Author Archives: jptomey

Conversion Memoir Entry #4: Discovering My Marriage as a Sacrament

wedding-rings-photo-2013-wedding-ring-on-hand-670x350But for one particular individual, I may never have become Catholic; without this person I may never have experienced the amazing graces that have flooded my life in the last two years. That person is my husband, Mike.

Mike and I came into the Catholic Church together, with our two children at the time (ages 2 and 2 months). Not only did we convert together, but the journey of inquiry into Catholicism was a shared experience the whole way. It seemed that God was moving our hearts simultaneously, and to have the support and companionship of your spouse during such a process was a great blessing. It is not often the case. Many converts journeys, such as Scott and Kimberly Hahn’s story, involve different timelines for spouses entering the church — if the experience is even mutual at all.

We had most of the same questions and concerns in common during our investigation into Catholicism, but Mike was the one who started seeking first and kept pushing us on along the way. Sometime in 2010, after finishing a one-year period of study at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California, he read Christian Smith’s How to Go from Being a Good Evangelical to a Committed Catholic in Ninety-Five Difficult Steps, and then he passed it on to me. When I finally finished it, I realized that I resonated with every single step. In fact, Smith had given words to inclinations that I never had words for regarding certain problematic aspects of Protestant doctrines or practices. Reading that book started a dialogue between me and Mike, and from that point on Mike would keep us moving forward with the question: Okay, what do we do with that?

I wasn’t reflective of it at the time, but looking back I realize that my marriage was the main vehicle bringing me into the Catholic Church. I was seeking truth and seeking God’s will, but I was less aware until after the fact that it was my marriage that was aligning me with God’s will for my life — making me holier. I was living sacramentally; I just didn’t know it yet — because evangelical Protestant denominations do not profess a sacramental theology or speak of marriage as a sacrament. Monsignor Charles Pope is the priest that celebrated our confirmation mass, bringing us into the Church and baptizing our boys. During our preparatory meetings with him he explained the seven sacraments of the church, of which marriage is one. Of course the Catholic Church recognizes (valid) Protestant marriages and baptisms. We didn’t get “re-married” or “re-baptized” when we entered the church. So my marriage always was a sacrament, and I always had the opportunity to receive the graces from that sacrament, but I was going along without conceiving of it that way.

Now, as a Catholic, my perspective of my marriage is so much richer; I understand the ways in which my marriage creates opportunities for God’s grace in my life. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states:

“This grace proper to the sacrament of Matrimony is intended to perfect the couple’s love and to strengthen their indissoluble unity. By this grace they ‘help one another to attain holiness in their married life and in welcoming and educating their children.’

“Christ is the source of this grace. ‘Just as of old God encountered his people with a covenant of love and fidelity, so our Savior, the spouse of the Church, now encounters Christian spouses through the sacrament of Matrimony.’ Christ dwells with them, gives them the strength to take up their crosses and so follow him, to rise again after they have fallen, to forgive one another, to bear one another’s burdens, to ‘be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ,’ and to love one another with supernatural, tender, and fruitful love.”¹

God is using my marriage to help me get ready for heaven, to prepare me for being in His presence. My marriage is not just some accessory of my life; it’s my vocation. My marriage does’t exist to make me happier (in terms of base-level happiness), but to make me holier. Many would rebuff at this statement; it goes against our society’s consumeristic and individualistic frameworks. One of the reasons that sacramental marriage in the Church is not the same as conceptions of marriage by the state is that they exist for different ends. The state emphasizes contractual language in the relationship; the Church emphasizes covenant language in the sacrament. Civil unions create partnerships and agreements based on one person fulfilling the needs and the expectations of the other, and–as with other contracts–when one end of the bargain is  not fulfilled the other is released from obligation, and the union can be dissolved. (Actually, it can be dissolved for no reason.)

The sacrament of marriage in the Catholic Church is indissoluble; it’s not a contract created by human law. It is the mystical union of two souls by God that creates a covenant relationship, the purpose of which extends far beyond my own personal wants and needs. The Catechism puts it powerfully:

“The purpose of the sacraments is to sanctify men, to build up the Body of Christ and, finally, to give worship to God. Because they are signs they also instruct. They not only presuppose faith, but by words and objects they also nourish, strengthen, and express it. That is why they are called ‘sacraments of faith.'”²

When in faith I come to the sacrament, it is my own faith that is strengthened and nourished. Moreover, not only does my marriage exist to sanctify me and my husband; it also edifies others within the church, and my faithfulness within my marriage is an act of worship to my God — the one who created me, redeemed me, and sanctifies me.

