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Catholic, Catholic Church, Christ, Eucharist, Evangelical, Evangelicalism, Flannery O'Connor, Holy Spirit, Protestantism
Yesterday’s post was a cry of pain. I state this, not as an evaluation, but as a description. It is as much a cry of pain as those of Job, or the groans of the Israelites that provoked God to bring about the exodus from Egypt. That it was a cry of pain is certain. What we do with that – and how we interpret it is another thing. So I would like to take a moment to perform a little exegesis on that post and add some clarification.
The two points I was trying to make – and ones I still support – are these:
1) Evangelicals who have been complicit in pastoral neglect in the past have no right to suddenly become the theological police when someone speaks of leaving. There are people who do have a right to speak, and those are the people who have been with one from the beginning and intentionally walked with one a long way. Indeed, I would worry if someone became Catholic without speaking to such people. What annoys me are the people who suddenly become interested when they need to tow a party line they have not explored themselves, and do not bother to familiarize themselves with the person involved or the facts. Indeed, I do even admit it is fair for a latecomer to the conversation to offer input, provided they do so respectfully and with the proper awareness that there is a large part of the story they have not lived through. Indeed, part of why I wrote the post was to help myself understand who I should and should not trust as I discuss these things with people.
2) Staying with the Church in the midst of corruption and believing God is still there often in spite of his ministers is in its strongest form a Catholic doctrine. It may I suppose also be found in some versions of Anglican and Lutheran theology, but of the three the Catholic church has the strongest doctrine of the real presence in the Eucharist, and it is this belief that Christ is really (rather than just symbolically) present that suggests faithfulness to the church – we go, so to speak, because it contains the conditions needed to really partake of Christ’s body and blood, not because of good or bad customer service. For instance, imagine I want a real Mars bar. If I am to actually get it, I will have to get something made in the original Mars bar factory. Even if all the staff are rude and the service is terrible there, there is no way around it – I’m sure I could find companies that produce knock-off brands with much better customer service and much better manners – but all my griping about this will not turn a knock off into real Mars bar. This is a somewhat poor comparison because I do not want to denigrate Protestant communion by referring to it as a “knock off” – even in its most symbolic form, it certainly does not deserve to be called that. But I do think the analogy gets at my point. A Catholic theology says there is Something there regardless of the ministers. An Evangelical says the Church is a meaningful body just to the degree that there is a certain level of vibrance, dynamism, etc. If these are wanting, the only conclusion I can come to from an Evangelical perspective is that I should leave and find somewhere where they are not – and I will never find that place because the world and churches are broken. It is not a question of finding a healthy church. It is a question of finding a church that tethers us to Christ in the midst of its unhealthiness. Not that unhealthiness is ever an ideal. But the Catholic I think would say that the beginning of the cure for that unhealthiness lies in Christ’s presence in the church – it comes from outside and into us – whereas for an Evangelical the cure is posturing oneself – emotionally, intellectually, etc. – in a certain way toward Christ and his word. The latter really do want to make their faith their own.
I also want to clarify what I did not mean to say. As Father J wisely clarified in the comment section, it would be imprudent to suggest that one simply become Catholic because the pastoral care in Protestant circles is flagging. Indeed, if this were the reason, it would just make sense to find a Protestant church with better pastoral care – and who in any case can tell if the pastoral situation on the Catholic side is better or worse? No, what I am looking for is a church with a doctrine that suggests radical faithfulness to the Church regardless of one’s experience with it. It is the Church where I may find myself sitting beside Judas and Peter at the Last Supper Table, knowing that I could follow the paths of either of these figures, both of whom denied Christ, but had different ends.
In addition, another thing I did not intend to say (and don’t think I did if one reads the post carefully) is that there were no blessings, or graces, or support in the Evangelical church; God, I am confident, was there. Perhaps not in all the places I was looking for him – particularly not in my inner emotional self so ravaged by sadness and fear – but He was there. I was blessed to be born to a mother with a deep sense of piety and a father with a good deal of heroic endurance, surviving as he was with depression in Evangelical circles. From my mother I have the capacity to feel, and from my father I have the capacity to think. I was blessed to be born into a house jam-packed with books, the books I could turn to when there was no one else, and the seeds of what has become my academic career, tied also very closely to my faith. I was blessed with friends – yes, we were outliers, but we were friends. I was blessed by Bible Quizzing (long story, ask me sometime); the huge chunks of Scripture I memorized through this program are still with me, and the Biblical orientation of the program meant that real Christian friendships could be formed more gently, unlike the more intense Youth Conference deals from which one was expected to go away changed. I was blessed by Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship and the friends who took pains to draw me out of myself; I was blessed to meet my wife there, with whom I have been now for seven good years. The intent of the last post, then, was not to say that nothing was there, but rather that it puts me out of sorts when a good number of people who have not bothered to be supportive suddenly show up and start asking questions when one mentions Catholicism. And maybe in some ways these people are less likely to show up than I expect. I got a surprising amount of encouragement and feedback on the post – sometimes from unexpected sources – and I also have to consider the “amplification factor” of OCD, which I will explain in another post – the part that will take a criticism one heard no matter how long ago and cling to it burr-like so that it is always in my head as fresh as the day it was said, and as menacing.
