It depends on whether you’ve already been baptized with water in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Most people coming from Catholic or mainstream Protestant backgrounds won’t need baptism again, they’ll be received through chrismation (also called confirmation). But some will need baptism.
Let me explain how this works.
The Orthodox Church recognizes that a valid baptism happens once. You can’t be re-baptized any more than you can be re-born from your mother’s womb a second time. So if you were baptized with the proper Trinitarian formula, “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”, your priest will almost certainly receive you through chrismation alone. This completes what was begun in your baptism but couldn’t be finished outside the fullness of the Church.
Who Gets Received by Chrismation?
If you were baptized Catholic, you’ll be received by chrismation. Same if you were baptized in most Protestant churches: Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Episcopalian, or non-denominational churches that use the standard Trinitarian formula. The Antiochian Archdiocese follows the ancient practice of economia, a kind of pastoral mercy that recognizes the grace present in these baptisms even though they happened outside Orthodoxy.
Here in Southeast Texas, that means most folks coming from First Baptist or St. Anne’s or Abundant Life won’t be baptized again. You’ll go through a period of instruction (catechism), then on the day of your reception you’ll renounce your former errors, profess the Orthodox faith, and be anointed with holy chrism. That anointing is what the Apostles did when they laid hands on new believers, it’s the seal of the Holy Spirit.
Who Needs Baptism?
You’ll need baptism if your previous baptism wasn’t Trinitarian. Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Oneness Pentecostals don’t baptize in the name of the Trinity as Christians have understood it for two thousand years, so those baptisms don’t count. Same if you were baptized in a church that used alternative formulas like “Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier” instead of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Some progressive churches started doing this, but it’s not Christian baptism.
You’ll also need baptism if you were never baptized at all. Plenty of people grew up in church-going families but never got around to it, or they came to faith as adults in churches that treat baptism as optional.
And sometimes, rarely, a bishop will require baptism even for someone baptized with the Trinitarian formula, usually because there’s serious doubt about whether the baptism actually happened or was done correctly. Your priest will work through your specific situation with you.
Why Does the Form Matter?
Because baptism isn’t magic words over water. It’s entrance into Christ’s death and resurrection, incorporation into His Body. The Church received this mystery from Christ Himself, who commanded His disciples to baptize “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” We don’t have authority to change that formula any more than we have authority to rewrite the Lord’s Prayer.
When the Church receives someone by chrismation instead of baptism, we’re not saying their previous baptism was perfect or complete. We’re saying it was real enough that God’s mercy allows us to complete it rather than start over. It’s the difference between finishing a house someone else started building and bulldozing it to pour a new foundation.
The Second Ecumenical Council dealt with this question back in 381. Canon 7 of that council laid out which groups could be received by chrismation and which needed baptism. We’re still following that same principle.
What Happens Practically?
Talk to Fr. Michael or contact the church office. You’ll meet with the priest, tell him about your background, and he’ll explain what applies to your situation. If you were baptized, bring documentation if you have it, a baptism certificate from your previous church helps, though it’s not absolutely required.
Then you’ll begin catechism, learning the faith whether you’ll be baptized or received by chrismation. The process is the same either way. You’re not in a different category or somehow less prepared if you need baptism. Some of the greatest Orthodox Christians in America were baptized as adults, people like Fr. Seraphim Rose, who’d been baptized in a liberal Protestant church but was baptized again when he became Orthodox because that’s what his bishop required at the time.
Your reception into the Church isn’t about your past. It’s about your future. Whether you’re baptized or chrismated, you’re becoming part of the same Body, receiving the same Holy Spirit, joining yourself to the same two-thousand-year-old faith once delivered to the saints.