There is a great temptation — I have experienced it and fallen prey to it — for the married individual to look everywhere other than his or her spouse for a method of spiritual renewal. Perhaps there is a new book, perhaps more prayer, perhaps many things. Of course these all are worthy pursuits. Yet, God in his wisdom designed an avenue by which we can obtain holiness as married individuals — union with our spouses. My husband is the best mirror I have for revealing my sinful flaws and selfish inclinations. Quite honestly, if he wasn’t in my life — if I was running solo — there would be many flaws that I could easily ignore. There is a wonderful grace that God gives in the gift of a spouse, because your spouse doesn’t need to be perfect to help you reveal your flaws and the ways in which your faith needs to grow. Each in their own shortcomings husband and wife reveal the other’s deepest brokenness and provide opportunities for personal holiness, opportunities for blessing other believers, and (most importantly) opportunities for worshipping our great God.

¹ Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) 1641-1642

² CCC 1123

Conversion Memoir Entry #3: “Your experience doesn’t match up?”

church-door-open-letting-light-h-jerup-kirke-stevns-klint-denmark-40837897Lot’s of former Catholics-turned-Evangelicals are greatly surprised to hear my husband and I became Catholic — for one very understandable reason — their experiences in the Catholic Church did not mirror our own. I can tell, in some cases, that the reaction is based on confusion. They know us and our general confession of faith, and they know of their experience with Catholicism; in their minds the two don’t match up. One thing has become clear to me, as this same scenario has replayed itself over numerous times (both with non-practicing Catholics and Catholics who left the church for other Christian churches) — we did not have the same experience.

So the question arises, if we did not have the same experience, then which one of us encountered real Catholicism — that is, the expression of authentic Church teaching?

A recent experience I had while in the hospital after delivering our third son may serve as a good analogy. There was a little hair dryer installed on the wall of my hospital room bathroom. When I went to dry my hair, I found that there was just one setting when you turned on the dryer, and it was blowing cold air. I only used it for a few minutes, opting to leave my hair partially still wet, rather than continue to blow cold air on my head. I thought to myself, How stupid that a hospital would install hair dryers that blow cold air!

As it happened, I was back in the hospital with my baby two weeks later, because he had to be re-admitted for a 5-day cycle of IV antibiotics. We were able to get our own room with bathroom again. After using the shower, I stared at the little hair dryer on the wall. I thought, Do I want to dry my hair with cold air again? Maybe just a little. I turned it on, and to my surprise, the air was hot! It suddenly occurred to me that the first hair dryer was obviously broken, and this one was not. I felt pretty silly. I wondered why I would assume that the hospital would install hair dryers that blow cold air, rather than conclude that the first hairdryer was simply broken. I hadn’t even considered the possibility that the original dyer was not designed to blow cold air. I assumed, without questioning the nurse or checking another dryer, that the large manufacturer of items like this for hospitals all over the country intended for the hair dryers to blow cold air.

I’m sure you are thinking, Well, yes, it is kind of ridiculous that you made that assumption. (Keep in mind that I was experiencing postpartum lack of sleep and stress of a newborn in the NICU.) Why is this a helpful analogy for different experiences of Catholicism? Because, many (not all) non-practicing Catholics that I have encountered have responded to the Church in a similar way, based on their singular past religious experiences. Perhaps they grew up within a dying parish: where the language of the homilies was not Christ-centric, with a curmudgeon priest who lost his zeal for the priesthood (if he ever had it) long ago, with joyless fellow parishioners who lacked the warmth of Christ’s love. Or perhaps they had a particularly horrific experience, being close to a scandal of abuse within a church or school setting. Maybe the perpetrator was never disciplined and reported, seemingly protected by a bishop and others in leadership who cared more about hiding a scandal than protecting and aiding the victim.

There are numerous reasons that Catholics leave parishes — they range from trivial to serious. However, important questions that individuals must ask of their singular experiences are these: Is this the intended design of the Church? Is this experience representative of Catholic teaching and true Catholicism; or is this parish, this expression and experience of Catholicism, broken? To be honest, I have a hunch that many non-practicing Catholics have left the Church as a result of their experiences in it, without asking these questions. Why do I think that? Because they don’t know actual Catholic teaching. They haven’t sought it out. They have never read their Catechism outside of the brief exposure in CCD classes as a child. They have constructed an (inaccurate) opinion of the entire Catholic Church, based solely on their individual experiences, concluding: I can’t believe the Church teaches or supports _________.

Well, the answer (in a lot of cases) is, it doesn’t.

