#4-- A TANGIBLE PRESENCE

 

                                                                BAPTISMAL FONTS

 

My ancestors are names in records and in my heart, but rarely is there anything tangible—gravestone, picture or heirloom—to physically connect to them. To touch the font in which my distant ancestor was baptised has personal meaning.  Fonts are often placed at or near the entrance to a church’s nave. They remind believers of their baptism as they enter the church to pray, since the rite of baptism served as their initiation into the Church.

Baptismal font in St.Bartholomew Church, Warleggan, Co.Cornwall, England. Home church of the Lemin family who left by early 1800s.

Baptismal font in St.Cyriacus & St.Julitta Church, Luxulyan, Co.Cornwall, England.  Home church of the Harper family; my great-great grandparents, Richard Harper and Jane Oliver Lemin, emigrated to Canada in 1849.

Baptismal font from Solingen Church, Germany. the Old Town of Solingen was completely destroyed by a RAF bombing raid in 1944; as such there are few pre-war sites in the centre.  This seems to be the home church of the Werth and Fudikar families. Jacob Werth emigrated about 1850.

Baptismal font from Turku Cathedral, Finland.  Grandma Suomela was baptised here in 1902. She and her mother emigrated to Canada in 1905.

Baptismal font in Our Lady, Guelph. Likely the font for Steve, Joan and WayneWhelan and older Walsh generations.