No baptism, no communion — not deferred, not private, simply not practised.
The Army stopped in 1883. The reasoning was pastoral rather than theological: that the sign was being mistaken for the thing signified, that the sacraments had become an obstacle to converts who could not get past the water, and that a movement full of recovering alcoholics should not be passing wine.
The Salvation Army is the largest Christian body in the world that does not practise the sacraments, and the decision was taken quickly and has never been reversed. Communion was discontinued in 1883 and baptism with it. The reasons given at the time were practical and characteristic: the sacraments were producing disputes about who could administer them, converts from drink were being handed wine, and — Catherine Booth's argument — women officers would be barred from administering them in the eyes of other churches, which would create exactly the two-tier ministry the Army refused. The theological position that developed afterwards is that the whole life is sacramental and that grace does not require a sign. The Army has periodically reopened the question, most seriously at the International Spiritual Life Commission in the late 1990s, which affirmed the existing practice while acknowledging the loss. Salvationists who want communion generally receive it in another church, and the Army does not object.
The same ground, other faiths
claims that share this one's ideasSign in to open the first thread. Everything here is attributed.