Wow this is huge. I am well surprised that the Catholic organization would recognize anything outside of it's own building. They historically believe they are the original church of Christ and that no one else has the same rights that they do.
I come by this through education and knowing many Catholics. I do believe though that in the Reformed tradition in North America we need to make a significant change to the Apostles creed. We need to remove the word catholic and imput the word Universal. As we are Christ's Universal church and the word catholic implies something different. Whether you use a capital letter or a small letter to many millions of people the word is spelled the same and thus has the same meaning.

I think we do need to be Ecumenical, however at the same time we must retain our identity.

I know that Rome has recognized Lutheran and Eastern Orthodox Baptisms (also Anglican/Episcopalian, I think) for quite a while. What makes the agreement with the Reformed much more complex than these prior acknowledgements is that they had all (in simlar fashion to the Roman Catholics) acknowledged Baptismal Regeneration, while the Reformed do not universally acknowledge that Baptism forgives sins.

Jan, you might be interested to know that my fellow Lutherans have acted similarly to your suggestion for nearly 500 years now. The Latin word, "catholicos" literally translates as "according to the whole." When Martin Luther translated the Apostles' Creed from Latin to German, he had to choose between the German words "Christliche" (Christian in English) or "Katolische" (Catholic in English) as a translation for this word. He chose "Christliche," and except for a small number of relatively recent departures, Lutherans have confessed their belief in the "Holy Christian Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, and the life everlasting," ever since.

This is quite interesting. I wonder why so few of the reformed denominations, however, are present. Do the others not care to join? Or were they not recognized therefore not invited in due to their much more brief history? After all, these are but a small portion of American reformed denominations, and in general the most liberal. I suppose it makes sense not because baptism has the same meaning in all of them (because it does not) but for two main reasons: The means of baptism is similar, in that it looks the same to an unknowing onlooker, and because the parents who bring their children to baptism usually have the same intentions accross the board. These leaders might have considered the earlier reason most, while parishoners will care most about the second one, and rightfully so. Yet, let us not come to conclusions until we know why the other denominations are not involved and let us not ignore the very different deep founded meanings behind a Catholic baptism, and a Reformed one.

Just so everyone is clear, since there seems to be some misunderstanding:

From the Roman Catholic side at least, this is only a somewhat redundant restatement of what has long been official RC policy anyway: a baptism carried out with the Trinitarian formula for the purpose of Christian initiation is valid in the RCC's eyes, regardless who performed it.

What is new here is the level of proactive administrative cooperation in this agreement, not the mutual recognition of one another's baptisms itself.

Do the eclectic collection of Evangelical Churches recognize baptisms among one another?

To the best of my knowledge, all non-Roman Christians who baptize babies recognize one another's baptisms that are conducted using the Trinitarian formula, "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." Typically, these denominations would consider Baptism to be a one-time event and would consider rebaptizing to be inappropriate.

In the event that a Baptism was conducted merely "in the name of Jesus" or using some recently-witnessed non-standard formulas (i.e. mother/child/comforter, creator/redeemer/sanctifier, etc.) it may call into doubt the validity of the initial Baptism and prompt rebaptizing. Baptisms by non-Trinitarian religions (i.e. oneness Pentecostalism, Mormonism, Jehovah's Witnesses, etc.) would similarly not be recognized.

Obviously, re-baptizing denominations would reject all baptisms of children prior to the age they deem appropriate, but I believe that most would recognize baptisms conducted in other congregations with comparable baptismal theology.

A very small minority would insist that all who seek membership in their fellowship be baptized into their particular denomination or congregation, but this is very rare.