Jason and the Callers do not say much good about Reformed Protestantism. They could possibly admit that the doctrinalist world of confessional Presbyterianism may have given them a taste for the theory greater than which none can be conceived — the visible church is the church that Christ founded. But they could also be a little more gracious. Rather than constantly counting the five digit totals of Protestant “churches,” they could, like Paul McCusker, give their Protestant backgrounds a little credit for making them the Christians they are:
It may surprise some that being a Baptist taught me to respect the authority of the church. I don’t mean the Church with the capital “C”, but the little “c” church, meaning an autonomous and local assembly with a Pastor (or pastors), a group of deacons, and the congregation. That’s the church we thought the New Testament was talking about. No Bishops, no Pope, no monolithic hierarchy with men dressed in funny clothes and hats (not counting Baptist conventions with all the polyester and toupees).
We believed our church was what Jesus Himself intended churches to be. Fallen, not perfect, but a church, doing what true First-Century-type believers did. That our church bore no resemblance whatsoever to the historical First Century church was something we didn’t know. Not that it mattered. Actually history meant very little when we could simply bypass the 2000 years and go to the Bible directly. At least our hearts were certainly in the right places.
Of greater importance, I learned that the local church was essential to Christian living, not merely the “optional extra” it seems to be now. There was no living the Christian life without it. A good Christian needed the church to survive spiritually. The church fed my personal spiritual life, which would, in turn, feed the church. That’s what it meant to be part of the Body of Christ, as we understood it. Going to Sunday School and Sunday morning service – and Sunday evening and Wednesday evening – and Awana on Thursday – and youth group on Friday – wasn’t a take-it-or-leave-it proposition. If I wanted to grow in Christ, then I needed to take my place in the church and all its activities.
I remember, as a teenager, skipping a Sunday evening service once. The Pastor’s wife later asked me why I wasn’t there. I honestly admitted that I didn’t feel like going. She asked, in that very Baptist way: “What if Jesus didn’t feel like going to the cross? Where would we be?” To which I replied, “At home, since there wouldn’t be a church if He didn’t go to the cross.”
She would have been within her rights to slap me.
I’ve mused that, considering the Baptist mantra of “Saved By Grace and not Works,” Baptists tend to be the hardest working people you’ll ever meet. It’s a funny thing. Catholics minimally have to go to Mass once a week and Confession once a year and they think they’re good to go. That’s pretty light stuff for a “Works-based” religion. Whereas Baptists could slide through Purgatory if only for the time they spent making chicken casseroles for the next fellowship, wedding or funeral. (If they believed in Purgatory. Which they don’t. Just to be clear about that.)
In another post, McCusker draws this contrast:
As a Baptist I truly believed faith without works really was dead. Fortunately, many of the “works” were done as part of “fellowship.” Few groups do “fellowship” as well as Baptists. They seemed to understand the importance of relationships to commitment and growth. After any service or event, the majority of people would hang around to “visit” for ages – adding a half-hour to an hour to the worship service experience. There was no rushing for the exit as soon as the final hymn ended or the last Amen said.
I have said in other contexts how it’s ironic that Catholicism is supposed to be about Community, but tends to be very individualistic (if one were to judge by the scramble to the parking lot even before Mass has truly ended), while Protestantism is supposed to be individualistic yet tends toward Community (if the crowds hanging out and talking in the lobby are an indicator).
It makes you wonder why he converted. It also makes you if it would kill Jason and the Callers to say something positive about Reformed Protestantism.
Old Life 
Sacrificing salvific certitude for epistemological certitude is a bizarre trade-off. Why surrender the joy of justification sola fide for the so-called veracity of an institution which, on top of stealing this assurance: tells us to pray to the dead; harbours and protects legions of paedophiles; and tolerates all sorts of doctrinal deviancy for the sake of institutional unity? As we say in Britain – mental.
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This is not going to earn me any friends here at Old Life but as someone baptized PCUSA I’ve always appreciated:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auburn_Affirmation
in particular and
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul_competency
in general.
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Contra the CTC narrative, the Christian life is no cake walk. To see someone fall into idolatry is sad, but no surprise or cause for wonder. There but for the Grace of God go I, kinda stuff, I suppose…
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Nick,
Those bad things only exist in your paradigm.
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McCusker’s piece reminds me of the good memories I have of all the churches I have been apart of at one time or another in my life. Learning Calvinism in Sunday School from a Methodist minister, hearing good sermons (and later meeting my wife) in a Baptist church, being a part of a Christian & Missionary Alliance Church in college, knowing lots of nice people in an E-Free Church, and finally settling down in a Reformed Church. I knew lots of sincere (not perfect) Christian people all along the way who I suspect I’ll see again in Heaven someday. Perhaps the CTC claims of the lack of “unity” among Protestants is indeed overblown.
