Several members of the Dutch royal family have been posthumously ‘baptised’ into the Mormon church, Trouw reports on Wednesday, quoting church documents.

The documents show prince Claus, prince Bernhard and princess Juliana were all ‘baptised’ as Mormons after their deaths. Mormons believe the proxy baptism ritual allows deceased people from other religions to enter the afterlife.
Prince Claus’ baptism took place two year after his death in 2002 at a Mormon temple in Brazil. This may have been done by ‘over-enthusiastic members’, Hans Boom, spokesman for the Mormon church in the Netherlands told the paper.
The state information service declined to comment on the claims. Boom told Trouw he could not imagine there would be objections because it is a ‘gesture of love’. There are some 8900 Mormons in the Netherlands.
Records
In addition, the paper reports that the Mormon church has offered the 12 Dutch provinces to digitally scan all their births, marriages and deaths records for use on computers, free of charge.
However, the aim of this is to collect more names to baptise by proxy, the paper says.
Gelderland has agreed to have its archives digitalised but Utrecht has refused and Overijssel has doubts, the paper states.

Last year there were claims that Anne Frank, the Jewish girl who wrote a diary while in hiding in Amsterdam during World War II had been baptised a Mormon by proxy, creating anger among Jewish groups.