running into cartoon characters.
= = =
I realize that it’s much easier for all of us to cast issues between RC’s and Protty’s in stark, sterile, unidimensional black/white terms.
Doesn’t match reality much but it does make for more glib word tossings.
I suspect the folks the author encountered would rather bristle at being called cartoon characters.
“If Randall ever runs into a real Catholic....”
I’ve run into such real Catholics...one Father “Duke” Schnider who ran an emersive Teen Seminar program that was designed to introduce both Catholic, Protestant, and non religious back-ground teens to the person of Jesus Christ. He de-emphasized the role of Mary as co-redemptrix but did not disrespect her roll as Jesus mother. There was such love and energy that flowed from him when I took the seminar and for a few years afterward he would often let me visit after hours to sit and talk to him.
The Syracuse parish had authority over the Binghamton area and they had been monitoring his work as there was a fear that his outlook and practise had certain “charismatic” features that were looked down upon. Many folks were actually saved thru his work and there was an uptick of interest in young folks joining the church locally, the protestant kids were also richly blessed and many unchurched “rough” kids experienced an infusion of Godly love for the first time.
My point in telling this story...I have met non Catholic leaders who were Christian, who had the same grasp of Christ as a person,God, and saviour. For both Father and these other men, they seemed to have transcended beyond the simple religious vehicles by which they practised their belief in God, projecting thru their lives the very image of Christ himself.
To me, it’s not a matter of “real Catholic, or real Baptist” but REAL CHRISTIAN! There is a difference!