I Hated the Idea of Becoming Catholic

Aleteia ^ | JUNE 20, 2014 | ANTHONY BARATTA

[NYer]

It was the day after Ash Wednesday in 2012 when I called my mom from my dorm room at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and told her I thought I was going to become Catholic.

“You’re not going to become Catholic, you just know you’re not Southern Baptist,” she said.

“No, I don’t think so.”

A pause. “Oh boy,” she sighed.

I started crying.

I cannot stress enough how much I hated the idea of becoming Catholic. I was bargaining to the last moment. I submitted a sermon for a competition days before withdrawing from school. I was memorizing Psalm 119 to convince myself of sola scriptura. I set up meetings with professors to hear the best arguments. I purposefully read Protestant books about Catholicism, rather than books by Catholic authors.

Further, I knew I would lose my housing money and have to pay a scholarship back if I withdrew from school, not to mention disappointing family, friends, and a dedicated church community.

But when I attempted to do my homework, I collapsed on my bed. All I wanted to do was scream at the textbook, “Who says?!”

I had experienced a huge paradigm shift in my thinking about the faith, and the question of apostolic authority loomed larger than ever.

But let’s rewind back a few years.

I grew up in an evangelical Protestant home. My father was a worship and preaching pastor from when I was in fourth grade onwards. Midway through college, I really fell in love with Jesus Christ and His precious Gospel and decided to become a pastor.

It was during that time that I was hardened in my assumption that the Roman Catholic Church didn’t adhere to the Bible. When I asked one pastor friend of mine during my junior year why Catholics thought Mary remained a virgin after Jesus’ birth when the Bible clearly said Jesus had “brothers,” he simply grimaced: “They don’t read the Bible.”

Though I had been in talks with Seattle’s Mars Hill Church about doing an internship with them, John Piper’s book Don’t Waste Your Life clarified my call to missionary work specifically, and I spent the next summer evangelizing Catholics in Poland.

So I was surprised when I visited my parents and found a silly looking book titled Born Fundamentalist, Born Again Catholic on my father’s desk. What was my dad doing reading something like this? I was curious and hadn’t brought anything home to read, so I gave it a look.

David Currie’s memoir of leaving behind his evangelical education and ministries was bothersome. His unapologetic defense of controversial doctrines regarding Mary and the papacy were most shocking, as I had never seriously considered that Catholics would have sensible, scriptural defenses to these beliefs.

The book’s presence on my father’s desk was explained more fully a few months later when he called me and said he was returning to the Catholicism of his youth. My response? “But, can’t you just be Lutheran or something?” I felt angry, betrayed, and indignant. For the next four months I served as a youth pastor at my local church and, in my free time, read up on why Catholicism was wrong.

During that time, I stumbled across a Christianity Today article that depicted an “evangelical identity crisis.” The author painted a picture of young evangelicals, growing up in a post-modern world, yearning to be firmly rooted in history and encouraged that others had stood strong for Christ in changing and troubled times. Yet, in my experience, most evangelical churches did not observe the liturgical calendar, the Apostles’ Creed was never mentioned, many of the songs were written after 1997, and if any anecdotal story was told about a hero from church history, it was certainly from after the Reformation. Most of Christian history was nowhere to be found.

For the first time, I panicked. I found a copy of the Catechism and started leafing through it, finding the most controversial doctrines and laughing at the silliness of the Catholic Church. Indulgences? Papal infallibility? These things, so obviously wrong, reassured me in my Protestantism. The Mass sounded beautiful and the idea of a visible, unified Church was appealing - but at the expense of the Gospel? It seemed obvious that Satan would build a large organization that would lead so many just short of heaven.

I shook off most of the doubts and enjoyed the remainder of my time at college, having fun with the youth group and sharing my faith with the students. Any lingering doubts, I assumed, would be dealt with in seminary.

I started my classes in January with the excitement of a die-hard football fan going to the Super Bowl. The classes were fantastic and I thought I had finally rid myself of any Catholic problems.

