- a Christian ceremony in which a few drops of water are poured on somebody or they are covered with water, to welcome them into the Christian Church and often to name them compare christeningTopics Religion and festivalsc2Word OriginMiddle English: from Old French baptesme, via ecclesiastical Latin from ecclesiastical Greek baptismos ‘ceremonial washing’, from baptizein ‘immerse, baptize’.
Idioms
See baptism in the Oxford Advanced American Dictionarybaptism of fire
(also less frequent baptism by fire)
- a difficult introduction to a new job or activity
Check pronunciation:
baptism