This doesn’t just happen in regard to Catholicism. Many people — in a variety of Christian backgrounds reject Christ or His church, based on faulty assumed generalizations of their own personal experiences. I know people who left dead Catholic parishes and started attending nondenominational churches because they never saw Jesus there. They had a real encounter with Christ for the first time elsewhere. I know former Evangelicals who grew up in Christian families, but they no longer attend church or really have the same convictions they previously held about the Christian faith. Both reactions are based on a rejection of an “experience” rather than a rejection of Orthodox faith or Catholicism. Some reject the experience they had with church or their parents’ faith, without considering whether their experience was constitutive of Orthodoxy in the first place. They were rejecting their perception of the faith, rather than the truth of the faith; and our perceptions can be false. For that reason, we should be critical about many of our initial perceptions. We should take the time to investigate our world outside of the immediate parameters of our singular experiences.

When my husband and I converted to Catholicism, I held no illusions regarding the marred image of the Church due to various scandals or inconsistent teaching and practice in some parishes. I was fully aware of the damage that had been done to the practice of the Catholic faith in many dioceses in previous decades (or centuries) — which faithful Catholic priests and lay men and women are working hard to reverse at present in many thriving American dioceses. (Ross Douthat, in Bad Religion, does a detailed job tracing the events and tendencies of the American religious horizon that led to the “beige Catholicism” of the 60s and 70s.)¹ But I was used to the same in my Protestant background. The same problems occur in all denominations of Christianity. All denominations have experienced scandal. My family’s experience in most churches or denominations that we were a part of (a lot during my childhood) involved one theological or practical stumbling block or another.

In fact, my husband and I were not looking for another church that gave us a “good experience.” We wanted to investigate the claims of the Catholic faith and find the truth. Was this the Church Christ established with Peter, against which “the gates of Hell will not prevail”?² When it came to my theological questions about problematic Protestant teachings and traditions, did the Catholic Church have better answers? I wasn’t searching for a fulfilling singular experience on Sunday morning; I was in search of a faith tradition that was true and timeless — one that was much bigger than my own experience within it.

What about you? Maybe you left the Catholic faith for another church, or altogether. Why did you leave? Maybe you grew up within another Christian denomination, but are no longer practicing — why? Did you leave because your church experience disappointed you or even damaged you somehow? Did you leave because your parents’ expression of faith or belief alienated you from Christianity? If so, can you say that you have asked the kinds of questions that take you away from your own singular experience and plunge you deep into an investigation of a greater truth?

I started my own investigation a few years ago, and it’s certainly ongoing. But my journey for truth led me to the doors of the Catholic Church, down the aisle of church history attended by the saints of the ages, to the altar of the blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist; and here I am home.

¹ Douthat, Ross. Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics. New York: Free   Press, 2012.

² Matthew 16:18

 

Conversion Memoir Entry #2: Reinventing the Wheel

“In general, throughout the work, what is new is not good; and what is good is not new.” – Rev. Martin Sherlock, comments on reviewing a collection of letters (1781)

There is this constant obsession within certain clusters of the Evangelical tradition to re-invent the wheel when it comes to the style and format of church. Perhaps this perpetual motion stems from the Protestant mantra “reformed and always reforming,” though the historical context for that phrase has more to do with the integrity of Christian doctrine and theology. As both a church attendee and a leader in various ministry roles throughout my teen and adult life, the idea that the Church should constantly be reinventing herself is one I heard expressed frequently, though in sometimes subtle ways.

Every Sunday or Wednesday night “production” had to be better than the week before. Every semon had to leave an impression of the speaker, and every worship segment had to dazzle and move the audience to new emotional highs. This was my experience of Church – little aesthetic or ritual permanance, a lack of “sacred” spaces or activities, and almost nothing that couldn’t be overhauled and done differently the next week. Quite frankly, by my mid to late 20s I was exhausted by the never-ending expedition for a fresh expression of church.

Nowhere is this phenomenon more evident than in the American Evangelical church planting movement of recent decades. Every protestant church planter that I have encountered has one thing in common with the others: they are sincerely seeking the best expression of “church” that could exist. They may start at different vantage points or by asking different questions. Some might be seeking the thing that they believe their current expression of church is missing; others may be trying to bring in seekers, attempting to identify the fundamental quality that will make the non-churched want to belong to a church community. I remember being part of those conversations, earnestly asking questions about how to repair broken church models. However, some solutions (good ones) that various leaders came up with were often accompanied by a statement or implication that caused me pause: “This is the way the Church was really meant to be.”

During my time questioning many of the practices and beliefs within the Evangelical tradition, it seemed to me that the current church-planting movement in America was opperating on one or both of the following assumptions: (1) that orthodox Christianity has essentially gotten it wrong for 2000 years; and (2) that what may have worked during certain periods of history is now in need of an overhaul or an “update.” Honestly, neither of these assumptions ever really sat well with me, but I had no logical basis for them not sitting well.