But just a few weeks later, I ran into more doubts. We were learning about spiritual disciplines like prayer and fasting and I was struck by how often the professor would skip from St. Paul to Martin Luther or Jonathan Edwards when describing admirable lives of piety. Did nothing worthwhile happen in the first 1500 years? The skipping of history would continue in many other classes and assigned reading. The majority of pre-Reformation church history was ignored.

I soon discovered I had less in common with the early Church fathers than I thought. Unlike most Christians in history, communion had always been for me an occasional eating of bread and grape juice, and baptism was only important after someone had gotten “saved.” Not only did these views contradict much of Church history but, increasingly, they did not match with uncomfortable Bible passages I had always shrugged off (John 6, Romans 6, etc).

Other questions that I had buried began to reappear, no longer docile but ferocious, demanding an answer. Where did the Bible come from? Why didn’t the Bible claim to be “sufficient”? The Protestant answers that had held me over in the last year were no longer satisfying.

Jefferson Bethke’s viral YouTube video, “Why I Hate Religion, But Love Jesus,” was released during this time. The young man meant well, but to me he only validated what the Wall Street Journal called “the dangerous theological anarchy of young evangelicals,” attempting to remove Jesus from the confines of religion but losing so much in the process.

Ash Wednesday was the tipping point. A hip Southern Baptist church in Louisville held a morning Ash Wednesday service and many students showed up to classes with ashes on their forehead. At chapel that afternoon, a professor renowned for his apologetic efforts against Catholicism expounded upon the beauty of this thousand year old tradition.

Afterwards, I asked a seminary friend why most evangelicals had rejected this beautiful thing. He responded with something about Pharisees and “man-made traditions.”

I shook my head. “I can’t do this anymore.”

My resistance to Catholicism started to fade. I was feeling drawn to the sacraments, sacramentals, physical manifestations of God’s grace, the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church. No more borrowing, no more denying.

It was the next day that I called my mom and told her I thought I was going to become Catholic.

I didn’t go to classes on Friday. I went to the seminary library and checked out books I had previously forbidden myself to look at too closely, like the Catechism and Pope Benedict’s latest. I felt like I was checking out porn. Later, I drove to a 5pm Saturday Mass. The gorgeous crucifix at the front of the church reminded me of when I had mused that crucifixes demonstrated that Catholics didn’t really understand the resurrection.

But I saw the crucifix differently this time and began crying. “Jesus, my suffering savior, you’re here.”

A peace came over me until Tuesday, when it yielded to face-to-windshield reality. Should I stay or leave? I had several panicked phone calls: “I literally have no idea what I am going to do tomorrow morning.”

On Wednesday morning I woke up, opened my laptop, and typed out “77 Reasons I Am Leaving Evangelicalism.” The list included things like sola scriptura, justification, authority, the Eucharist, history, beauty, and continuity between the Old and New Testament. The headlines and the ensuing paragraphs flowed from my fingers like water bursting from a centuries-old dam. 

A few hours later on February 29, 2012 I slipped out of Louisville, Kentucky, eager to not confuse anyone else and hoping I wasn’t making a mistake.  

The next few months were painful. More than anything else I felt ashamed and defensive, uncertain of how so much of my identity and career path could be upended so quickly. Nonetheless, I joined the Church on Pentecost with the support of my family and started looking for work.

So much has changed since then. I met Jackie on CatholicMatch.com that June, got married a year later, and celebrated the birth of our daughter, Evelyn, on March 3rd, 2014. We’re now in Indiana and I’m happy at my job.

I’m still very new on this Catholic journey. To all inquirers out there, I can tell you that my relationship with God has deepened and strengthened. As I get involved in our parish, I’m so thankful for the love of evangelism and the Bible that I learned in Protestantism.

I have not so much left my former faith as I have filled in the gaps. I thank God for the fullness of the Catholic faith.

[boatbums]

That's a lot of "explanation" for something that is not all that complicated. Can you say who is teaching this to you or where you have learned some of these assertions? Because, much of what you are saying sounds more like conjecture, hyper literalism or prophecy disjointed from its context.