This of course will leave most people puzzled. If God is in some way in the Evangelical church in spite of problems, why not just stay there? And my answer must be that it can offer no solid reason for staying with a corrupt church, which the church militant will always in some way be. In the face of corruption, it will seek exclusion and perfection (with the illusion that somehow drawing another circle will keep those in that circle from problems) – it is as if one had auditions to decide who could get into a hospital, and those who were healthiest were given precedence while the sick were bumped lower in the line or bumped off entirely (dare I say this sounds like social Darwinism?).
But how can God be both in both the Catholic and Evangelical Church? For an answer to this – and I expect no one to like it – I turn to Flannery O’Conner. O’Conner was in the interesting position of being a Catholic in the southern U. S., which meant she probably saw far more extreme incarnations of Protestant Christianity than I ever have up in the less heated reaches of Canada. And I like her response to these Christians because it was complex. From a certain perspective, one might imagine she was in a perfect place to support her own Catholicism by showing up the sheer lunacy of some of these Protestant extremes. But she doesn’t. In fact, often in her stories it is very strange kinds of Christians – Christians of the sort I am certainly not comfortable with – that are vehicles of grace. For instance, in “Greenleaf,” Mrs. Greenleef collects newspaper clipping of tragedies and crimes, buries them in the dirt, and prays over them in what can only be describe as a charismatic way. She is not the Christian we want her to be. We want the exemplar of Christianity to be sane, reasonable, like (or so we imagine) us. But that is not what we get. I had the pleasure of taking a class on O’Conner in Vancouver, one of the more secular cities of Canada and somewhat correlative to the “north” often criticized by O’Conner. It was extremely interesting watching the students – many of whom had come to this particular theological seminary to escape such “crazy” Christians – squirm at the thought of such an embarrassing person being a conduit of grace. And O’Conner also holds the converse – being Catholic is not a free ticket to assumed superiority. This she shows in “The Temple of the Holy Ghost,” where the main character must learn to be chastened of her pride, much of which consists in her assumption of her “superiority” over uncultured low-church Christians. She critiques where we think we are safe, and sees grace where we can only think of shame.
And this, I suppose, is how I have come to see the Evangelical church. From a Catholic perspective, God works both in and outside the Church. In the Church he largely works through revelation, the synthesis of this revelation (tradition), and participation in the sacraments. Outside he works more generally if less directly and in a less immediately perceivable way through all sorts of things in the world – the theological distinction here would place revealed theology within the Church and natural theology without. What I want to suggest – and it is bound to make some angry – is that Evangelicals exist in a twilight zone between these two theologies. Whatever else it wants to claim, much of what Evangelicals have by way of spirituality, theology etc. is a pared down minimalist version of broader Catholic tradition – Evangelicalism doesn’t have the entirety of the tradition, but there are lots of points Evangelicals and Catholics agree upon – the Catholics are different not so much in overt disagreement, but rather in that they have an extra helping of tradition and the real presence etc. This, as far as I can tell from the Catechism, is perfectly good Catholic doctrine, though I will be happy to accept clarification on that point from someone who knows better what they are talking about.
On the natural theology side lies experience. Evangelicals, I suggest, cannot be such without it – the strange warming of the heart – and it seems to me impossible to have such a thing as a negative theology in Evangelicalism, or at least the modern incarnations I am talking about. We are probably not used to talking about spiritual experience as “natural theology” per se, but strictly speaking I think it fits the definition – theology gotten from things that happen in creation, and this includes spiritual experience because such experience is never disembodied (that is, outside creation).
And this leads me to the way I, via Flannery O’Conner, interpret Evangelicalism. Let us start with natural theology. Nature in some way points to God, but the exact way this works out is often circuitous and confusing – nature is both beautiful and brutal by turns – and the character of God is hardly self evident from nature. So natural theology involves interpreting signs that point to God, but also the recognition that these do not always point to God in any kind of straightforward way.
And it is something similar I would suggest with Evangelicalism, but one step up. If nature points to God, how much more a group of Christians? But, I would argue, this group of Christians does not point to God in exactly the way it supposes. Lacking what must always be the first commentary on Scripture, tradition, the signs they produce are often broken, angular, and hard to read. But, as Flannery O’Conner suggests, these signs are nonetheless still signs, no matter how twisted. They may not be perfect, and in many cases may be something we will not want to emulate at all, but we have a strange God who will speak by strange means, through the mouth of an ass if need be. And so, much as I am uncomfortable with the undisciplined and emotive character of Evangelicalism, I cannot deny God’s grace in it. He has, after all done stranger things, not the least of which is stooping down to earth to visit someone like me.
A Christian Thing 
Hi Churl,
I’d agree with much of what you write here. The importance of the Real Presence—Christ truly, physically present in the Sacrament for His Church—cannot be understated. We need God physically among us precisely because the Church is composed of broken, sinful people. In our visible structures at least, we are filled with unworthy (sometimes even evil) men. But despite that sinfulness present in the Church, Christ is Himself there, truly and physically offering grace, speaking His own words, offering His own body and blood for us. When you call this Catholic doctrine, I agree, though I would say these beliefs are not restricted solely to “Roman” Catholicism.
