Believer's baptism

Believer's baptism or adult baptism (occasionally called credobaptism, from the Latin word credo meaning "I believe") is the practice of baptizing those who are able to make a conscious profession of faith, as contrasted to the practice of baptizing infants. Credobaptists believe that infants incapable of consciously believing should not be baptized.

The mode of believer's baptism depends on the Christian denomination, and is done either by pouring (the normative method in Mennonite, Amish, and Hutterite churches) or by immersion (the normative method practiced by Schwarzenau Brethren, River Brethren, Baptists, and the Churches of Christ, among others). Certain denominations of Methodism, including the Free Methodist Church and Evangelical Wesleyan Church, practice infant baptism for families who desire it for their children, but provide a rite for child dedication for those who have a preference for believer's baptism only after their child has made a personal acceptance of Jesus as their savior.

Denominations and groups who practice believer's baptism were historically referred to as Anabaptist (from Neo-Latin anabaptista, from the Greek ἀναβαπτισμός: ἀνά-, "re-", and βαπτισμός, "baptism"), though this term is used primarily to categorize the denominations and adherents belonging to the Anabaptist branch of Christianity that emerged in the era of the Radical Reformation.