For example, Daniel 7:25 is talking about THE Antichrist in the end times and says how he will pervert the feast days, rituals and temple ordinances for the Jewish people IN Jerusalem - concluding with HIM sitting in the holy of holies declaring himself to BE God, and this is midway through the seven year peace treaty signed with Israel and facilitated by the Antichrist.

Rather than thinking you are receiving some great, previously unknown, mysteries from God and you trying to figure out how it all fits into Scripture, I can suggest some good websites to read to help you more fully understand how this all fits into God's plan. One such place to start, and it's a whole series on the subject, look to https://bible.org/series/millennial-series. It was written by John Valvoord, long-time president of Dallas Theological Seminary. He was one of the most prominent evangelical scholars of his generation. He is considered perhaps the world's foremost interpreter of biblical prophecy.

[editor-surveyor]

>> “14 For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end” <<

.
This clear statement, and the many similar ones spread through the epistles, is what they all are running from.

The fact that one can only be saved if he holds the faith unto the end, is what they want to hide, from themselves as well as others.

It puts churchianity out of business. The anything goes gospel, the prosperity gospel, and the grab it with your faith gospel, all preach a pre-trib OSAS lie with their money-sucking TV ministries.

They’re all going to fly to heaven in their luxury corporate jets. Their staff of accountants and lawyers will take care of the expenses.

[boatbums]

The Nicolaitanes are the followers of that Nicolas who was one of the seven first ordained to the diaconate by the apostles.

I'd be interested in knowing WHICH Apostle ordained the guy, wouldn't you? If such heresy could start that soon after Christ's ascension, that an actual Apostle laid hands on the man, what does that say about "Apostolic Succession"?

[Springfield Reformer]

Attributes from Hebrews 6:4-6 speak of true believers who received the LORD Jesus Christ

Not so.  See my post #852.  All of those conditions can be met and a person still not yet born again, born of the spirit, reconciled to God, etc. etc.  Many proofs are available.  I have other work tonight and cannot address this in a full manner.  But to dispel caricatures, many opponents of Calvinism cannot state correctly what Calvinism is.  I have seen this many times over.  Suffice it to say, your sound-bite, "We are not saved by believing we are saved," is a complete misrepresentation of what Calvinists believe. No Calvinist I have ever heard of or read or spoken with, not one, would say we are saved by believing we are saved.  Sounds more like something that would come out of one of the New Age errors. I would be fascinated to know where you picked that up. It's about dead opposite what we believe. Truth.

Peace,

SR

[boatbums]

Perhaps this theory was introduced, like "the rapture," by Cyrus Scofield. I have not found an earlier reference yet than him introducing it in the Scofield Bible. Perhaps someone else knows if anyone of the Reformation faith groups introduced it earlier.

No, it is a Scofield novelty. It was meant to help justy other protestant novelties.

That's funny, RCs casting aspersions on "novel" Christian doctrines. You're getting your "Protestant novelties" confused. Scofield helped describe and systematically define Dispensationalism - though there is adequate ECF references to the understanding of dispensations in Scripture. Scofield also didn't invent the Rapture theology. Though some assert it didn't come about until the 19th century, it also has early patristic support. Here are a few links to help you learn about the two:

Defending the Pre-Tribulation Rapture

Is Dispensationalism a Recent Doctrine

[editor-surveyor]

>> “The Nicolaitanes are the followers of that Nicolas who was one of the seven first ordained to the diaconate by the apostles.” <<

.
Scripture? (not holding my breath)
.

[editor-surveyor]

Dispensationalism is the result of a vast forest of misconceptions, but the most disabling of which is the simple fact that all of Yehova’s elect from the beginning to the end will be raised at once at the last trump. “Blessed is he that has part in the First Resurrection.”

The GWT judgment at the end of the 1000 years following the Trump is a resurrection unto the second death.

This simple fact is irrefutable.