A couple of technical comments: I’m not sure how (confessional) Lutherans are softer on the doctrine of the Real Presence than Catholics; Anglicans are a little wishy-washy on this subject (because Cranmer became a symbolist, and he wrote the original 42 Articles), but Lutherans are pretty clear: “Of the Supper of the Lord they teach that the Body and Blood of Christ are truly present, and are distributed to those who eat the Supper of the Lord” (AC 10). In fact, in the Roman Catholic response [The Confutation] to this section of the Augsburg Confession, they heartily approved our theology: “The tenth article gives no offense in its words, because they confess that in the Eucharist, after the consecration lawfully made, the Body and Blood of Christ are substantially and truly present.”
But I digress. I agree with you that the following is necessary: “staying with the Church in the midst of corruption and believing God is still there often in spite of his ministers.” I agree that it is a Catholic doctrine (by which I mean the Church historic). But for that very reason it also exists as doctrine in Anglicanism (or would if Anglicans ever enforced doctrine). It certainly still exists in confessional Lutheranism. As the Anglicans write, “Although in the visible Church the evil be ever mingled with the good, and sometimes the evil have chief authority in the Ministration of the Word and Sacraments, yet forasmuch as they do not the same in their own name, but in Christ’s, and do minister by his commission and authority, we may use their Ministry, both in hearing the Word of God, and in receiving the Sacraments. Neither is the effect of Christ’s ordinance taken away by their wickedness, nor the grace of God’s gifts diminished from such as by faith, and rightly, do receive the Sacraments ministered unto them; which be effectual, because of Christ’s institution and promise, although they be ministered by evil men” (Article 36).
In this section, Cranmer (as he does in much of the Articles of Religion) is cribbing from the Augsburg Confession and its Apology. “Although the Church properly is the congregation of saints and true believers,” Melanchthon wrote in that confession, “nevertheless, since in this life many hypocrites and evil persons are mingled therewith, it is lawful to use Sacraments administered by evil men, according to the saying of Christ: ‘The Scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat,’ etc. (Matt. 23:2) Both the Sacraments and the Word are effectual by reason of the institution and commandment of Christ, notwithstanding they be administered by evil men” (AC 8). And the Apology: “We hold, according to the Scriptures, that the Church, properly so called, is the congregation of saints [of those here and there in the world], who truly believe the Gospel of Christ, and have the Holy Ghost. And yet we confess that in this life many hypocrites and wicked men, mingled with these, have the fellowship of outward signs, who are members of the Church according to the fellowship of outward signs, and accordingly bear offices in the Church [preach, administer the Sacraments, and bear the title and name of Christians.] Neither does the fact that the Sacraments are administered by the unworthy detract from their efficacy, because, on account of the call of the Church, they represent the person of Christ, and do not represent their own persons, as Christ testifies, (Luke 10:16): ‘He that heareth you heareth Me.’ [Thus even Judas was sent to preach.] When they offer the Word of God, when they offer the Sacraments, they offer them in the stead and place of Christ. Those words of Christ teach us not to be offended by the unworthiness of the ministers” (AAC 7/8).
Like the Church historic, we confess the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, despite the unworthiness of the minister, for the efficacy of the Sacraments depends on God’s mercy not on man’s desire or effort. They who stand in Christ’s stead do not speak on their own behalf, but rather Christ speaks through them. It is true in Lutheranism, and I would be the first to confess that it is also true in Roman Catholicism. And how vital a thing is that for us—we who are the Church on earth, torn asunder by sin and hatred and brokenness. Christ’s body on earth is torn (at least to our eyes): how much therefore do we need Christ to come to us with His own body, offering it not only through broken ministers but also to broken people. The broken body of Christ needs Christ’s body broken for us.
There’s a reason, Churl, that many Lutherans still refer to themselves as “Evangelical Catholics.” Our theology is identical in many fundamentals (though the question of justification—the Doctrine of the “Evangel” or “Gospel”—has, of course, been a major sticking point throughout the centuries). We too affirm the role of Tradition, the witness of the Church Catholic throughout all ages. As we confess at the end of the doctrinal section of Augsburg Confession (and before the articles on abuses in the Church), “This is about the Sum of our Doctrine, in which, as can be seen, there is nothing that varies from the Scriptures, or from the Church Catholic, or from the Church of Rome as known from its writers… Our churches dissent in no article of the faith from the Church Catholic, but only omit some abuses which are new, and which have been erroneously accepted by the corruption of the times, contrary to the intent of the Canons” (AC 21).
Given that commitment to the Church Catholic evident in the primary Lutheran confession, Pope Benedict (before he was elevated to the papacy) once declared, “It might be possible to interpret the Confessio Augustana under the laws of the empire as a catholic confession.” And again: “Efforts are underway to achieve a Catholic recognition of the CA or, more correctly, a recognition of the CA as catholic, and thereby to establish the catholicity of the churches of the CA, which makes possible a corporate union while the differences remain.” I pray earnestly for that day. We are Catholics in exile (exiled not by choice but by force), but many of the concerns we first raised are slowly being addressed. I pray earnestly for the reunification of the Church that “all may be one”—when the Catholic Church will truly and visibly be catholic again.
