Baptist minister has begun his swim across the Tiber

I am fascinated by these stories and on the off chance that some of you need to read them, I'm more than willing to share them:

I still say to this very day that the greatest argument against Protestantism is Protestantism. Most Protestant churches are by far pro-choice and pro-homosexual. Protestantism was born in schism and she begets schisms. Schisms are all she knows and it will be all she ever knows. The principle of sola scriptura is not only self-defeating but the consequence of this doctrine has had a large impact in the creation of over thousands and thousands of denominations. I will stop here for now but perhaps I will blog later about why I believe the Protestant Reformation is also (significantly) responsible for the Enlightenment and secularism as we know it.

Now coming back to how my graduate studies in philosophy helped pave the way, it was by reading the medieval Catholic philosophers like Anselm, Aquinas, and Molina, as well as reading contemporary Catholic philosophers like Feser, van Inwagen, Stump, and Flint. Reading philosophers like these allowed me to see that Catholics were not the enemies. Rather, Catholics were my allies against the likes of naturalism. I began to appreciate them when I realized they were always showing up to the abortion clinics with me as well.

After becoming more open to Catholics in general, I began to have a more aesthetic attraction to the Church. I found the Church beautiful and its thinkers both godly and brilliant. However, I still would not become Catholic as I thought they believed that one entered a state of grace by their works and that they believed Jesus needed to be re-sacrificed on the cross over and over again.

These prejudicial conjectures would soon be pushed off as I found catholic.com and calledtocommunion.com. It was at these sites that I realized most of my beliefs about the Church were not true. I found myself agreeing with Archbishop John Sheen as he states, “There are not a hundred people in America who hate the Catholic Church. There are millions of people who hate what they wrongly believe to be the Catholic Church — which is, of course, quite a different thing.”

I would continue to investigate Rome’s claims. There were of course times when I would want to end my journey, however, God would not let me. There was even one night last Mother’s Day where I had a dream that a man was calling me to become a Catholic. What is even more strange is that the same night, my wife had a spiritual dream. The conclusion of her dream was that we were not to go to Israel but we were to help defend the faith here. Why were these dreams so strange? These dreams were strange for us because the few weeks beforehand, we were praying on the topics of going to Israel and if Rome’s doctrines were true.  Needless to say, we attended Mass that day.

There's more and I think it worthy.

Perhaps some of you are struggling with Catholicism and you're on the outside.

Or perhaps some of you are struggling as lapsed Catholics.

All I can tell you, and I'm so encouraged when I read others who are experiencing the same, is that the deeper I go, the more satisfied I am that I'm back in the Church.

With props to Devon Rose.

Comments

[chuck aka xtnyoda]

Just a fun little thought, without "Protestantism" there would be no America as we have known it.
:-)

[Iris Celeste]

Chuck,

And now you know why God allowed the breaking of his mystical body. Freedom of religion is very important, but it is something we humans have never truly understood. God does not force himself on us and He doesn't want us to force Him on others (even with the best of intentions because we know the truth.) Just like Jesus said to His apostles when He sent them out, and I paraphrase, if the people don't receive you and your message, shake the dust from your sandals and continue on. Likewise when the apostle complained to Jesus about others preaching in his name who were not part of His disciples (think Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches and their direct line to the apostles) He told them to let them be; those individuals were not against Him (think the countless Protestant denominations) and though they may not have had the fullness of the Gospel they had enough. Basically, God can complete in the human heart anything that is lacking in anyone's religious instruction (even Muslims or Hindus or Wiccans) if that individual truly and sincerely gives his heart to God and turns his will over to God.

[BroKen]

I would just point out that reformers like Luther had no intention of producing schism. He wanted to reform the existing church, not start a new one. Luther did not excommunicate himself! Protestantism may be born of schism and beget schisms... but we didn't invent schism or even really (most of us) seek it out.

Personally, I think institutional unity is far less important than the spiritual unity which all believers share whether Protestant or not. I think C.S. Lewis somewhere describes the sorrow we all feel about the cracks in the Body of Christ, yet he then speaks of his experience when he was an atheist. The unity he observed in the followers of Christ (all of them together) was a "fearful" thing to him. I would say that the cracks we grieve over are not nearly as deep as they appear to us.

[Rick]

The original post by Tyler McNabb has been taken down... in fact, the entire blog has been deleted.

I'm checking with Devon Rose for reasons.

Stand by.

[chuck aka xtnyoda]

perhaps the water in the Tiber caused his feet to grow a little too cold?
:-)