[boatbums]

Thank you for this blessed essay! All glory to God!

It saddens me - though I know it saddens the Lord more - that some read or quote this passage from Hebrews with the intent of holding a Sword of Damocles over the necks of every Christian - that our eternal salvation swings from a fine thread. Though their intent may be to warn against sin and apostasy, the result is often a serious loss of confidence in God - not in oneself. As you pointed out, that passage clearly declares there IS no second chance, no opportunity to repent and turn back to God. Christ cannot be re-sacrificed, His precious blood cannot be spilled out again. There remains NO MORE sacrifice for such sin.

Rather than this passage scaring me as it once did, I find comfort and assurance in the promises of God and know that He holds onto me, not the other way around, and no one can pluck me from His hands because I hear His voice and I know Him and He gives to me eternal life and I shall *never perish.

(* do a word study on the Greek word used here as "never" - awesome!)

[Heart-Rest]

Well, BlueDragon, I certainly wouldn't pretend to know everything there is to know about either of the main questions you raised in your post, and I don't have a lot of time right now to discuss all those related questions of those main subjects which you included in your post, but these links should help to answer your main questions about St. Jerome and the Canon of Scripture, as well as your questions about Anglican priests and sacraments.

First, please read these resources for information about St. Jerome (who no Catholic claims was infallible in his various personal writings over time) and the "deuterocanonicals", if you are sincerely interested:

• "Did St Jerome reject the Deuterocanoical books?" by Dr Taylor Marshall

• "Does Saint Jerome Endorse the Protestant Canon?"

• "Jerome and the Apocrypha"

• "Defending The Deuterocanonicals" by James Akin

And please read this article, written by Dr. Taylor Marshall, a former Episcopalian priest who is now a Catholic layman, as I think he has a clearer picture of these matters than I do:

• "Do Anglicans Have a Valid Eucharist?" by Dr Taylor Marshall

Regarding "standing" or "kneeling" to receive Holy Communion, I don't believe that is the key to the validity/invalidity of the Sacrament.    Here is an interesting link you might want to take a look at that discusses the Last Supper:

• "The Seating Plan at the Last Supper" by Msgr. Charles Pope

(And, finally, for some brotherly advice, I also think that "shut up" never belongs in a Christian discussion.    For some reason, that kind of talk seems to fit better in that garbage on youtube recorded by "Steven Jo" called "Just Shutup!", which I DO NOT recommend that anyone watch/listen to, due to it's vile nature and very foul language, and I will not provide a link for it.)

[boatbums]

I kinda get the impression they can’t. Jesus told us to be IN the world but not OF the world and I certainly can do that even though I go along with the way the modern (secular) world marks time if nothing else but for convenience - I HATE it when a store is closed and I need something! When I note the day is Thursday, I’m NOT thinking, “Oh, joy! I get to worship Thor today!” ;o)

[boatbums]

I’m not interested in discussing your view of what a “vast forest of misconceptions” you think is wrong within Dispensationalism - I seriously doubt you’ve really given it much study. Reading some of the stuff you have posted over the years, though, tells me you have not yet cleared a path out of your own vast forest of misconceptions. Sad to see Rood’s smug, self-righteous superiority complex is being taught as well as his heretical doctrines.

[Springfield Reformer]

All glory to God!

Amen!

And thanks for the Greek hint on "never perish." Looks like Jesus has a pretty strong opinion about our security!

Peace,

SR

[metmom]

That's good, because God's word says that nobody is saved yet!

And you're STILL wrong.

NOTHING we can do can save us. We do not have it in us to endure to the end and it isn't by obeying the Law, by which no man can be justified.

The Law brings knowledge of sin and it brings death.

But we are saved now. Scripture tells us that if any man be in Christ, he is a new creation.

We ARE the sons of God and what we will be has not yet been revealed.

And we are sealed by the Holy Spirit until the day of redemption.

Jesus Himself tells us that if we believe, we HAVE eternal life. It's ours.

It's the only way that a changed life is possible. No one can live for God or even want to unless the Holy Spirit enables him to.