Ha! Love the comment on Anglicans being wishy-washy on the Real Presence. I’m going to make no attempt to defend Anglicans on that point, except to say that I believe in it.
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The first point – I wasn’t involved in the pastoral neglect experienced, however Jesus Himself talks about resolving sin between people in Matthew 18. It always is Jesus’ intentions that we seek reconciliation regardless of whose side is at fault in an experience. That sometimes means adding an objective witness to the proceedings when one side can’t see the point of the other. As I said in another article that was posted, there can probably be neglect from whatever church tradition you might turn to, however, the real issue is whether the tradition you choose to follow is truly following the will of God in its perspective.
What I am talking about has nothing to do with either “evangelicalism” or “Catholicism”, but what is supported by Scripture.
Having issues with particular individuals, as far as I am concerned, can be a separate issue from whether or not you have an issue with an overall tradition.
I’ve already made arguments in another post to a Catholic priest why I don’t believe Catholicism is following God, but is preaching a false gospel, and that is a very good reason for people to turn away from it as an option.
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i am a long time evangelical, turned Anglican, who recently decided to swim the TIbor. I have always loved the liturgical church as my dad was EO, but I also know the value of my time as an evangelical and the importance of a personal conversion to Christ and knowledge of the bible. My reason for going to Rome is this: I see in the evangelical/protestant world increasing heresies, whether it be the hypercharismatic movement, the Diminunist movement, and my twin favorites. mega churches and turning church into a big fat rock concert to entertain young people on Sundays, rather than worship the Living Christ and the Trinity. The last church I attended was a breakaway Anglican group which experienced a split because of a couple who began to attend and because of some domestic and frankly spiritual issues, tore our little church assunder. Since I have frequently experienced protestant and nondenominational churches splitting, this time I had enough and decided, that like it or not, the Catholics don’t change and they don’t change their doctrine (most of the time). ( Disclaimer: I LOVE MARTIN LUTHER. He is one of my heroes. That causes some issues in catechism class when my priest damns him to hell on a weekly basis and my priest is Austrian!.)
Having said that, I have found myself in an unexpected situation. I have found that every single protestant/evangelical friend I have, and some friendships I’ve had for over 25 years, has turned their backs on me because I am joining the RC church. I don’t know what to think of this, because in spite of some doctrinal issues that I don’t agree with in the Roman Catholic church, we all agree with the deity of Christ, the fact that our salvation is through him, the Holy Trinity, and the creeds. My evangelical friends have been sending me all manner of anti-catholic literature, lecture me, judge me, but the fact is that I am a bible believing Christian too, and I believe they are judging me now. I go to catechism class on Sunday and am told the protestants are not christian. i am told Luther is in hell-which I REJECT. I talk to the evangelicals/protestant “friends” I formerly had and they tell me that Roman Catholicism is heretical and that they are a cult and all catholics are going to hell. They haven’t been in a Catholic church in years, mind you, but they are convinced. So I walk away thinking, “well, I guess we are ALL going to hell.”
Can you give me any insight into this?
thanks.
Just want to begin here by saying that I can understand a lot of what you are going through because I too began my faith in the Evangelical church, migrated to the Anglican church, and have become increasingly frustrated with the state of the Anglican church, on both high-church and low church sides. If you get a chance, look up the Diocese of New Westminster in Vancouver, Canada; our family spent our time flip-flopping between a low church locked in a lawsuit to take its building with it when it left and a high church in the downtown Eastside, lovely and very good when good (and also situated geographically in a very opportune place to care for the poor in Vancouver), but sometimes doctrinally ambiguous. Things are better now we are in the prairies, but still I fear that winter is coming; it is less and less clear to me what a person means when they say they are Anglican, particularly when the founding incident was neither the Bible nor doctrine but a king who wanted a divorce.
For what it is worth – and here I speak as a lay person not yet Catholic and exploring it myself – I feel that there are two issues here; one the pastoral/emotional/relational and the other intellectual. For people like me – and given your post I suspect you are somewhat this way – we are quite happy to take on the intellectual side e. g. give me a copy of the Bible and that Catechism and put me on the stand like Socrates and I will be happy – maybe even thrive – in answering you.
Of course the problem is that none of us are purely and simply intellectual beings. As a non-gnostic theology would insist, we are a bundle of reason, emotion, relationships, spiritual impulses etc. And I feel like, when one is growing spiritually – in this case pursuing full acceptance into the Catholic church – God will throw at us things from those areas we feel least able to navigate. It is precisely because I am particularly intellectual that the struggle God has given me as I navigate this is not primarily intellectual but involved in emotions and relationships, two things I am bad at. And I imagine it is the same in other areas; those more attracted emotionally – viscerally – may have to deal with the hardness of dogma and the intellect. Those particularly “good” at being spiritual in their own Protestant traditions may feel lost in the wide ocean of Catholic spirituality. God, I think, does this because he will have nothing less than all of us, and all of us enter the Church not in triumph but on a cross. He also I think does it to teach us to pray. I envy the disciples who, when they asked how to pray, got the Pater Noster. We get a stone that causes us to stumble wherever we are weakest. But that stone is also that which the gates of hell will not overcome, as Christ promised.