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Erik, do you think that in their RC paradigm, children aren’t being abused? I wonder how that works!?
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I read this somewhere, a German theologian (a woman), I believe;
“In Catholicism, one’s relationship to Christ depends on one’s relationship to the Church. In Protestantism it is the opposite. One’s relationship to the church depends on one’s relationship to Christ.”
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Nick,
That’s an interesting question. They know that what has happened is not right, but I’m not sure they quite know how to process it. Hart gave the Callers a hard time of that of late and a good guy there, Michael Liccione, referred to a post by Jeremy Tate to show that they had addressed it. Read the post for yourself and tell me if you think this is adequate. How does it stack up volume-wise against all they have written against Protestantism?
http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2011/08/children-and-the-catholic-church/
Michael notes that he himself was a victim of abuse by a Priest and I imagine he sees his return to the Church as evidence for the truth of Catholicism (kind of a “I Fought the Church and the Church Won” a la Jason Stellman). It could be interpreted as a case of Stockholm Syndrome or just an attempt to make peace with the past, though. I know as I’ve aged I’ve revisited some of the things that were disturbing to me when I was young (although nothing that serious). The thinking is “Hey, this bothered me as a kid, let’s see if I can process it better as an adult.” For the most part, I have been able to process it better as an adult.
The bottom line is we need more from the Callers on the scandal as part of their apologetic.
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Michael (#393) – That the measured rate of sexual abuse of minors by Catholic priests is lower than that among public-school teachers is, I believe, evidence that priests do so strive.
Erik – Are you suggesting that public school teachers teach in the Schools that Christ Founded? Of course you aren’t. I just think your apologetic for the glories of Rome break down at this point. If you are constantly defining down the expectations for the one true church supposedly led by an apostle, the expediency of conversion gets really low. An apologetic that devolves to such an abstract, intellectual level is appealing to very few people. In fact, it’s pretty much only people like me who primarily live their lives between their ears (and we’re rare).
It’s also ironic that Tate’s post is all about experiencing the glories of Catholicism in a visible, hands on way. Those who suffered at the hands of deviant priests had very damaging, negative experiences of the church in a visible, hands on way.
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Erik – for example, there’s the case of MLB first baseman and outfielder Tom Paciorek:
In the spring of 2002, Paciorek told the Detroit Free Press in a report that priest Gerald Shirilla had molested him and three of his four brothers while working as a teacher at St. Ladislaus Catholic High School in Hamtramck in the 1960s. “I was molested by him for a period of four years,” Paciorek is reported to have said. “I would refer to them as attacks. I would say there was at least a hundred of them.” The former All-Star said he didn’t tell anyone because no one would have believed him. “When you’re a kid, and you’re not able to articulate, who’s going to believe you?” he asked. “The church back then was so powerful, there’s nothing that a kid could do.”
The “church back then was so powerful”?? What has changed?
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Erik,
Regarding sexual abuse by priests, what do you mean that adult Catholics don’t know how to process the information?
Catholics have said that sexual abuse is a moral evil. Some people high up even try to act like the abuse doesn’t happen. These people are rotten when they hide a molesting priest. There are no misgivings here.
When can we go back to the question of whether or not all of Rome’s theology is true?
Susan
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The RC clergy child abuse scandal does raise questions about the church as a whole and its theology, it cannot be discarded, especially as the Vatican itself that claims to interpret Scripture for the people has its hands so dirty. Watch “Silence in the House of God” and see for yourself.
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The 10^5 protestant denominations is a misleading canard. It is not at all clear to me that the difference between the beliefs and practices among say the OPC, Assembly of God, SBC, and all of the independent protestant churches (Calvary Chapel, Vineyards, WillowCreeks, etc…) is as large as the range of beliefs and practices among RC parishes (from those trying to replicate the pre VatII experience to those telling their parishioners that they need to get on birth control). Indeed surveys of the actual beliefs of the parishioners tell the same story. This supposed infallible magisterium only exists in the philosophy of theology seminar room, and the authority of the Vatican seems quite toothless as Catholic universities have demonstrated by their repeated thumbing of the nose at “Ex Corde Ecclesiae” – at ND it seems clear that NBC is far more authoritative than Rome.
To paraphrase what my pastor says when we have the Lord’s supper, “This is not the table of CPC or of the PCA, it is for all those who confess Christ”. So you can have methodists, baptists, lutherans, etc… all in communion more or less at the lay level. Indeed, most of us have moved within these communions rather seamlessly – I don’t know that anyone would call a move from Calvary Chapel to the OPC a “conversion”. My move from the SBC to the CRC to the PCA was more or less driven by geography, and while my theological views have matured and I have major disagreements with SBC theology, they strike me as minor compared the differences between say Wills and Neuhaus.
