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| Historic St. Anne's Catholic Church on Mackinac Island, Michigan. Baptism, death and marriage records date back to 1695 |
Perhaps you have
heard this: “You have fallen away!” Or perhaps, “What are we going to tell the
family?” These are the comments people hear when they are no longer attending
the Catholic Church. People who grew up Catholic and stopped attending can
attest that the saying “once a Catholic, always a Catholic” has been likely
used and probably abused.
For
a time in my life, I heard those words. I was brought up in a Catholic family
and educated in a Catholic school, and I embraced Catholicism as an adult.
However, soon after we were married and had our children, my wife and I started
attending a non-denominational church. My mom and dad as well as many in my
family questioned our newfound faith and the reason why we were seemingly
abandoning our religion.
One day when I
was traveling through Indiana for business, I took the opportunity to visit my
favorite aunt and uncle. The conversation over dinner quickly turned to
religion. It was a good conversation, and I gave them all of the reasons why we
felt it was important for us to attend a great church in our neighborhood.
My aunt turned
to me and said, “Once a Catholic, always a Catholic.” It was not a statement of
reason but an emotional appeal she was making to her nephew. She knew only the
Catholic Church and believed it to be the one and only true church.
From my
perspective my wife and I hadn’t converted or abandoned anything; we were
actually embracing our faith and growing closer to God. To us, moving from one
location on Sunday to another wasn’t about converting to another faith but
reaffirming what we knew to be true.
Our journey as
Catholics had started with baptisms as infants decades earlier. However, our
deep and personal relationships with Jesus Christ in reality had started during
a ninety-day period, from Ash Wednesday to Pentecost Sunday, just a few years
prior. It began when our Catholic priest, whom we had gotten to know, invited
us to a Catholic charismatic group meeting on Tuesdays starting the first full
week of Lent. We had asked a few questions about getting to know some other
couples and growing in our faith. He told us about this little group and said
there was a break at Easter, so if we didn’t feel the group was for us we could
easily just drop out.
We didn’t drop
out, and because of this group of committed, charismatic Catholics as well as a
number of other things that seemed to be calling us to more, God changed our
lives during those ninety days. We purchased our first Bible and started
reading it on a daily basis. After the ninety days, we found a similar and even
larger group that met on Fridays in a gym and occasionally in a park. We
enjoyed the fellowship and the scripture reading. Someone always had a guitar,
and we learned new songs and began to experience worship in a new and
meaningful way. We loved meeting and getting to know other Christians who were
as excited about their faith as we were.
The Friday group
included young and old, married couples, singles, and a few younger children.
For the first time, we heard about having a personal relationship with Jesus.
We knew what that was and could look back to that ninety-day period and feel
how much our hearts had changed. The language we were using about our faith was
also changing. It wasn’t as much going to Mass as it was being in fellowship
with other believers. The group was primarily Catholics, but they referred more
and more to themselves as believers or spirit filled and even born again. We
found we had everything in common with these people as well as other Christians
who read the Bible for wisdom, devotions, and personal growth and desired to
have living relationships with Jesus Christ.
That was in the
early 1980s, and the charismatic renewal of the Catholic Church was in full
swing. It seems like every family had one of those kinds. In our family it was my wife and I. We were the ones
who seemed always to find a way to turn any conversation into a conversation
about Jesus. It seemed like our favorite activities were reading our Bibles and
listening to Christian radio and Christian music. Our kids were still very
young, and we wanted the very best for them. We started looking for a church
that could help us grow, that would be a great place for our young children to
learn about God, and that would give us an opportunity to meet other couples
who were just as passionate about their relationships with God as we were.
In
the beginning I had more passion and enthusiasm than common sense. I was
insensitive, rude, argumentative, and no fun to have at a party. My wife was
much more pleasant. She didn’t like arguments and was a natural peacemaker. In
time God was able to smooth out some of these rough edges in my life, and my
family eventually forgave me. Surprisingly, and over time, they started to see,
through my gentler and humbler self, that my faith in and love for God were
real. I’ve found this approach to be better when we want to share the Gospel.
St. Francis of Assisi once said, “Preach the Gospel at all times, and if
necessary use words.”[i]
Over the years
I’ve had the opportunity to read and grow and have taken some classes in
theology, the Bible, and history. I’ve learned a lot about my Catholic
heritage. Had I known then what I know now, I would have had better answers to
people who asked about me falling away or abandoning my religion. To me
Catholicism was a great inheritance, and it was in the Catholic Church that I
came to believe the essential truths I continue to believe today. The faith,
the history, the traditions, and even the doctrines contributed greatly to who
I am.
I am writing
this book because of these experiences. I am much more than a former Catholic.
I have an appreciation of my Catholic heritage, the Catholic members of my
family, and all of the wonderful members of the Body of Christ who attend
Catholic churches. This is my story, but I will also be sharing the story of
the church through history, which influenced my thinking and clarified my
thoughts. The history of the church will include the dates and the people and
the places, but it will also be the story, the narrative of how the church has
evolved. My evolution, however, began more than forty years ago, when I was
still in Catholic school.
Except from "Roaming Catholics: ending the wandering to embrace the wonder" by Kenneth Behr, available at Amazon and your local Christian Bookstore
[i]. Susan Henderson McHenry, Therapy with
God: Wonderful Counselor, Comforter, Friend (Xulon, 2008), 25.
