The baptism is going to be wild: horse troughs, whirlpools and hashtags

However, as these 20th century churches age, their once-modern baptisteries also look old-fashioned.

“It’s like eating organic food,” says Chad Seales, professor of religious studies at the University of Texas at Austin, who has written on the history of the indoor baptisteries. The middle and upper classes today embrace the “primitive” as a sign of authenticity.

Change isn’t just a matter of style. Built-in baptisteries are a nuisance. Mold and leaks are a constant problem, and because the tanks are larger than most portable options, they take longer to fill and heat. “Baptisteries are very expensive to run,” said Evan Welcher, until recently pastor of Vine Street Bible Church in Glenwood, Iowa, which operates two large 19th-century church buildings on the same block. (That is a long story.)

These days Pastor Welcher is eying newer, ostensibly hip baptismal institutions with something like envy.

“We have two baptisteries and they both leaked at different times,” he said. “The cattle trough looks really simple; it looks so much better. People might say, ‘Oh, the cool churches do this,’ but it actually looks like a better way. ”Vine Street, which baptized four people this year, spent around $ 3,000 on one a few years ago to repair a defective heating pump in one of their facilities.

These “cooler churches” are often “church works” or new congregations planted by an existing church or denomination with the goal of evangelizing in a new location. They typically meet in rented facilities like schools, movie theaters, or shop windows and are geared towards events and aesthetics that draw crowds.

Historically, black churches have generally maintained a more formal tradition, said David Latimore, director of the Betsey Stockton Center for Black Church Studies at Princeton Theological Seminary. The Black Church “has always resisted the pull of informality for informality’s sake,” said Dr. Latimore. Because baptism is a ritual of belonging and “citizenship,” it has had something of a double meaning for much of American history. “There is a great and heavy sense of the deep holiness of this ritual,” he said.