There are two sets of “stones” here you are dealing with, one from the Protestant and one from the Catholic side. Regarding the situation on the Protestant side, pray, very hard, and love deeply the friends who reject you and give you tracts; remember that Christ knows exactly what it is to be rejected by friends (incidentally by that very “rock” on which Christ built his church). You are I imagined wounded, and perhaps deeply, by your Evangelical and Anglican past. To begin, do not deny these wounds. Denying them and pretending they don’t matter and that you can be “objective” will only bury them deeper in your heart. At the same time, pray for a love that transcends, surpasses, and redeems these wounds. Do not for a moment imagine on your own strength you can fix them, but never stop begging God for the grace to love deeply in the face of rejection, and to say with Christ, “Father forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.” After all, I imagine much of what your friends are attacking is not the Church herself, but a misunderstanding of her, the caricatured Protestant version that very often does not exist and, where it does, is certainly not at the heart of Catholic faith.
On the other side, there is the matter of the priest from whom you are taking Catechism. Your situation reminds me a little of something Tolkien once said, which is that you don’t understand the power of the Eucharist – of Christ’s real presence in it – unless you have taken it from a priest you absolutely despise. Another friend wisely told me that whatever I expect from the Church – apart from Christ’s tangible body – I will be disappointed; it will break my heart. If I expect community, I will find isolation; if doctrine, I will encounter priests who (against Church teaching) do not hold to it; if Biblical fervor, I will find Biblical illiteracy. This is not to say that we ever stop lamenting these things and working toward the fullness of Christ. But it is not these things that bring us to the Church. It is the promise of Christ’s real bodied presence on earth, no matter how corrupt or simply annoying the ministers.
To finally though get to the gritty details of the theological question, I am not sure how the priest you mention can be both in agreement with the Magesterium and claim that Protestants are not Christians. If you have a copy of the Catechism nearby (and do pick one up if you don’t), look at articles 818 and 819. 818 asserts that “All who have been justified by faith in Baptism are incorporated into Christ; they therefore have a right to be called Christians, and with good reason are accepted as brothers in the Lord by the children of the Catholic church.” Of other churches in article 819, there is the assertion that “Christ’s spirit uses these churches and ecclesial communities as means of salvation, whose power derives from the fullness of grace and truth that Christ has entrusted to the Catholic church.” Then see article 838, which asserts that “the Church knows that she is joined in many ways to the baptized who are honored by the name of Christian, but do not profess the Catholic faith in its entirety or have not preserved unity or communion under the successor of Peter. Those who believe in Christ and have been properly baptized are put in a certain, although imperfect, communion with the Catholic church.” This is what the Catechism says, and what ultimately you will be agreeing to in becoming Catholic – or at least that’s how I understand it, and would appreciate any necessary correctives from more informed commenters.
What you do with this information from the Catechism, though, and how you must relate to the priest in question, is something you must pray deeply about; I would not more advise trying to beat him over the head with bits of the Catechism than I would advise beating your Protestant friends with bits of the Bible. To be fair, though, you are in a catechismal class, which seems to me to be exactly the sort of place these questions can and should be raised – I would be worried in fact if they were not being raised – because part of Catholic faith insists that the way you believe must be a way that does not violate your self as a human, and part of acknowledging this self means acknowledging the reason that is leading you to ask these questions. Because this is already long, I am going to leave the Luther question for another time – I do have some thoughts here, one of the most pressing of which is a deep uneasiness with flippantly deciding who has and who has not gone to hell – but more on that later. In the meantime, I will invite my Facebook friends, many of whom are more informed in these matters than I, to respond as well if they like.
I would like to state again for the record that I have no defence to make about the claim that Anglicans are ‘doctrinally ambiguous.’ That is simply a very accurate description of the state of things.
Thank you, CHurl. I actually love my priest (in a Christian manner) and he is a good and holy man. He is old school Austrian Catholic, so there may be some personal reasons for his frequent comments about Luther and Calvin. I am reading Pope Benedict’s Compendium to the Catechism, and he states the same thing as you did in Articles 818, and 819. In fact, I have read them, and my priest does marginally admit the truth of those devout Christians outside the Roman church. I hesitate to take him on in a full-on doctrinal debate however, because I know I’ll lose. Besides, I came to them, they didn’t come to me, so if I am going to be Catholic, I have to at least know what they believe, even if I don’t agree with it.
I appreciate your advice and wisdom though. It has helped me to deal with the great pain I didn’t see coming.
Elizabeth,
I don’t have a lot to add to what Karl and Susan have already said so beautifully. But I did want to check in to encourage you, even late as it comes. I often say that I want to believe in a God who brings resurrection without the cross – because so often, when I find myself at the cross, I resist it as though it wasn’t promised to His disciples.
