A New Blog in the Blogroll

A fellow member of FishEaters Forum has begun writing a blog, A Young Popish American. He deliberately used the word 'popish', originally an anti-Catholic epithet used by protestants, to reclaim the word, and to show pride in being a Papist (another anti-Catholic epithet we need to reclaim!).

His first post relates his conversion to the One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman Church, the only Church founded by Christ.

The Story of My Conversion

The story of my conversion to Catholicism isn’t very exciting or glamorous. Parts may be interesting for sure, but the beginnings of my conversion only began about four years ago. First a little background. I was blessed to be born to two God-fearing Evangelical Christian parents who taught me to love Jesus, and I’m grateful to them for that. All my extended family (grandparents, aunts, uncles) are also Evangelicals. Growing up, we attended an Assemblies of God community, which is a Pentecostal denomination. When I was around 12 or 13 we started going to a couple different non-denominational Evangelical communities, which weren’t too different from the Assemblies of God community (a few worship songs with a worship band, 45 minutes-an hour long sermon, belief in the sole authority of Scripture, the “ordinances” of Baptism and (irrfrequent) Communion, etc). I grew up as a devout Evangelical; I accepted and believed in Jesus as my Savior, prayed regularly, read the Bible, etc.

I attended public elementary school from Kindergarten to 5th grade, but my parents decided to move me over to a private non-denominational Christian school which I attended 6th through 8th grade. We were having certain issues with the school, so my parents had me “shadow” a student at the local Catholic high school for a day. I loved it! The students there were so much nicer and friendlier than at the non-denominational school. So, for the following school year my parents switched my siblings and I to Catholic schools. Prior to attending Catholic high school, I had no exposure to more traditional expressions of Christianity. I had been to 2 Lutheran funerals when I was younger, but that was it.

I accidently received Holy Communion the first time I ever went to Mass, which was the weekly Mass with the whole school. I didn’t know that only Catholics could receive the Holy Eucharist, simply because no one told me and I didn’t know any better. I probably just assumed that it was like how we “took Communion” in our Evangelical church. I wasn’t even baptized yet. I walked up, put my hand out, and started walking away with the Eucharist in my hand over to the EMHC with the chalice, who abruptly told me “consume it.” The reason I did this is because we would get crackers and little cups of grape juice and walk back to our seats before consuming it. Another student came up to me after Mass and was like “uh, you know you’re not supposed to receive Communion if you’re not Catholic, right?” To which I replied that I didn’t know. I think I’m actually the reason that they now give a talk before the first Mass of the school year on who can receive Holy Communion.

The school introduced me to something I never even knew existed; I just grew up thinking that all Christians were like us. So, I started doing my own research. I briefly considered Catholicism my freshman year because of the aesthetics of the Faith, but I then turned full circle and became a very anti-Catholic Pentecostal. I don’t remember all the exact little details, but at some point I came back to my senses and was a normal Evangelical again. When I was 15 I was baptized at my Evangelical church in the spring of my freshman year.

Deep down I knew something was missing, that there was something deficient with Evangelicalism. I started reading and researching, and I became very interested in Anglicanism. I had already started to believe many things that Anglicanism and Catholicism have in common: 7 Sacraments, infant Baptism, the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist (though we disagree exactly on what that means), the threefold Orders of deacon, priest, and bishop, etc. I was essentially an Anglo-Catholic, which is as High Church as it gets within Anglicanism. It was a way to be Catholic without accepting the dogmas of the papacy, “extreme” Marian dogmas, Purgatory, etc.

Anglicans believe in the “Branch Theory,” which is the belief that the true Church exists in three “branches:” the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Roman Catholic Church, and the Anglican churches. I saw everything that was happening in the Episcopal Church and other Anglican churches and became dissafected by it all; so I eventually came to disregard this theory. I just couldn’t believe that Anglicans were an “extension” of  the Apostolic Faith with the advent of women “priests” and same-sex “marriage” in Anglicanism. I started praying that God would enlighten me as to what Church is true; to guide me where he wanted me to be.

I then seriously looked into Eastern Orthodoxy while I was wavering on exactly what the Petrine primacy was. The deal was sealed after I experienced both Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament and the “Mass of the Holy Spirit” at the beginning of the school year. After experiencing the priest, vested in a cope exposing the Blessed Sacrament in the monstrance, incensing it and intoning the Tantum Ergo, as well as the aesthetic beauty of that Mass, I knew that God was guiding me to his Church: the Catholic Church. I just knew deep down that it was where God wanted me to be. I did more research and came to believe everything that the Catholic Church teaches, and so I entered RCIA at my local Catholic parish, and after going to Confession was received into the Church, confirmed, and received First Holy Communion on April 1, 2017.

A deeper understanding of Sacred Scripture, realizing the reality of Sacred Tradition, realizing the reality of the Magisterium, reading the writings of early Christians (the Church Fathers), and looking more deeply into Church History led me to the understanding that the Church has been very Catholic since it’s inception at Pentecost, just like many other converts to Catholicism from Protestantism. Take the Didache, for example, or the quotes of the Church Fathers. Their sayings show exactly how Catholic the early Christians were; they should know because they were early Christians themselves! And some of them personally knew the Apostles! Here’s an example from a Christian (a Church Father) who lived between 140 AD and 202 AD:

…He took from among creation that which is bread, and gave thanks, saying, “THIS IS MY BODY.” The cup likewise, which is from among the creation to which we belong, HE CONFESSED TO BE HIS BLOOD.

He taught THE NEW SACRIFICE OF THE NEW COVENANT, of which Malachi, one of the twelve prophets, had signified beforehand: [quotes Mal 1:10-11]. By these words He makes it plain that the former people will cease to make offerings to God; BUT THAT IN EVERY PLACE SACRIFICE WILL BE OFFERED TO HIM, and indeed, a pure one; for His name is glorified among the Gentiles.

– St. Irenaeus of Lyons (Against Heresies 4:17:5)

We must remember that our belief in the Catholic Church as the true Church and our Catholic Faith as the fullness of Truth is not meant to be demeaning to Protestants and other non-Catholics; a deep look into the facts simply shows that this is True. And it is true because God loves us. As John Henry Cardinal Newman once said:

To be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant.