Advice to a Young Convert

I recently had a conversation with an online friend, a young man, recently converted to the Church. He is having doubts and looking to Eastern Orthodoxy because of the scandals and the heresies emanating from Rome. I have bracketed, in red, some thoughts I've had since that were not part of the original exchange.

His remark that began the convo:

So I have to be honest with myself.  As I try to learn more, in early Church history papal primacy is pretty clear - but papal supremacy seems to be very un-clear.

Did some research on the book Papal Primacy, and it appears for the first 300 years if you asked a Christian if the pope was infallible as described today the answer would have been no.

I am having a very hard time with this.  When they wanted to take Jesus and make Him a temporal king he said no.  But it seems Pius the IX did the near opposite.  

[Actually, the declaration of the Dogma of Papal Infallibility in Pastor  aeternus was in response to the loss of the temporal Kingship over the Papal States.The Popes had been temporal Kings for over a thousand years. The Papal Zouaves used the battle cry, Vive Pie Neuf, Pontife et Roi! (Long live Pius IX , Pontiff and King!).]

I am trying - but I can't seem to see it any other way.

I replied:

The Act of Faith says:

O my God, I firmly believe that Thou art one God in three divine persons, Father, Son and Holy Ghost. I believe that Thy divine Son became man and died for our sins, and that He will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe these and all the truths which the holy catholic Church teaches, because in revealing them Thou canst neither deceive nor be deceived.

The Church teaches:

We teach and define as a divinely revealed dogma that
when the Roman pontiff speaks EX CATHEDRA,
that is, when,

in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians,

in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority,
he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole church,

he possesses,by the divine assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, that infallibility which the divine Redeemer willed his church to enjoy in defining doctrine concerning faith or morals.

Therefore, such definitions of the Roman pontiff are of themselves, and not by the consent of the church, irreformable.

So then, should anyone, which God forbid, have the temerity to reject this definition of ours: let him be anathema.

-Pastor aeternus, Vatican I.

I leave you to draw your own conclusions.

He came back with this:

I'm working on this, as I really don't want to go anywhere. I don't know why, there is just something about Papal Infallibility and today's Church that don't sit right with me.

The biggest thing is that primacy was in the early Church, but not supremacy that I see. If I could see supremacy in the Apostolic age I'd feel a lot better.

Me:

Your attitude indicates that you reject the teaching authority of the Church after a certain point, which seems illogical to me. If the Church taught authentically in the Apostolic Age, when did She lose the authority to teach authentically?

To which he replied:

A good question.  I heard of a Catholic bishop that said we should consider all councils since the East - West divide to basically local synods, and everything back on the table since then. [I wonder what sort of 'Catholic' Bishop is spouting heresy like this?]

I guess in many ways the Eastern Church just looks more like the Apostles to me than the West, and so my questioning.

Me:

So it looks 'more like the Apostles' to call Christ a liar when he said, in Mark 10:9, 'What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder', and to have multiple warring Churches when he said, in John 10:16, 'And there shall be one fold and one shepherd'?

Me, later, to stress John 10:16:

They fight and go into schism over the oddest things, too. How to pronounce the Holy Name and how to hold your fingers whilst making the Sign of the Cross (Old Believer schism - 17th century), or what calendar to use (Old Calendarist schism - 20th century).

Him:

Thanks Jovan. I did some reading early this AM and never realized there was that much Eastern support for the Papacy.

On one hand, everywhere without it has crumbled on things like divorce, gay marriage, and more. And even the East has been very "iffy" on contraception. 

The thing that really has had me frustrated, confused, and upset is the state of the Church. I have tried to convert over the last couple years and it's been hard. I have found out on top of things, my local and only available pastor is quite modern, church of nice, and in favor of not rocking any boat. On top of that one of the top lay employees said to me personally, "We are cafeteria Catholics here, we don't believe all that stuff."

The way people think and talk there wouldn't have been tolerated at my old protestant church, which was very conservative. And it's not because what they do and say is Catholic, it's because it's not even good basic Christianity.

And so I have been in turmoil, no longer believing in Sola Scriptura or Sola Fide, but also looking at this thing and seeing something that looks worse than what I left. And so I started looking at the East, because this can't be "it".

Thanks for giving me information and not just a scolding.

[And here I thought I was scolding! LOL!]

Me:

I came OUT of Orthodoxy when I realised that they were a rudderless vessel with no captain, no pilot, and no steersman. Obviously, if they were right, Christ was wrong.

My advice? Immerse yourself in the Traditional Catholic Faith. Study the old catechisms, use the old devotions. Eschew anything post-conciliar. Check out Being Catholic and For Catholics on the main site. Go to Mass where you must, and offer up your pain and, yes, anger, for the good estate of Christ's Holy Catholic Church.

I will pray for you. I've been Catholic for almost 40 years. It hasn't been a pleasant ride for much of that time, especially the past six years, but as St Peter, our First Pope said, 'Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we have believed and have known, that thou art the Christ, the Son of God.' Christ only founded one Church and it is demonstrably the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church in union with the Successor of Peter.

[For those who want to know more of my conversion story, I posted it on my old blog, The New Crusade.]