After all, I grew up within the Evangelical tradition generally, and no one denomination in particular. Every church that I had ever attended represented a split-off of a split-off of a split-off. The very nature of the Evangelical movement involved a diversity of expressions of church and denominations of Christianity, within the parameters of a Fundamentalist or Evangelical confession of faith. So the idea of continually trying “new” things was not foreign to the overall tradition in which I was raised. That tradition lacked a significant amount of history, and as a result, I grew to realize that I completely lacked a historical understanding of orthodoxy. I was largely ignorant of the centuries of church history that built the tenets of Christian faith that I (and other Evangelicals) took for granted in present day American Christian cultures.

As I became more aware of my lack of historically comprehending my faith, I was forced to identify a troubling aspect of the books that I was reading on Christianity – the books that most young evangelicals and post-evangelicals were reading; they lacked a historical comprehension of the faith as well. These books were mostly really new and theologically and intellectually “light.” Rob Bell, Erwin McMannis, Don Miller, and Brian McLaren were having an impact on my generation. They were saying things that resonnated with young adults – making them think about their faith in ways that they never had before. However, (like Sherlock’s quote above) the problem I came to identify was that some of the good things that they were saying were in no way new (they were centuries old), and some of the new things that they were proposing were not really all that good.

For example, Rob Bell scandalized many theologically conservative Protestants with his 2011 publication of Love Wins: A Book about Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived. In that book he posed many questions about how we know who will be in heaven or hell, who gets “saved” or not, whether or not everyone makes it to heaven, etc. Essentially, anyone who tracks with John Piper or holds to the doctrine of Predestination (and certainly the idea that some are Predestined for hell) would write-off Bell just a few pages into the book.

However, for many young evangelicals (and not so young ones), these were questions they had themselves wrestled with privately, having been given only simplistic pastoral explanations of how salvation functioned in Christianity. Many people had asked similar questions: Will my relatives who never set foot in church but were the kindest people I had ever met not be in heaven with me? What about those people in the world who have never heard of Jesus? Does the murdering rapist who on his deathbed makes a confession of faith in Jesus end up in heaven too?

These are good questions! They are natural questions, and many Evangelicals I knew were so intrigued to hear a Christian pastor/author bluntly asking them. However, they are not in anyway new questions, and Rob Bell’s ideas on the subject are by no means original and not terribly developed. Theological discussions about heaven, hell, the existance of both, and how people end up in either place date back centuries. There is a rich body of theological discussion and doctrine on these topics, thanks to centuries of Catholic and Orthodox thought and Church councils. However, somehow Bell managed to write a whole book about these issues without referencing much of the vast theological dicussions or many of the significant theologians that contributed to them.

There seemed to be two different, yet common, responses to Bell’s book. There were those who called him a heretic and lamented his decent from orthodoxy, and then there were those who thought Bell had unearthed new theological ground. Both responses from various Protestant and Evangelical groups shared one thing in common – a Christian paradigm that lacked a solid historical framework for the development of orthodox thought.

I also operated according to such a paradigm most of my Christian life, and since my realization of this deficit in my faith perspective I have come a long way. But I often think that I’m making up for lost time as a new Catholic. There is so much richness to be discovered – so much beautiful history of the development and preservation of Church doctrine that I often find myself regretting the years I spent ignorant of it. Yet, at the same time, the more I uncover at this point in my life the more precious it is to me. It’s a grace.

While my experience in the various Evangelical circles in which I was raised revealled a startling lack of historical perspective, that certainly does not mean that I think all Protestant groups or individuals lack a historical knowledge of the development and preservation of Christian doctrine, as I did. Moreover, those Protestant groups and individuals that have a richer historical framwork seem much less prone to constantly overhaulling the style and format of “church.”

My personal inquiry into Church history led me to become Catholic; but there are many Protestant friends I have with a strong understanding of Church history who have not come to the same theological conclusions. I am, and always will be, an ecumenical Christian who embraces and strives for Protestant-Catholic dialogue. My hope is that, through continued dialogue, others—Protestants and Catholics alike—will seek to deepen the historical framework for their Christian faith. In doing so, they may discover—as I did—some very good aspects of the Christian tradition that are not new at all; and in turn, they may abandon novel pursuits that are revealled to lack sufficient good.

____________________________

References:

Bell, Rob. Love Wins: A Book about Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived. New York: HarperCollins, 2011.

Sherlock, Rev. Martin. Letters on Several Subjects. Vol. 2, Letter XIV, pp. 128 -129. London: J. Nichols, T. Cadell, P. Elmsly, H. Payne and N. Conant, 1781.