The sponsor accompanies a baptized candidate at confirmation and First Eucharist, but also is the designated role for the companion of a catechumen-to-be.
10. A sponsor accompanies any candidate seeking admission as a catechumen. Sponsors are persons who have known and assisted the candidates and stand as witnesses to the candidates’ moral character, faith, and intention. It may happen that it is not the sponsor for the rite of acceptance and the period of the catechumenate but another person who serves as godparent for the periods of purification and enlighenment and of mystagogy.
Many newcomers do not have sponsors. The natural sponsor may be a family member, even a spouse. Such a person would hardly ever be appropriate as a choice for godparent, but a husband or wife or parent may walk the initial walk with their loved one as a sponsor.
The rite suggests that the role of godparent kicks in seriously during the intense Lenten preparation, and the godparent continues to assist the neophyte with the integration into the rest of the faith community.
