I read the article which you excerpted your post from. The author takes quotes out of context and makes assumptions based on what he thinks Scott Hahn believed not what Scott Hahn stated whe believed. He also decides without evidence that Scott Hahn has personality
disorders
“What sorts of people write autobiographies when they are healthy and well at 35? Generally there are three sorts: egotists, egomaniacs, and megalomaniacs.”
“One remark his wife makes in this book suggests that Hahn’s desire to be noticed is great: ‘Scott suffered tremendous loneliness. He was misunderstood and rejected by many Protestant friends who didn’t want to talk to him....’ “
“During his first years in Gordon-Conwell Seminary, 1979-81, Hahn suffered from a confused mental state: /At this point I would describe my study as a detective story. I was searching Scripture to discover clues as to the whereabouts of real Christianity’”
The above quotes are insulting in the extreme and I would protest if the story was a critique of a Catholic converting to Protestantism.
Rather than believing Scott Hahn’s reasons given in his books for his conversion the author assumes he knows the real reasons:
“The first of the reasons for Hahn’s conversion to Romanism is liberalism and Arminianism.”
The author nevers says just why this would lead to converting to RCC rather than a more liberal Protestant or even Unitarian denomination. Also his association in highschool with what the author terms an Arminian Evangelstic group Young Life can hardly be pointed to as a reason for converting to RC decades later. I once sang in a Methodist youth choir- I guess that makes me a future Protestant. Oh wait my inlaws are Protestant. I guess I am not Catholic after all.
The author is also very dismissive of Scott Hahn’s religious and spiritual experiences before he even considered converting. The author is also a mind reader and determined that if one has interests outside of theology one obviously is not really interested in theology
“While in high school, Hahn also became enamored of Luther and Calvin, apparently because they appealed to his need for heroes: ‘I decided the figures in Christian history who most appealed to me...were the great protestant reformers Martin Luther and John Calvin’ (5). But the theologies of Luther and Calvin seemed to play relatively small parts in Hahn’s thinking; he was fascinated by other things. A guitarist, Hahn liked modern music:”
The author gives as Hahn’s second reason for converting his study of St.Thomas Aquinas. Now maybe I am too naive but I think many Protestant pastors are well aware and have studied Aquinas. They did not find him the force for conversion. Perhaps Hahn had a different edition of his works? As to the RC philosophy of evidentalism I am not familiar with that so shall not comment.
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The author does not give any rational defense of Protestantism rather he makes personal attacks against Scott Hahn for converting. He claims to know the reasons despite that they are contrary to the ones given by Hahn himself. He is scornful of any spiritual experiences related by Hahn insinuating they must have been invalid because of Hahn’s future conversion.
There are fortunately Protestant apologists who can make a good ( even though I disagree with them) argument for Sola Scriptura without resorting to the personal attacks of this author.
Evidentialism is not the huge bugaboo the author makes it out to be. I did a search on Evidentialism. I found an article from Standford University titled “The Epistemology of Religion” Simply put Evidentialism is one philoshophy of how people arrive at their belief in God and other religious teachings. Though in philosophy it may be simple to divide those who arrive at faith through evidence from those who use personal feelings or experiences to do so I doubt in the real world it is that simple. I would think each of us use a bit of both. I tend to weigh personal experience against the Bible and Church teaching. Trusting those sources more than my own experience. But I would only discount personal experience if it contradicted what is taught in Scripture and by the Church. For instance if I suddenly got the revelation that God blessed homosexual unions I would immediately pray that such enlightenment go back to hell where they belong. But if I feel the need to pray for someone I would do so.