From Operation Rescue to Operation Convert [Randall Terry now Catholic]

National Catholic registar ^ | 5/17/06 | TIM DRAKE

[Full Court]

font face="Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif" size="4" color="#990000">From Operation Rescue to Operation Convert

May 21-27, 2006

by TIM DRAKE

Also in the Register:

Randal Terry, CatholicRandall Terry has become Catholic.
Between 1987 and 1994, Randall Terry led Operation Rescue, the country’s largest peaceful civil disobedience movement. He now serves as president of the Society for Truth and Justice, and is running for a Florida Senate seat. One of the leading evangelical pro-life leaders in the country, Terry quietly entered the Catholic Church on Holy Thursday with his wife Andrea and three sons. Register senior writer Tim Drake spoke with Terry about his conversion at his home in Florida.

 Where are you from originally?
I grew up in upstate New York, in West Henrietta. We grew up in the country.

 Tell me about your family.
I was conceived out of wedlock in 1958. Within three months my parents were married, and I was born six months later. I’ve always had an affinity with babies born out of wedlock who are in danger of perishing. Had Roe v. Wade been the law of the land in 1958, I might not have been here, although I’m certain that my mother would have chosen life.
I have one brother who is four years younger. My parents were both career school teachers.

 What was your faith background?
I was baptized in the United Church of Christ in New York, but grew up in a nominal Christian home. We were barely Christmas and Easter Christians. From the time I was a little boy until I was 17, I was anything but devout. At times, I was a verifiable agnostic.

 How did you come to know Christ?
As a teenager, I had lived a life immersed in the rock ’n’ roll culture, away from the paths of God, but I had a real yearning in my heart to know ultimate truth and ultimate reality. That set my heart seeking after God in prayer and reading Scriptures and talking to people who were devout in their faith. On Sept. 6, 1976, I made an evangelical commitment to Christ as a 17-year-old.
In conjunction with my teenage rebellion, I was seeking to know if God existed, if heaven and hell and demons and angels existed. My prayer, journey, discussions and reading brought me to the point where I asked Christ to come into my life and be my Lord and savior. That brought an immediate change in my lifestyle, my speech, my relationships and my church attendance. I went from rarely going to church to going three times a week. I began to evangelize all of my former rock ’n’ roll buddies, many of whom became devout Christians. Some of them went into ministry as missionaries and pastors. Once I was convinced that Jesus was the Son of God and that he suffered and died for us, I was thrilled with the Good News and wanted to tell everyone that I knew — family, friends and foes.
It defined my life from that moment on. Two years later I enrolled in a Bible College in New York.

 How did you first get started in pro-life work?
While at a prayer meeting in the fall of 1983, a woman came into the meeting weeping. She said she had just seen a special on Christian television on abortion. She said, “We’ve got to pray that God ends this killing.”
Whenever I thought about abortion, I got a sick feeling in my stomach, yet my evangelical sociology did not allow me to be in the political and social battles of the day. I had very little historical and theological framework from which one could launch and sustain a socio-political movement.
I would think about abortion and pray, “Oh, God, please do something,” but wouldn’t know what to do.
Eventually, on May 1, 1984, I took a position in front of a Binghamton, N.Y., abortion business. I had no literature. I just stood there committed to talking to women who were entering, to beg for the life of their babies. From that grew Project Life — a crisis pregnancy center, and Operation Rescue.

 What led to the founding of Operation Rescue?
I met John Ryan, who was doing sit-ins in St. Louis, and my heart was stirred to participate in direct action. While sitting in jail in 1986, I had another epiphany about how to recruit masses of people. We recruited tens of thousands of people. Between 1987 and 1994, 75,000 arrests were made. That is 10 times the size of the arrests made during the years of protest for civil rights.

 How many times were you arrested?
More than 40 times, always for peaceful protest, like praying in front of an abortion business.

 When did you first take an interest in the Catholic Church?
It was during my work in Operation Rescue that I first became interested in the Roman Catholic Church. My training and experience were in evangelical Christianity with an evangelical framework theologically, but the Roman Catholic communion had a much better sociology and better stability, coupled with a phenomenal theology of suffering.
I would look at my evangelical friends, who would come and go from the pro-life movement. They would proclaim undying devotion for pro-life activism and then later disappear. Then I would look at my Roman Catholic friends who would never swerve. That had a tremendous magnetism for me.
I also found myself defending Catholics against ignorance and bigotry, and defending evangelicals against ignorance and bigotry.
What took me so long was that I was a cultural Protestant, trained in Protestant theology. I had to look at the parts of my training that were inaccurate or deficient. For the past six years, I have been in the Charismatic Episcopal Church. My conversion began with my friendships with clergy in this Church. They told me that the farther you go in Reformation theology, the more you end up in Catholicism and liturgy.

