Posted on 08/02/2010 3:13:20 AM PDT by markomalley
In the fall of 1999, I was a freshman at Gordon College, an evangelical liberal arts school in Massachusetts. There, fifteen years earlier, a professor named Thomas Howard resigned from the English department when he felt his beliefs were no longer in line with the college’s statement of faith. Despite all those intervening years, during my time at Gordon the specter of Thomas Howard loomed large on campus. The story of his resignation captured my imagination; it came about, ultimately, because he converted to Roman Catholicism.
Though his reasons for converting were unclear and perhaps unimaginable to me at the time (they are actually well-documented in his book Evangelical is Not Enough which, back then, I had not yet read), his reasons seemed less important than the knowledge that it could happen. I had never heard of such a thing.
I grew up outside of Boston in what could be described as an Irish-Catholic family, except for one minor detail: my parents had left the Church six years before I was born when they were swept up in the so-called “Jesus Movement” of the 1970s. So Catholicism was all around me, but it was not mine. I went to mass with my grandparents, grew up around the symbolism of rosary beads and Virgin Mary statues, attended a Catholic high school, and was present at baptisms, first communions, and confirmations for each of my Catholic family members and friends.
All throughout this time my parents never spoke ill of the Catholic Church; though the pastors and congregants of our non-denominational, charismatic church-that-met-in-a-warehouse, often did. Despite my firsthand experience with the Church, between the legend of my parents’ conversion (anything that happens in a child’s life before he is born is the stuff of legends) and the portrait of the Catholic Church as an oppressive institution that took all the fun out of being “saved,” I understood Catholicism as a religion that a person leaves when she becomes serious about her faith.
And yet, Thomas Howard is only the tip of the iceberg of a hastening trend of evangelicals converting to Catholicism. North Park University professor of religious studies Scot McKnight documented some of the reasons behind this trend in his important 2002 essay entitled “From Wheaton to Rome: Why Evangelicals become Roman Catholic.” The essay was originally published in the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, and was later included in a collection of conversion stories he co-edited with Hauna Ondrey entitled Finding Faith, Losing Faith: Stories of Conversion and Apostasy.
Thomas Howard comes in at number five on McKnight’s list of significant conversions, behind former Presbyterian pastor and author of Rome Sweet Home, Scott Hahn, and Marcus Grodi founder of The Coming Home Network International, an organization that provides “fellowship, encouragement and support for Protestant pastors and laymen who are somewhere along the journey or have already been received into the Catholic Church,” according to their Web site. Other featured converts include singer-songwriter John Michael Talbot and Patrick Madrid, editor of the Surprised by Truth books, which showcase conversion stories.
Would Saint Augustine Go to a Southern Baptist Church in Houston?
McKnight first identified these converts eight years ago, and the trend has continued to grow in the intervening years. It shows up in a variety of places, in the musings of the late Michael Spencer (the “Internet Monk”) about his wife’s conversion and his decision not to follow, as well as at the Evangelical Theological Society where the former President and Baylor University professor Francis J. Beckwith made a well-documented “return to Rome.” Additionally, the conversion trend is once again picking up steam as the Millennial generation, the first to be born and raised in the contemporary brand of evangelicalism, comes of age. Though perhaps an unlikely setting, The King’s College, an evangelical Christian college in New York City, provides an excellent case study for the way this phenomenon is manifesting itself among young evangelicals.
The King’s College campus is comprised of two floors in the Empire State Building and some office space in a neighboring building on Fifth Avenue. The approximately 300 students who attend King’s are thoughtful, considerate and serious. They are also intellectually curious. This combination of traits, it turns out, makes the college a ripe breeding ground for interest in Roman Catholicism. Among the traits of the Catholic Church that attract TKC students—and indeed many young evangelicals at large—are its history, emphasis on liturgy, and tradition of intellectualism.
Lucas Croslow was one such student to whom these and other attributes of Catholicism appealed. This past spring, graduating from The King’s College was not the only major change in Croslow’s life, he was also confirmed into the Catholic Church.
Croslow’s interest in Catholicism began over six years ago when he was a sophomore in high school. At the time, Croslow’s Midwestern evangelical church experienced a crisis that is all too common among evangelical churches: what he describes as “a crisis of spiritual authority.” As a result of experiencing disappointment in his pastor, Croslow began to question everything he had learned from him. This questioning led him to study the historical origins of scripture and then of the Christian church itself. Eventually he concluded that Catholicism in its current form is the closest iteration of the early church fathers’ intentions. He asks, “If Saint Augustine showed up today, could we seriously think that he’d attend a Southern Baptist church in Houston?” The answer, to Croslow, is a resounding “No.”
Croslow’s belief that the Catholic Church most accurately reflects the intentions of the early church fathers is echoed throughout the movement as other evangelicals seek a church whose roots run deeper than the Reformation. Further, due to the number of non-denominational churches that have proliferated since the Jesus Movement, many evangelicals’ knowledge of their history runs only as far back as the 1970s. These are the young believers who are attracted to a Church that sees itself as the direct descendent of the religion founded by Saint Peter and the apostles.
Another recent convert and current King’s sophomore, Nick Dunn, agrees with Croslow about the need for a historically grounded Christianity, however he emphasizes the liturgical aspects of Roman Catholicism as a motivation for converting. When he moved to New York City to attend The King’s College he had a difficult time finding a church that was similar to his home church in San Diego. The churches that he attended in New York, even the evangelical ones, often were a bit more structured and incorporated some liturgical elements into their services. In time, Dunn realized that these liturgical practices, which had been all but absent from his church life to that point, were quite rich.
When he asked his parents why their church didn’t have a benediction or a call to worship, they answered as many evangelicals would, saying that they don’t like “these ritualistic or religious kinds of things.” Eventually, after attending mass at St. Francis of Assisi in midtown Manhattan, Dunn became interested in learning more about Catholicism. It was living like a Catholic, Dunn says, that finally made him to decide to convert.
In much the same way that many evangelical churches have discarded Church history, so the liturgical structure of worship was left by the wayside as these churches made claims to the “freedom” that comes from forsaking the bounds of the Catholic Church and even mainline Protestant denominations. But for many young evangelicals and former evangelicals like Dunn, this move to be free of liturgical strictures came at the expense of religious practices that have been a part of Christianity for two millennia, and to these believers, the loss is too great. This is precisely why many evangelical churches have, as Dunn witnessed, made an effort to reintroduce those once forsaken elements into worship services.
Chris White, a 2009 King’s graduate, shares the concerns of Croslow and Dunn, while adding another of the main reasons why many evangelicals are converting to Catholicism: intellectual hunger.
White describes himself as a “victim of Church history classes that start in 1517,” the year Martin Luther posted his Ninety-Five Theses. That is, until he took a course entitled “Foundations of Judeo-Christian Thought” at TKC. It “raised certain questions within me,” he says of the course. White cites Boston College philosophy professor and TKC visiting faculty member Peter Kreeft’s Catholic Christianity as a factor in his conversion, but he also points to a number of other courses that he took at King’s that led him to the point of conversion. He says of the college’s curriculum that it is “not a ‘great books curriculum’ but it draws heavily on the liberal arts tradition.” He adds, “You can’t study the liberal arts without confronting the rich history of Catholicism.”
Indeed The King’s College is a microcosm of the larger community of young believers whose frustration with the lack of authority, structure, and intellectualism in many evangelical churches is leading them in great numbers to the Roman Catholic Church. This trend of “Crossing the Tiber” (a phrase that also served as the title of Stephen K. Ray’s 1997 book on the phenomenon), has been growing steadily for decades, but with the help of a solid foundation of literature, exemplar converts from previous generations, burgeoning traditional and new media outlets, and the coming of age of Millennial evangelicals, it is seeing its pace quicken dramatically.
Back in 1985, when many of the most recent converts were still singing Sunday School songs in evangelical churches, Thomas Howard wrote in the postscript to Evangelical is Not Enough that after completing the text in 1984, he formally converted to Catholicism at the Easter Vigil in 1985. Ultimately, Howard concluded that the question that matters most is “What is the Church?” His answer, like that of Hahn, Grodi and Talbot, and now of Croslow, Dunn, and White, is that the “one, holy, Catholic, and apostolic church”—the historical, traditional Church—can only be the Roman Catholic Church.
I'm honestly not sure where I'd place groups like the "emergent churches" or even the Warren / Osteen style megachurches.
"emergent" == recrudescent protestant social gospel liberalism. hook, line & sinker. Most likely of the three groups to take issue with the Nicene Creed (always a bad sign).