It seems to me that the difference between the commonweal RCs and the firstthing RCs is not all that different than the many flavors of evangelical. Where some see chaos, others see a dynamism that creates stability (perhaps some wisdom from Hayek is relevant here). I’m not saying all is perfect in the world of protestantism, but it isn’t 1613 anymore for RCs or CPs.
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Dan H., I’m not sure if you’re trying to wind us up, but if you are, nothing Protestants have done compares with
http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius09/p9syll.htm
or
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_Librorum_Prohibitorum
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I’m for realz on those two. Fosdick is my kind of Protestant (Mad props to Quaker theologian Robert Barclay as well). And I like my Catholicism like I like my Heidegger, filtered through Rahner.
“The kind of Church that might correspond to Rahner’s vision of man and faith is sketched out in his collection of essays, Concern for the Church, which is the twentieth and final volume of his Theological Investigations. The essays embody the last reflections of a wise old man who looks into the future as well as at the present of his Church with equal measures of criticism and hope. He is outspoken in his denunciation of the official “blunders” and the “narrow-minded procedures” that often typify the Vatican’s response to liberal theologians. He is just as critical about the poor quality of Catholic sermons and popular catechesis, but seems resigned to its inevitability. (“We cannot have a fatherland unless we are prepared to live with its philistines and slackers. It is the same with the Church.”) ”
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/1982/feb/04/the-dream-of-karl-rahner/?pagination=false
Here I stand, yada, yada, yada…
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As to the syllabus and the index well, mistakes were made.
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Sean,
Piggybacking off of what you just said and comments by Erik on another post—
At the lay level among Protestants there is certainly a good degree of unity. Take your average SBC, Assemblies of God, PCA, OPC, and Missouri Synod Lutheran and have them look at the case of a professing Christian who is engaging in homosexual activity and shows no remorse, contrition, or any evidence that it is bothering his conscience at all. I think if you were to push any of them on it, they would finally admit that said person is not a Christian. I don’t see how a Roman Catholic could say that. If the person is baptized Roman Catholic, he is Roman Catholic and so a Christian. He might be a bad RC or a bad Christian, but his profession doesn’t make him non-Roman Catholic, especially since the odds are nil that said person is going to be disciplined at least in this country.
I grew up Lutheran (ELCA), spent some time in the Charismatic movement, was a member of the Church of the Nazarene, and then became Reformed on account of personal study and conviction. At no point in moving between those groups did I think of myself converting. With Rome, you have people speaking of “converting” to Roman Catholicism. It really is quite strange. In fact, if Protestants are separated brethren, it seems to me that Roman Catholic theology would make it impossible for you to say that you are converting. Were you not a Christian before?
There were important differences between all those groups I mentioned, including on such things as ecclesiology and even whether it is possible for the truly justified person to fall away finally. But all recoiled in horror in the thought that our works play any part whatsoever in getting us into heaven. I go to Rome, and I have some laypeople who don’t know Roman doctrine but are trusting in Christ alone. Others who hold to a strict “I earn my way to heaven.” You have no standard doctrine of election. A multitude of different views of ecclesiastical authority and infallibility even within the Magisterium (especially when you read Magisterium members from the past alongside those from the present). About the only thing people can agree on is that you should go to Mass at least a couple of times a year.
I am consistently struck at how shallow the Roman view of unity is. You have just as wide a swath of opinions on the ground level as in Protestants, but somehow that church is more united because it has the same home office.
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The problem isn’t sexual abuse by priests per se (though that is a problem). As many have noted, the rate at which they abuse young children is lower than the general population. The problem is that the Church is complicit in ongoing coverups of this behavior and in some instances the shepherds put wolves in the churches that destroyed the faith of many.
For example, Cardinal Dolan (one of the “good” guys) lied when he “denied emphatically” that he ever sought to shield church money from potential lawsuits as Bishop of Milwaukee. Later documents emerged in which he wrote to the Vatican to explain his management of funds “I foresee an improved protection of these funds from any legal claim and liability.” Obviously one would be a fool to take him at his word about anything – I certainly wouldn’t trust him to relay the infallible interpretation of a biblical text.
And let’s not forget Cardinal Mahoney who worked to shield a serial rapist within the priesthood and help him evade the police. Or Monsignor Groeschel who decided that serial abuser Fr. Urritogoity had confessed so it is OK to send him from the Diocese of Scranton to run an orphanage in Paraguay. With judgement like that I’m sure Monsignor Groeschel is a reliable person to turn to make heads or tails of the catechism – why would I want to rely on my own private judgement.
