There are two large parishes in beautiful churches up in the farm country of Michigan. Several of their people have left to become Baptists and other “flavors” of Protestantism. They all joined Protestant Bible studies or had a religious experience that convinced them the Catholic Church was wrong. Then they began attempting to pull others out of the church.

Several years ago we had a meeting. The priests had received a letter from a gentleman named Dean (and I sincerely mean “gentleman” since he was polite and a pleasure to talk with) demanding answers to a series of questions directed against them. He was convinced that Catholic teaching and practice were wrong and unbiblical and it seemed he convinced a number of people to follow him.

I was invited to come out last evening to answer their questions — or rather — their charges and criticisms. There were about eight Catholics and about twenty Protestants—mostly Fundamentalists—one even referring to the ridiculous and thoroughly discredited “Trail of Blood” as his source and authority for understanding Church history.

As a whole, they were a nice group of people but it did not take long to realize that their claim to be “Bible-only” Christians was sincere but very incorrect. They thought they followed the Bible alone but in reality, they were steeped in traditions and teachings of Fundamentalism which does not allow them to read the Bible objectively. Fundamentalist tradition is like a pair of glasses through which everything is understood and colored — including the Bible.

It happens with other groups too. If an uncatechized Catholic agrees to listen to the Jehovah’s Witnesses and go to their meetings and Bible studies, pretty soon the Catholic begins to see clearly the JW’s doctrines in the Bible: “Oh, you are right! Jesus is not God; there is no trinity; there is no hell!” And it makes perfect sense to them. With their new “Jehovah’s Witness glasses” on they see it all very clearly now.

Fundamentalists are no different. They invite unsuspecting Catholics to their Bible studies and out to lunch and before long the under-catechized Catholic trades his Catholic glasses for a pair of Fundamentalist glasses and begins to say, “Oh, I see! The Bible does not teach sacraments; the word pope is not in here, etc. etc. . . . “ It amazes me that they can’t see what is happening to them. they have not read the Bible objectively first — no, no! They have swallowed the new tradition hook, line and sinker and now they read the Bible through the glasses or lense of their new tradition — a recently invented one too, by the way.

And the more they hate the Catholic Church — the more vocal they are about it — the more loved and accepted they are in their new anti-Catholic community.

Anyway, I think the Protestants originally expected to “expose the errors of Catholicism” and vindicate their leaving the Church. They expected to wash over us like a tidal wave, but that is not what happened. The Catholic position dominated the evening and I even felt a little sorry and embarrassed for them in the end. The tidal wave went differently than they expected.

We tried to be kind and charitable throughout the evening and I think we were very successful. Most of them were also charitable, but there was some visible anger and frustration in a few.

They were a typical Fundamentalist bunch. They rattled off the same old misconceptions about Church teaching, misquoted the Bible over and over again, and had no systematic theology or training other then their immersion in Fundamentalist tradition. Virtually all of them were “ex-Catholics” who didn’t know their Catholic faith to begin with. They were easy prey for the Protestant evangelists. Their ignorance of Scripture and Catholicism was very obvious from the comments and questions fielded last night…

For the whole article about this exciting evening, click here.

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