 Which theological hurdles were the most difficult for you to jump?
They boiled down to papal infallibility, Marian dogma, and purgatory. For years I have craved to be in the Catholic Church, but couldn’t figure a way to get around these hurdles. They became resolved this Lent.
On Ash Wednesday, I started a 40-day fast. I have been in conversation with a priest, Father John Mikalajunas, in Binghamton for over 20 years. To my amazement, during Lent, I sensed that it was the plan of the Holy Spirit to bring us into the Catholic Church. After some further conversations with Father Mikalajunas as well as with other evangelicals who had come into the Church, those theological issues evaporated. Once I realized the Truth, I had to go in. I couldn’t wait.

 I understand that you are awaiting word on the annulment of your first marriage. Can you tell me why you chose to be received into the Church (without being able to receive the Eucharist), before the resolution of your annulment?
This has been a journey for 18 years. I knew when I came in that I would have to deal with my annulment. I couldn’t bear not being in Rome any longer. So, I decided I would rather come in and wait to receive the Eucharist, rather than not be in the Church. I felt that I needed to come in, and that it was something I needed to do during Lent. Thus far it has been wonderful — I’m glad I didn’t wait.

 Tell me how your reception into the Church came about.
In my conversations with Father Mikalajunas, he would tell me that I belonged in Rome, and I would jokingly tell him that he would make a great Baptist preacher. I knew I was being pulled into Rome. At the beginning of Lent, he told me something that made a lightbulb go on. He said that he would receive me into the Church. He knew what I knew — he knew that I knew the dogmas of the Church. He was offering to receive us in the event that I could say, “Yes, I believe.”
I thought, “Oh my goodness,” and felt like the Holy Spirit was showing us a plan for our lives. Father Mikalajunas concurred.
Over Holy Thursday we were received and confirmed at St. John the Evangelist Catholic Church in Binghamton. Father Mikalajunas brought in two witnesses.
When I was confirmed, I had this overwhelming sense that I had just walked into a cathedral that was packed with people — namely, the heroes and martyrs and saints who had gone before us. I felt they were rejoicing and calling us on in our journey. I felt as if I was with these people.
There was a tremendous sense of joy realizing that it was the end of my ongoing struggles.

 What was your greatest fear?
That I would wake up and say there was no change in me. That has not been the case. Being in the Church has brought a wonderful sense of belonging. I am part of 2,000 years of Christian history that is glorious, that has warts, and heroes and villains, but that is nonetheless the Church founded by Jesus upon Peter.

 How do you expect your evangelical colleagues will react to news of your conversion?
My journey is so personal, and yet so public. An important part of my journey is that as a pro-life leader I have had the honor of leading tens of thousands of evangelicals and Catholics in pro-life activism. I pray that I am able to continue that leadership in both communities. We have a unity of purpose. We unite around the Apostles’ Creed and our common love of life and justice.
My mission as a man is to unite as many in the Christian community as possible to stand for the Christian ethic of life and justice as defined by our historical and common Christian faith.

 Do you anticipate that your conversion could hurt you in your Senate race in a predominantly Protestant state?
I hope it won’t. I believe that the unity of purpose that has helped me as an evangelical to work with Catholics will help me as a Catholic to work with evangelicals. My wife says that I am bilingual — I can speak both languages. What I would bring to the table as a state senator is standing up for the underdog for justice and freedom. Whether you’re Baptist or Episcopalian or Catholic, you can appreciate that.
We see that kind of working together in the example of a Presbyterian president [Ronald Reagan] working with a Polish priest [Pope John Paul II] to free Poland from communism. I am convinced that the two can work together in our common missions. If we don’t work together, we cannot win.

 

[Full Court]

you're just trying to provoke an argiement -- bait, etc.

Save it for some other sucker, I ain't interested.

[Full Court]

Why would they be less able to do this when they are in the glorious presence of Almighty God?

Why would you need them to?

The Holy Word of God only lists Jesus Christ as an intercessor between man and God.

[jmaroneps37]

"Left his wife for another woman, both daughters pregnant out of wedlock, (one is now a Muslim,) one son is a homosexual."


Know Jesus Christ personally. When asked if he was one of Jesus' disciples, he denied Jesus three times in a matter of hours. Actually hid during the days after Jesus died.



Also, Actually knew Jesus and lived side by side with him and other followers. Demanded to see the risen Christ and put his fingers into Christ's wounds before he would accept the Resurrection



Actually led persecutions of Christians and did so well at it that he lived a nice life as an important army officer.



Was such an incorrigible criminal that he was condemned to death the same day as Jesus.



I could go on but I think you get my point.

[Full Court]

My hero.

"Oh Lord, open the King of England's eyes!"

[Jaded]

Some things just never change.

[Dr. Eckleburg]

I think Luther realized that no oath nor action on our parts can save us. While Baptism is not a salvation issue among Protestants, it certainly is for Catholics who must be baptized into the Holy Roman Catholic Church in order to be saved.

All men are told to obey God. Some do; some don't. We're told to repent, believe, be baptized, perform good works, love God...all of which is the Holy Spirit working within us.