Osteen == "Word Faith Lite"
Warren == pragmatism. Don't step in the "leadership".
It doesn't look like there'd be much interaction between these. Scary, but there is.
I may see these more clearly for being closer to them. If the distinctions don't make sense, ask, and I'll try to clarify.
Probably because that terminology was never used by Christians until a handful of years ago. ... The way evangelicals speak about “Having a personal relationship with Christ” has nothing to do with the Bible (the terminology is entirely foreign to scripture), has no place in tradition and seems to have been invented only recently in the last few decades.
That's one reason I try not to talk that way. Everybody has a "personal relationship with Jesus". For some He's saviour. For others, judge.
Better to talk of repentance and faith, of the dying of the old self dying and the coming to life of the new. Work on faith as knowledge, assent and trust.
Well, you might want to ping Alex to those fine comments. He is the one who built the above taxonomy, not me. As a Catholic who has not studied comparative religions all that much, I am uniquely unqualified to build a taxonomy of the various denominations that exist in the non-Catholic / non-Orthodox sphere.
Having said that, I will be happy to bookmark and use whatever you all come up with.
Some very good, orthodox Catholic thought in the above sentence...IMHO. You ever read any Teresa of Avila?
For once you and I agree entirely.
Oh, hell just froze over!
Some very good, orthodox Catholic thought in the above sentence.
Interesting.
You ever read any Teresa of Avila?No. Have you ever read the Heidelberg Catechism? Lately I've been reading it devotionally, to shape and inform the soul. Astonishingly carefully crafted and pastoral.
Wednesday, May 12, 2010Progression of a Convert
Some of you may remember that old poster from the 1970's of some guy on a drug trip (no, this was NOT in my room - it was in a friend's room), where it showed his progression from "normal" to "wasted". For some reason that popped in my head the other day.
Since my return to the Faith in 1998, I've gone through all of the stages shown here, and would guess many others have also. Things are better than they were 12 years ago, to be sure, but sometimes panel # 6 still applies.
I went to a Catholic school till 9th grade. Was an active member of my church (Altar boy, CCD etc). went to a Catholic University and attended mass there (at least sometimes) and never once did anyone even suggest reading the bible. Not once.
I didn't even realize what the bible was until my fiance gave me one.
I am uniquely unqualified to build a taxonomy of the various denominations that exist in the non-Catholic / non-Orthodox sphere.
As I am poorly qualified to put a scalpel of classification to your world. I know, by watching the conversations here if nothing else, you-all have your liberals, you traditionalists, your syncretists in the back woods of Central America, your nutters of various stripes, your purveyors of liturgical novelties and dire music.
Just like us. And, just like us, I realize that what's true of the Roman Catholic oddballs isn't necessarily true of you, and doesn't get to the heart of the differences.
Well, fortunately, that much at least has changed a bit. My daughter's Catholic school required the kids to have a Bible since the 4th grade. Sacred Scripture was one of her HS classes (religion in all 4 years, but one of those years was specially dedicated toward study of the Bible).
What you tell me with your "Catholic" university doesn't shock me in the least bit. In fact, you will find folks agreeing with you on the dismal state of many of those schools (did you ever hear of the Land of Lakes agreement back in the 60s? It was a decision to divest ownership of virtually all universities owned by religious orders and turn over that ownership to private nonprofits, investing control in boards of trustees who were majority laity. That decision absolutely decimated the majority of Catholic universities in the 60s and 70s)
So what you're saying is no surprise to me. It distresses me...but not the first time I've heard it and, unfortunately, won't be the last time.
BTW, on the subject of indulgences for Sacred Scripture, here is the text of the 1968 Enchiridion Indulgentiarum:
50. Reading of Sacred Scripture (Sacrae Scripturae lectio)
A partial indulgence is granted to the faithful, who with the veneration due the divine word make a spiritual reading from Sacred Scripture.
A plenary indulgence is granted, if this reading is continued for at least one half an hour.
And from the current (2002) one:
30
Sacrae Scripturae lectio§ 1.59 Plenaria indulgentia conceditur christifideli qui Sacram Scripturam, iuxta textum a competenti auctoritate adprobatum, cum veneratione divino eloquio debita et ad modum lectionis spiritalis, per dimidiam saltem horam legerit; si per minus tempus id egerit indulgentia erit partialis.
