John Hunt, a nurse, is one of a growing number of people around the world who want their former involvement with faith groups to be struck from official records.

Now 56, he was baptised at the parish church of St Jude with St Aidan in Thornton Heath, south London, when he was just a baby.

But as a schoolboy he decided he did not believe in God and stopped going to Sunday school aged 11.

More recently he asked Southwark diocese to remove his name from the baptismal roll, because he believes he was too young to agree to the ceremony taking place.

He was told that his baptism cannot be deleted because it is a matter of historical record.

However, he paid £60 to place an advert in the London Gazette, an official journal dating back to the 17th century, in which he rejected publicly the Christian faith, and wants church leaders to put a copy of the announcement in the baptismal roll.

Mr Hunt said: “I think it’s important that more people speak out and say they don’t subscribe to the historic beliefs of the Church.”

He has got a copy of a “de-baptism” certificate produced by the National Secular Society, which states: “I, John Geoffrey Hunt, having been subjected to the rite of Christian baptism in infancy hereby publicly revoke any implications of that rite.

“I reject all its creeds and other such superstitions in particular the perfidious belief that any baby needs to be cleansed of original sin.”

The society says an estimated 100,000 people have downloaded such certificates from its website over the past five years. It produces mock official versions, and has had to order a new consignment of parchment to meet demand.

Although the Church of England’s policy is that it will not record formally those who wish to renounce their baptism, Roman Catholic canon law allows a process known as a “formal act of defection” from the faith. This means that a note will be made on a person’s baptismal record stating that they have left the church.

De-baptism movements exist in Catholic countries such as Spain, Italy and Argentina, while Germans are allowed to renounce their baptism officially in order to get out of paying a church tax.

Terry Sanderson, the president of the NSS, admitted its de-baptism certificate had been produced originally as a “tongue-in-cheek” joke but added that the procedure is now being taken seriously by an increasing number of atheists.

He said: “There’s so much anger against the church that people actually want to make a statement against it.”

The Bishop of Croydon, the Rt Rev Nick Baines, said: “Whether we agree whether it should have happened or not is a different matter.

“But it’s a bit like trying to expunge Trotsky from the photos. You can’t remove from the record something that actually happened.”

Read the full article | Print this article