My operative theology, even as a life-long Roman Catholic, seems to assume that those who live within the Church (Catholic and beyond) should get some sort of short-cut to grace, and be immune from the struggles of life in a fallen world. And my operative theology is wrong.
One of the things I find hardest about living faith and working within the RC church is that none of us have it all figured out, and I am slowly learning that this is precisely how the church is what God intends it to be. God designs it so that we need each other, that our own weaknesses are mirrored back to us in those we worship with, that those who teach will need to learn and those who learn will teach. It’s a humble way of being church, but it is Christ’s way.
I can feel your pain in the loneliness of making the transition. So much of our personal faith lives will be misunderstood by those we love. This has been an important lesson for me as the tables have turned and I have found myself in a position of authority within my church. God asks me to be faithful to him, inasmuch as I am able, seeking the wisdom of the tradition, the heart of Christ in the Scriptures, the gifts of Sacramental life, and the grace available in His presence in my daily life. He does not ask me to control this process for anyone other than myself. And when others feel inclined to do things I would not do or cannot fathom, I am drawn into the compassionate heart of God, who still calls and invites but does not manipulate, coerce, reject, despair or give up hope. Dorothy Day wrote that we all experience the long loneliness and find its relief in community. Ron Rolheiser’s book: The Holy Longing has an excellent chapter on the way in which loving the community of faith is essential to Christian life.
It is such a miracle to me that God waits so patiently for us, moves so slowly, works in such poor conditions (our broken souls!) and puts up with so much garbage! I was once praying before the Blessed Sacrament and started to laugh out loud when I noticed the plastic flowers beside the tabernacle. Here is Jesus, the most beautiful One, placed beside the most ugly bouquet I’ve ever seen and He just waits on us. I’ve thought of that moment a lot of times in my faith life, when I have failed and He is there waiting, when one of His pastors brings scandal or just fails to see what someone is looking for in him.
Anyway, for not much to say, I’ve said a lot! I will be praying for you, that you find Christ’s consolation along this lonely road, that he breaks your heart open to love while you travel, and that those who do not understand will follow your courageous journey in their own ways as they strive to be faithful to the God who calls us all.
With peace,
Leah
You all make so much sense and it’s nice to be on a blog that’s intellectual and I can tell you all know what you are talking about. One of your posts, where you refer to us (and protestants are soooo guilty of this) seeing an empty cross and not expecting to suffer, Dr. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, if any of you have read of him, used to speak often about “cheap grace.” He had a total grasp of the beatitudes and related to them as the Catholics do. I think that’s the problem with many protestant and nondenominational churches today. “Oh, Armaggedon is coming? No prob. We will all be whisked away in a pretribulation rapture before the bombs start to fall.” Um, the only problem with that is (a) when did Christians EVER get a pass on suffering; and (b) pretrib rapture isn’t scriptural. There are so many groups out there that are really into some crazy heresies and they go unchecked. If the pope says one thing the world doesn’t like, as Pope Benedict did at Christmas time about the state of western civilization, all heck breaks lose!
Incidentally, I don’t hate the Anglican Church. I love it actually. I just see it dying and I just can’t stand to watch it anymore. I feel like the only stability in my life right now is through the Roman Catholic church I attend. I know I will be able to have a talk with my priest and tone down the damning Luther to hell business once he knows it hurts me. And since I have 13 generations going back to Calvin himself in my family, he needs to lighten up on the protestants going to hell too. He is a very humble and holy man and he has a kind heart and I know he will listen to me.
Thanks all of you. I will keep coming back as I go through my catechism class and into the world of Rome. You have all taught me so much. God bless you all.
I want to second, and third, and fourth, what Churl said; the only things I would add are these, in ascending order of importance:
(1) Get not only a Catechism but the invaluable “Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church.” It is much shorter, a kind of Cole’s Notes, and gives you doctrine in manageable chunks; sometimes you want to know the what and hold off on the why, or sometimes you think you already understand the why.
(2) Christ’s church is perfect; we, however, are imperfect; I include in this not only my own tendency to sinfulness but your priest’s imperfect understanding of doctrine.
(3) To say, as the Catholic Church does, that the Church contains the fullness of everything that is necessary for salvation, is not to say that salvation cannot be found outside the Catholic Church. This is the critical point of the sections of the catechism that Churl cites as well. It is also possible — and I make this point in charity, trying not to excuse your priest because he is Catholic, but to give him the benefit of the doubt on the question of his fidelity to the Magisterium — that he is expressing this idea imperfectly, which is leading to a misunderstanding not of his actual words but of what he intended to express. We sometimes have this challenge with international priests as well.
(4) I remember years ago, having attended an Anglican service, chatting with Churl about it, and saying that I find it deeply unnerving, because the Real Presence seems to be an optional part of the service, even when there is a liturgy of the eucharist. It just strikes me as odd that what, for us, is so fundamental a question seems largely left to the discretion of the celebrant.
(5) Ask. It’s a catechism class. And that is part of the duty laid on us, to genuinely seek the true and the good.
God bless. And welcome aboard.
