Church Records

To receive a baptismal certificate you must have the church/religious institution send on their business letter head stating the facts of the event. Approximately when the baptism happened with only the given name of the man/woman that was baptized.

A Baptismal Certificate is a form of identification under the laws of the Creator and the Laws of Man

Fed. R. Evid. 803(11) provides that statements of births, marriages, divorces, deaths, legitimacy, ancestry, relationship by blood or marriage, or other similar facts of personal or family history are admissible if contained in a regularly kept record of a religious organization. This exception is designed to supplement the business records exception under Fed. R. Evid. 803(6) by omitting the requirement that the person furnishing the information be acting in the course of the religious activity.

Baptismal records of a church are admissible to prove the fact and date of baptisms, and entries in church registers of burials are admissible as evidence to prove the death of a person.

Fed. R. Evid. 803(11) does not include records of taxpayer donations to religious organizations. 

In light of the First Amendment protection of the free exercise of religion, there is scant authority on what would constitute a “religious organization.” There is authority that organizations that have no ecclesiastical control of those engaged in religious worship, and that cannot prescribe the forms of such worship or subject to ecclesiastical discipline those who fail to conform to the rules, usages, or orders of the religious society of which they are members, do not have the character of a church, congregation, or society formed for the purpose of religious worship.