes from the water after immersing
him.
In
the lower close-up photo, Rev. Spratley is shown preparing to
immerse Gregg Pierce. The third to be baptised was Wesley
Barnes.
Since
Christ was baptised in the River Jordan almost 2,000 years ago,
the river, a lake or a deep pond were used for baptismal
ceremonies until 60 years ago when baptistries were installed in
several town churches in Monroe County. It was not unusual for
ministers to cut the ice during the colder winter
months in order to baptize converts who were unwilling to wait
until spring and warmer weather. Several pictures of such icy
immersions exist today in Monroe County, among them one that
took place at the old Stoutsville covered bridge around 1910,
when 14 Inches of ice covered the waters of North Fork of Salt
River and temperatures stood at zero or near that. Old timers
recall that in such
instances,
even though both ministers and converts got wet and chilled and
often had to ride a mile or two in buggies or wagons, for dry,
warm clothing, no one ever heard of any of them taking cold or
otherwise suffering from exposure. |