(6) One more thing: The Catholic Church names as saints those we are certain are in heaven. This is not to say that they are the only ones in heaven, simply that they are the ones we are sure of. At no time has the Church made a definitive statement about who is in hell. We cannot, in fact, be certain that there is anybody there. Now, I have my own theories — indeed, I have a list! — but the Church asserts no such thing. Because only God can know what passes in the moments of death, and perfect contrition may be made and by the grace of God received, such that even the most miserable of sinners may at the last be restored.
S
Thank you, S. I know what you mean about the Anglicans being rather flippant about the Eucharist. The Anglican church I just left for the RC was one step above the Methodists in my opinion. They only have Eucharist every other week. What? I’ve been an Anglican for a long time, and this is the first time I’ve encountered that in the Anglican community. I even told the priest that Christ himself commanded us to “do this as often as you meet in remembrance of me.” How much more clear did he have to be? This church was so low that they refused to use incense for a supply priest’s funeral when he suddenly passed away. His widow requested it and it was denied. That’s just not right.
Thank you again for your wisdom and advice.
Ha! Still no defence of Anglicans on the Real Presence. I just find myself nodding in assent, like, ‘Yep, sounds about right.’
Chinglicanattable: I am sad to read this but I am looking at the 39 articles in my 1928 prayer book and as to the Lord’s Supper it states the following: “the Supper of the Lord is not only a sign of love that Christians ought to have among themselves to one another; but rather it is a Sacrament of our Redemption by Christ’s death; insomuch as that to such is rightly, worthily and with faith, receive the same, the bread which we break is partaking of the Body of Christ; and likewise the cup of blessing is a partaking of the Blood of Christ.
Transubstantiation in the supper of the Lord, cannot be proved by Holy Writ; but it is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture, overthroweth the nature of a Sacrament and hath given occasion to many superstitions.
The Body of Christ is given, taken and eaten in the Supper, only after an heavenly and spiritual manner. And the mean whereby the Body of Christ is received and eaten in the Supper, is Faith.
The Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper was not Christ’s ordinance reserved, carried out lifted up, or worshiped.
I am totally confused now because I was taught in all the years I was Anglican/Episcopalian, that the Anglicans did believe in Transubstantiation. Further, that last sentence, can’t be right because Jesus told the apostles at the last supper “do this as oft as you gather together in remembrance of me.”
I’m not a bible scholar, just a Christian who loves the Lord, the bible and Christian history. You are all so knowledgeable and much more kind than some “Christian blogs” I’ve been on, which is why I don’t post on them, but I would like to know what you all think of this. I also have an 1899 prayer book. I will look to see if it’s 39 articles read the same..
Ah! Yes, thanks for writing back. Maybe I can offer a bit of a defence, although you will likely find this very wanting.
On the 39 Articles, our co-blogger CaptainThin is the resident expert, as he did his thesis on the Book of Homilies and always has a great deal more intelligent things to say about these things than me, although I’m a card-carrying (and very happy and free-spirited) Anglican.
However, what I *can* talk about is how every attempt to get Anglican theology to become uniform is pretty much a failure because they usually come with some political agenda. I suppose the joke’s on me for leaving the neo-Reformed crew with their attempts at theological consolidation (Gospel Coalition, Together for the Gospel, Resurgence, etc.) and jumping into Anglicanism where every theological consolidation agenda under the sun and moon are imaginable.
What we have in the 39 articles, then, is a political attempt to articulate the Church of England as a Protestant denomination. The trouble was, this only worked to some degree. While this Reformed kind of Anglicanism attempted to be the big thing in the seventeenth century, Anglican Christianity has so many camps (latitudinarians, then in the 19thC, Anglo-Catholics) that the 39 Articles sort of fell by the wayside. The best explanation I’ve heard for this is because the 39 Articles aren’t really so much the ‘confession of faith’ by Anglicans, as much as the Book of Common Prayer is a ‘formulary’ of faith, following the principle of ‘lex orandi, lex credendi’ (i.e. law of prayer, law of belief). This, of course, drives some Anglican theologians crazy–most notably, J.I. Packer–and they say that we need to get back to the 39 Articles as the definitive articulation of theology in the Anglican Communion. Good luck with that.
So…what this means is that there are evangelical interpretations of the BCP, Anglo-Catholic interpretations, latitudinarian interpretations, etc. and the Alternative Service/Common Worship books have been criticized by each group for not being in accord with each group’s theology. Some of them like the 39 Articles, some of them hate it…
BUT that’s not the point of being Anglican in the technical sense. As I’ve argued elsewhere on the blog (an argument that I’d be happy for someone to dispute…it is, after all, an argument about Anglicans, which means that for every argument, there’s someone who will dispute it), all it means to be Anglican is to find yourself in a church under a bishop with the particular stream of apostolic succession that comes down through Canterbury. That’s it. It’s about the form, not really the content.
And so…no, there’s no uniform theology of the Eucharist, and the 39 Articles are just one part of many disputing factions.