John 5:24 Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life.

John 10:25-30 Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father's name bear witness about me, but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand. I and the Father are one.”

1 Corinthians 1:4-8 I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that was given you in Christ Jesus,that in every way you were enriched in him in all speech and all knowledge—even as the testimony about Christ was confirmed among you—so that you are not lacking in any gift, as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.

2 Corinthians 1:21-22 And it is God who establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us, and who has also put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee.

2 Corinthians 5:4-8 For while we are still in this tent, we groan, being burdened—not that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.

So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord.

Ephesians 1:13-14 In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.

Ephesians 4:30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.

Colossians 1:13-14 He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Colossians 3:3 For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

1 Peter 1:3-5 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/3156607/posts?page=313#313

2 Corinthians 1:21-22 Now he which stablisheth us with you in Christ, and hath anointed us, is God; Who hath also sealed us, and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts.

For which the Greek, from the Byzantine, is:

2Corinthians 1:21-22 ο δε βεβαιων ημας συν υμιν εις χριστον και χρισας ημας θεος ο και σφραγισαμενος ημας και δους τον αρραβωνα του πνευματος εν ταις καρδιαις ημων

The first word in bold above is “bebaion,” the idea of confirmation, frequently used in commercial settings to confirm a bargain. Which of course makes sense of the remaining terms used here, which are also elements of a secured contract.

The second word in bold above is “sphragisamenos,” being sealed is to be marked by the signature, signet ring, or other unique proof of identity, that we belong to God, and this sealing is done by God, who is the one taking action in this verse. We do not and cannot seal ourselves. We do not, by our own powers, have access to God’s “signet ring.”

The third bolded word above is “arrabona,” and indicates what we might loosely refer to as earnest money, but in Hebrew culture conveys more the idea of a pledge of covenant, a security given as a guarantee that the deal will go through, though we only receive part payment at the beginning. See ערב for the related Hebrew stem indicating “pledge.”

[imardmd1]

I'd be interested in knowing WHICH Apostle ordained the guy, wouldn't you? If such heresy could start that soon after Christ's ascension, that an actual Apostle laid hands on the man, what does that say about "Apostolic Succession"?

I was trying to find the words that the Nicolas thing is a bit of a stretch, but Jesus' refutation of the formation of a clergy is quite consistent with His firm rebuke and refutation of the repeated attempt of Peter, James, and John to be ranked above the other disciples. IIRC, this topic was still alive the week (or even the day before) His crucifixion.

Irenaeus apparently was not quite right in some other things. But there are some other factors to be scoped out, such as if Nicolaitanism (whatever it was) started to be a problem to the early church, and before 100 AD, how did it get started? Where did it get started? etc.

[Elsie]

That's good, because God's word says that nobody is saved yet!

1 John 2:12
I am writing to you who are God's children because your sins have been forgiven through Jesus.

[Elsie]

The Moon completes its orbit around the Earth in approximately 27.322 days

 

Close to a fortnight; but not quite...

 

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbit_of_the_Moon

[Elsie]

The new moon tells us when the year begins, at Jerusalem, as it defers to the Barley growing on the slopes of the Mount of Olives.

So THAT's why Peter Kassig converted to Islam!

They use a REAL lunar calendar!

[Elsie]

Every twenty-thirty years or so in Indiana, we get in a big hissy fit over DST.

Being on the edge of a time zone really can mess ya up!

Living where the local sun time 'noon' (directly overhead) is NOT what the 'clock' says; is a bummer!

Being outside a lot without a watch, I can usually guess the time within 20 minutes if the sun is out.

DST jerks with my mind!

[Elsie]

...ordained nondenominational...

HUH?

How does THAT work?

I've always thought that DENOMINATIONS ordained folks?

[Elsie]

Hebrews is written to believers.

The entire Bible was written to Catholics.

At least they compiled it.

Why; at later dates; did Rome feel compelled to add to it's teachings with non-biblical TRADITIONS?