And what does Cardinal Law’s repentance and contrition look like? Repentance indeed.
Yeah, I know God can (and does) use broken vessels, and the truth of what they say is independent of their moral rectitude. But if I can’t trust them (and one would be quite irresponsible to do so), then I’m left with my own private judgement. The question is whether I judge the meaning of an inspired text or the meaning of interpretations of that text penned by men who celebrate non-repentant enablers of rapists.
Further, it isn’t just the moral weakness of these princes that is the problem. It is the structure of Rome itself that perpetuates this evil. As one person commented on the news about Cardinal Law’s birthday bash:
To which Rod Dreher (who has covered this scandal extensively and really should be required reading for all who wish to join Rome)
The leaders who relay the supposed infallible magisterium are not reliable or accountable. But hey they hold the keys so you better jump in anyway? No thanks…
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Dreher’s excellent writing on the subject is indeed a must read. Don’t miss this portion of the quote cited by sdb:
there is nothing within the system to allow them to effectively push for moral reform
Dreher was Roman Catholic but then converted to Eastern Orthodoxy because of the scandal and Rome’s absolute, and I mean absolute, refusal to do anything meaningful about it.
The doctrine of infallibility makes the church of Rome impervious to any true reformation of life and doctrine except of the most shallow kind.
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D.G.,
One week ago I posted “Why Evangelicals are Getting High” where I wrote:
. I can’t think of something more positive than this.
Peace in Christ, Jeremy
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Jeremy, seems chincy. McCusker is writing four separate posts about the values of his Baptist upbringing.
in the imputed righteousness of Christ,
dgh
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Jeremy,
The sentence after the one you quote, in your article, you state:
“that in her [Roman Catholic Church] one may receive the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ in the Eucharist.”
If, as a Christian, I never partake in a Roman Catholic Eucharist, what precisely am I lacking? I’ve been a protestant my whole life. You left confessional Protestantism (presumably) for Roman Catholicism. Your joy in what you have found leads you to write public articles, and comment in blogs that where people of your former persuation tend to write, read, and opine. Something is compelling you to do all this. Maybe you are just defending the group that Darryl is criticising here in his blog. I could get that. However, maybe it the Eucharist that is driving you, more broadly? I’m curious to hear more from you, as you have availability.
Regards,
AB
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PS and, Jeremy, just a little about me and my motives, since I ask about yours. I’ve felt compelled to learn about RCism (including reading blog articles like the ones you write at CTC) because the Roman Catholic Church is the largest grouping within Christianity. In other words, I need to have some things straight for when I will undoublety come to face either Roman Catholic persons, or ideas. With the strain of thought I sense at CTC, I can share in lamenting the fragmented nature of the Christian Church. However, there’s not yet been one argument that I have felt is compelling that would have me question my Reformed convictions. I’m always open to find the errors in my thinking, and I welcome people to share with me what they think are my shortcomings. My point is, learning about RCism only turns me more away from it, and that includes reading articles like yours. It causes me to further rejoice in the freedom I have found, through what I believe had been my knowledge of the Truth. Take care, answer only as you feel led.
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While I am not Jason or a “caller” I am happy to say some positive things about Reformed Christianity and (orthodox) Protestantism in general.
I left the Catholic Church as a lad for for Evangelicalism and eventually made my way to Reformedom in my early 20’s (in my early 40’s now). God very clearly blessed me during those years and I am quite certain it is why I am a Christian today. Had I stayed (nominal) Catholic I doubt I would have truly known Christ.
I had wonderful teen years, free of sex and drugs but plenty fo rock and roll because I wanted to love Christ with the way I lived. I only grew in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ. And Reformedom was the height of my Christian life. It is when my faith became deeper and I truly experienced freedom in Christ as opposed to the teetotaling of evangelical rules (no dancing or drinking etc.)
It was the depth of the faith of Calvinist Christianity that taught me that God is truly sovereign over all things. It forced me to challenge what I took for granted. I had to let go of believers only baptism, pure memorialism in communion, low ecclesiology and faith in my own efforts (yes I said that). Ironically, it was this effort to go deeper that eventually forced me to consider the Catholic and Orthodox churches because I started drinking heavily of the ECF’s (and single malt scotch… but that is a different story).
The Reformed introduced me to Augustine and Anselm. I learned to love weighty hymns and reverent worship.
I also loved my complete set of Matthew Henry’s biblical commentaries.
I could go on.
Btw, today is a Holy Day. Get to Mass. 😉
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