I had a similar situation. I was a cradle Catholic, converted to the Baptist faith in my 20’s and had a similar experience. After a really long study of 8 years trying to save my family from the Roman Church, I found myself reverting back to her.
I had the similar notion of all those works and rituals until I realized in my study, that the Catholic Church teaches one thing and one thing only
We are saved by grace, through faith, and evidence of this is our works. Any other order prescribed by any one in the faith is in error on the teachings of the Catholic church. Works are important as we are Jesus’s hands and feet on this earth and we are to do as He would do while on it. Jesus’s life was lived in action- living the corporal and spiritual works of mercy, as we are called to do.
Just as there are not so great, or even horrible examples of every faith out there, that does not negate the fact that a devout christian, Catholic or other wise will absolutely say when asked, that we are wretched sinners, in need of salvation, and that we are saved by grace through faith and the evidence of this is our works, which are comprised of our imitation of Christ’s example to us while He walked the earth both proclaiming and doing the word and works of God. Let anyone who tells you otherwise be treated as suspect, as they do not know what the Catholic Church teaches regarding salvation. They are going by hearsay from some disgruntled or misinformed Catholic in name only and believe me, we have some doozies-I was one of them.
It is like someone telling him what to write It seems very sterile on the Catholic side of the article. There should be more little things its like a phony hit piece.