§ 2. Quod si rationabili de causa quis legere non valeat, indulgentia, plenaria vel partialis prout supra, conceditur, si textus ipse Sacrae Scripturae, vel alio legente vel ope instrumentorum, quae « video » vel « audio » vocantur, percipitur.
(Sorry, but the English language version of that text is available hard copy only)
I have to say that US Catholic history has never been revealed, nor world Catholic history either, at least at the parish level, but instead we are left to 1940’s black and white movies to get even a glimpse of how things used to be. Today, inside the Church, we have a flock full of minimalists who have been liberally “shepherded” by other minimalists, all protestants in the truest sense of the word. God knows our plight and our longings, and how with all our heart we are holding on by virtue of the apologetics crowd who have been sent by God as angels to inspire us, encourage us and who are soldiering us up. Our transformation from sterility to heart throbing knowledge of the Great Faith is becoming, from a trickle to a river, a wave of transformation inspite of dull and dispirited priests, whom we pray for.
His moral theology was not liberal, and I am not implying that.
One big problem the Catholic church has is that while there are volumes on what it officially believes, in practice there is very little you are actually called to believe. I could walk into a typical Roman Catholic parish and be considered a very conservative Catholic, with out changing what I believe in. So could a great many non Catholic Freepers.
The Catholics we see here on FR are very unique, in that for the most part they know what they believe, and why. That is not very common.
It actually is probably not quite as uncommon as you would think (I know many in my own parish who are far more knowledgeable than I and they aren't FReepers in any regard).
But in the main I would, unfortunately agree with you. As I said in #25, above,
I would doubt that there would be a Catholic on FR who would disagree with you. The level of catechesis both through CCD and in Catholic schools is appalling.The trouble is that this is the second, and, in some cases, the third generation who never have been educated in their own faith. And so parents have a hard time taking on their responsibilities as the primary educators of their children because they don't know either.
But let me ask you, though...is it really that much different in your typical Lutheran, Methodist, Presbyterian, or Baptist congregation, though? Yes, I know that there are scholars in all of them and, absolutely, I would imagine that the level of understanding of doctrinal issues is far higher with FReepers than non-FReepers. But is Joe sit-in-the-pew-on-Sunday ___fill in the blank___ all THAT much different?
In my home town, my Lutheran parish was known for turning out kids who would know the catechism backwards and forwards (literally, before confirmation we had to stand before the congregation and answer each of Luther's small catechism questions). My current church is similar.
But that isn't the norm anymore. Most parents don't want to drill their kids on mountains of memory work. I hated it, but when my father in law died I was able to give the priest verses to look up off the top of my head. My wife loves to joke that I am the product of MoLu Bible education at its finest!
Which brings me to another point. Most Catholics, including priests and bishops, don't know the Bible that well. It was rather shocking to me that my inlaws priest didn't know some of the old stand bys for Psalms in the time of death. Not to mention what verses to read for the death of a farmer. My old Lutheran pastor could do that in his sleep, and so could most of my classmates.
Now I hear that is changing, but it is still shocking to me.
Can you say the Baltimore Catechism?
They really need to go back to that format...although the Didache series of Catholic religion textbooks (aimed to high schoolers) is pretty good as well. But the pablum that they gave my daughter in Elementary/Middle School...yuch. (Therefore, she got her real catechesis from Daddy...still isn't all that good, but head-and-shoulders above her peers)
Most Catholics, including priests and bishops, don't know the Bible that well. It was rather shocking to me that my inlaws priest didn't know some of the old stand bys for Psalms in the time of death.
Doesn't surprise me. I actually wonder how many priests ordained between 1970 and 1985 actually even pray the Office every day? (If they did, they'd read all 150 psalms every six weeks or so)
That generation of priests is more likely to be really scary to me. But the ones that I've seen cranked out since the early 90s are a whole lot better. And the ones I've gotten to know who were ordained in the past 5 years are, for the most part, truly holy men (YMMV). [Caveat: I'm looking at Mt St Mary's seminary in Emmitsburg MD and St Joseph's seminary in Yonkers NY for most of my first-hand experience...other seminaries may produce wildly different results]. And the ones I've met that are coming from Africa and India are just GREAT!!
Now if we could just get some more sisters like the Nashville Dominicans...
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