And just like the "wind and the sea obey Him" because they are compelled and have no choice, all those whom God ordains to save will obey, repent, be baptized, perform good works and love God.

Salvation is of the Lord. Christ will lose none of His sheep whom God has given Him to lead home. Christianity is a specific, particular faith. God breathed your name among His flock from before the foundation of the world.

Baptism confirms that fact.

[Alex Murphy]

"They told me that the farther you go in Reformation theology, the more you end up in Catholicism and liturgy."

They told him that? Were they church recruiters, behind on quota, needing more converts??? I guess they conveniently forgot to tell him about the Council of Trent's Sixth Session....

CANON V.-If any one saith, that, since Adam's sin, the free will of man is lost and extinguished; or, that it is a thing with only a name, yea a name without a reality, a figment, in fine, introduced into the Church by Satan; let him be anathema.

CANON IX.-If any one saith, that by faith alone the impious is justified; in such wise as to mean, that nothing else is required to co-operate in order to the obtaining the grace of Justification, and that it is not in any way necessary, that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will; let him be anathema.

CANON XI.-If any one saith, that men are justified, either by the sole imputation of the justice of Christ, or by the sole remission of sins, to the exclusion of the grace and the charity which is poured forth in their hearts by the Holy Ghost, and is inherent in them; or even that the grace, whereby we are justified, is only the favour of God; let him be anathema.

CANON XV.-If any one saith, that a man, who is born again and justified, is bound of faith to believe that he is assuredly in the number of the predestinate; let him be anathema.

CANON XXIV.-If any one saith, that the justice received is not preserved and also increased before God through good works; but that the said works are merely the fruits and signs of Justification obtained, but not a cause of the increase thereof; let him be anathema.

CANON XXX.-If any one saith, that, after the grace of Justification has been received, to every penitent sinner the guilt is remitted, and the debt of eternal punishment is blotted out in such wise, that there remains not any debt of temporal punishment to be discharged either in this world, or in the next in Purgatory, before the entrance to the kingdom of heaven can be opened (to him); let him be anathema.

[blue-duncan]

"I certainly hope you are not 'Catholic bashing' with that statement."

I think if you look at my posts debating with Roman Catholics on this forum you will see although I disagree with some of the postions I do not insult, disparage or "bash".

[fatima]

Wow,Don't have time to read article but will catch it later.I met Randy a few times.

[old and tired]

Alright, anybody else think after reading that NY Times article that Randall Terry became a Catholic so he could smoke his cigar and drink his beer in public?

Which reminds me - thank God I'm Catholic!

[Graymatter]

Guess I'm just lucky I don't know as much about Randall Terry's spiritual credits as some others on this thread.
I do know that there were two criminals on Golgotha with Jesus and at least half of them went to Heaven anyway.

[SuziQ]

And the Vatican will approve his annulment because he is a high profile convert.

If the Vatican approves the annulment, it will be FOR CAUSE. It doesn't matter who is he or how many people know him.

Your posts make it seem that you always want to believe the worst of the Church, no matter how much evidence may be presented to the contrary.

[blue-duncan]

"They told me that the farther you go in Reformation theology, the more you end up in Catholicism and liturgy."

"ROTFL!"

This is serious stuff and you are laughing at it instead of plugging up the hole in the Reformation theology where all the converts are leaking out.

Here is some patching material specially anointed by Benny Hinn for just the occasion. Just put it on the crack in the theology where they are leaking out. You can thank me later.

[xzins]

I'm glad for his pro-life stand.

I'm disappointed that an "evangelical" can overlook the obvious biblical absence of the theology known as the immaculate conception and it's kissing cousin, the assumption.

He certainly wasn't a biblical evangelical.

[Campion]

While Baptism is not a salvation issue among Protestants ...

Best not tell that to the Church of Christ folks.

[Campion]

The Protestant, pro-life corrupter of so many Christians has himself been spiritually corrupted through and through because he has loved the unborn more than Christ.

Bizarre. Sick. Cloud-cuckoo sick.

"Whatsoever you do to the least of these, that you do unto me ..." -- Matthew 25

[Campion]

Why would you need them to?

Why did Paul ask his readers to pray for him?

[Campion]

And Willilam Tyndale, who was burned at the stake for translating the Bible into English against the dictate of the Romanists

Tyndale was executed in Belgium on a charge of heresy, not for translating the Bible into English, which wouldn't have been very interesting to the Belgians anyway.

The "King of England" whose eyes he prayed to be opened had already broken with Rome by then, and was busily executing faithful Catholics.

[BibChr]

Apostasy is always tragic.

What Is Biblical Christianity?

[Scotswife]

"First of all, he believes that forgiveness ONLY comes through a Priest and communion...that if a man sins, and prays for forgivenss, and truly repents, that if he dies before he can see a Priest and confess and ask for forgiveness, then he will go to hell and burn in eternal damnation-I don't see that an anywhere in the Bible. "

This is not true. People can "believe" many different things and still not get it right when it comes to actually understanding what the Church actually teaches.