This, of course, makes Anglicanism sound very bad, and in many ways, it probably is. But as I argued in my Anglican post (and as Pope Francis himself says), there are many ways in which Anglican charisms are a gift to the church catholic. I think the strongest gift is how weighed down we are with political theology; if we do anything as Anglicans, we reflect a lot on church-state relations, partly because for the last 500 or so years, we’ve been in bed with the state–though for like 1000 years before that, we were in serious tension with the state, and currently, the Church of England finds itself in an awkward position in Parliament as it has pushed a sort of Catholic social teaching agenda via Rowan Williams, John Sentamu, and Justin Welby. That has been a huge gift, and I suppose that’s why I don’t give up, although, seriously, you are right: it’s a complete mess otherwise.
In other words, replying to Susan, here’s probably why she felt that the Real Presence was ‘optional.’ If it’s not optional, it sounds too close to Rome, which is a sort of bad political move. If it’s not there, it betrays the priest’s own theology. The easiest way? Make it optional. Now, of course, this may sound quite disingenuous, and in many ways, it is. However, this is precisely what I mean by Anglican ‘political theology,’ not that it’s done particularly well in this instance, but you can tell that the poor priest is wrestling with the political implications of his theology, and while that’s rough, that’s pretty much Anglican theology and spirituality in a nutshell: you become a bit of a political animal and have to learn to be holy through that. Not for the faint of heart, for sure.
Basically, I guess I’m trying to dispute the idea that Anglicans occupying the in-between space of the ‘via media’ are wishy-washy. It’s not wishy-washy. It’s very hard political work, and the moral, ethical, and spiritual dilemmas that come from that political work make for tough theological moves and a lot of hand-wringing reflection.
It isn’t wishy washy to me. Christ said ” this is my body and my blood. Do this as oft as you do in rememberance of me.”
Thanks. I don’t usually do Christian blogs because they tend to get vicious. However, you all are loving and patient with me and I really appreciate that. God bless all of you.
Fantastic–our pleasure!
Right, right–what I’m saying is that there are some who think that Anglicans are wishy-washy because, like, I might say, ‘Oh, yeah, I believe in the Real Presence because Christ said, yes, this *is* my body,’ etc., but then, there’s these pesky 39 Articles over here that are trying to say, ‘Oh, yes, but we’re still Protestant–none of that popery stuff!’ A reflective Anglican looks at that and says, ‘OK, let’s find a middle position.’ To some, that ‘middle position’ will be wishy-washy. But what you do as you find that middle position is that you realize that you are doing theology between the church and the state, which makes one think an awful lot about both. That deep and almost wrenching sort of reflection is what Anglican spirituality looks like–the political dimension is always there in our most contemplative work–and hopefully, as the Spirit blows the Anglican Communion closer toward Rome, that gift can be channeled to inform the greater church catholic’s understanding of political theologies, theologies of politics, and political tensions in discernment processes. So I think that’s a distinctively Anglican contribution to the church catholic, but my hope is that one day, we’ll be able to speak of ‘being Anglican’ in the same way we speak of ‘being Jesuit’ or ‘being Franciscan’ in the sense that there’s a distinctive charism, but it exists in greater communion with something more catholic.
But yes, it’s so unfortunate that you experienced that on other Christian blogs. You asked some really good questions, and they deserve real answers from us (even I don’t think mine are as good as Churl’s and Susan’s–their Catholic spirituality is deep stuff!). So yes, our pleasure to engage you. Do stick around and don’t worry about asking stuff around here; as Churl would say, it’s the whole point of having a ‘Thing.’
Speaking of which, now I’m really curious as to what CaptainThin would say. Let’s ask him about the 39 Articles: CaptainThin, I just gave my Chinglican/Anglican answer about the 39 Articles, but as you’ve been much more attentive to their actual wording and context, I’m curious as to what you might say to Elizabeth’s question about the Real Presence in Anglican theology.
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To all of you on this blog: I spoke at length with my priest yesterday, and unloaded on him all the issues that are weighing on my heart. While the Luther issue was not resolved, but i did tell him how I felt about Luther, and that it hurts me to hear that he is damned to hell. The Catholics do blame Luther for splitting the Roman church, so there isn’t much I can do about that, but at least he realized that his comments were disturbing to me, a budding roman catholic. I have been a devout Christian for 30 years now, and this priest is the most compassionate and and loving leader I have ever encountered. He did give homage to the devout protestants who are not part of the RC church per the compendium, as you all suggested. He was very upset over my spiritual suffering (in addition, I am losing my job and have to find another apartment by the end of July) and he told me that as sad and unfair as it is for me to lose my protestant friends, i have new friends and a new family with the Roman Catholic church, and he promised to help me in any way he can (with the help of the faithful) so that I can make new friends, find a job and an apartment and won’t let me get kicked out in the street. I know that he has my back, and for an older single woman who lives in a city with no relatives or real friends, that is a most comforting statement. Our Lord Jesus is so wonderful in the way he uses people to help us.
Thanks again all of you. I consider you all my new friends as well. I hope that isn’t presumptuous. God bless you all!
Elizabeth
You are our sister in Christ, and it was a pleasure to engage you on this blog.
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Elizabeth was never an Anglican, just went to an Anglican Church……..never confirmed. By the way, the Anglicans and Protestants helped her out plenty.