the missing godparent

[justcarol67]

No: HPFGUIDX 88273

--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "Taryn Kimel" <amani at c...> wrote:
> Fawkes:
> i was thinking today about the hp3 movie premiere (US) and that i 
> would be going as sirius. so as i thought about it i was thinking 
> maybe since i was harry's godfather one of my other friends would go 
> as his godmother when i reazlized: who is harry's godmother? why has 
> JKR not mentioned his godmother? if he has a godfather then he must 
> have a godmother as well should he? just throwing this out there, if 
> its already been posted please inform me. 
> 
> Taryn:
> It's certainly not necessary. Within my family, I have a godfather
and a godmother, two of my brothers only have one godfather, and one
of my brothers has two godfathers. (For the record, we're Episcopalian
AKA the Anglican Church AKA Church of England.) This subject has come
up numerous times before and, while it's certainly very possible Harry
has a godmother, I just want to stress that it's not NECESSARY. (If he
does have a godmother...well, where is she?)
>

Speaking also as a former Episcopalian and assuming (perhaps wrongly)
that the practice is the same in the Anglican Church from which it
branched off, the usual practice is (or used to be when I was a child)
to have two godparents of the same sex as the child and one of the
opposite sex, so I had two godmothers and one godfather; Harry would
have the opposite.

However, I'm surprised that the WW has godparents at all, or that they
celebrate Christmas and Easter and have monks and friars among their
ghosts, or even that they use such expressions as "My Lord!" and
"Bless my soul!" (both from th Leaky Cauldron scene in SS/PS).
Christianity in all its variants, including the Anglican Church, is a
Muggle institution, and it doesn't appear that Witches and Wizards
attend church. I guess a secularized Christianity has permeated their
culture as it has permeated British Muggle culture, but still,
godfathers (and -mothers) are a religious tradition, not a secular one.

Carol, who knows that JKR can depict her world in any way she likes,
but nevertheless finds the religious elements strange. (I'm not
anti-Christian; I just think the WW and the RW should be a bit more
distinct.)