|
The Catholic Undertow Mary Ann Collins, A Former Catholic Nun |
|
Appendix B Our Families Some former Catholics are under emotional pressure to return to the Catholic Church, because they don’t want to hurt their family members. In addition, the Pope is called “Holy Father,” and the Catholic Church is called “Holy Mother Church.” As a result, people may feel as if they are betraying their father and their mother if they leave the Catholic Church. Whether the pressure comes from your natural family, or from “Holy Mother Church,” Jesus addressed these issues when He said:
Some former Catholics have had to face control, manipulation, intimidation, rejection, and false accusations. If you are going through something like this, then remember that God is faithful, and His grace really is sufficient. He will get you through it. In addition, the experience will give you a new appreciation for the rejection and misunderstanding that Jesus endured for our sakes. He left the love and appreciation of Heaven, to come here to earth and be falsely accused, misunderstood, rejected, and mocked, in order to save us. The Apostle Paul said:
You are sharing in the fellowship of Christ’s sufferings. This will give you greater love for Him, and more gratitude for what He has done for you. It will enable you to know His heart in a new way. It will also qualify you to receive the blessing of one of the Beatitudes. Jesus said:
The process of qualifying for that blessing is no fun at all. But if we see the eternal perspective, then we will be able to endure it, and to trust God while we are going through it. The Apostle Peter said:
Try to find an understanding friend or prayer partner to stand with you, as you go through this. You can pray together. Your friend or prayer partner can help you keep a Biblical perspective when you are under emotional pressure. If your family is pressuring you to come back to the Catholic Church, then this is probably not a good time to try to share your new-found, Biblical faith with them. SHARING OUR NEW FAITH How do we share Jesus with family members who don’t know Him? We long to have them know Him and love Him. We have found a treasure that is so beautiful, so wonderful, so priceless, that we want to share it. What can we do about it? The first thing to do is to pray for them. The Bible says:
We can pray for God to remove the blinders and open their eyes, and enable them to desire and understand the truth. Jesus told a parable about a man who sowed seed into four kinds of soil. (Matthew 13:3-23; Mark 4:2-20; Luke 8:5-15) The first soil mentioned in the parable was so hard that the seed couldn’t get into it. It just stayed on top of the ground, until the birds ate it up. It doesn’t do any good to throw good seed (truth about Jesus) onto hard soil that can’t receive it. So pray for God to make your family members hungry for Him and receptive to the truth. You may want to do a lot of praying, before you start sharing with them. Before you talk to them about God, spend time talking to God about them. When you are walking on a path, there are two ways of getting off it. You can go too far to the right, or too far to the left. Similarly, when it comes to sharing the Good News about Jesus, we can make two mistakes. One is to be afraid of speaking about our faith. The other is to talk about it in a way that turns people off, instead of helping them come closer to Christ. If you are hesitant to share your new faith with your family, the cause is not necessarily fear. It may be a matter of timing. Perhaps they aren’t ready to hear about it yet. Or perhaps you need to become more solidly grounded in your faith before you share it with your family. It’s one thing to share your faith with a stranger in a shopping mall. It’s quite another thing to share it with your own family. Sharing your new faith with family members can result in rejection and other forms of emotional pressure. You need to be solidly grounded in your faith first. And you should have a support system--fellow Christians who will pray for you and give you wise counsel, practical advice, and moral support. Remember that there is much more involved than intellectual understanding of doctrines. We are dealing with living people, not with intellectual abstracts. This is ministry, not a debating club. You can win an argument and lose a relationship. Jesus told us to speak the truth in love. There is more involved than an accurate explanation of doctrinal issues. We need to show love and respect for the people we are talking to. And we need to avoid saying, or doing, anything that might make people feel that we are nagging them, or pressuring them. Jesus left people free to make their own decisions. When the rich young man turned away from Him, Jesus looked on him with love, but he let him go. He did not try to pressure him or manipulate him. (Mark 10:17-22) We need to follow Jesus’ example. If our friends and family members decide to leave the Catholic Church, it should be based on their convictions--not ours. Jesus said: “...ye shall be witnesses unto me...” (Acts 1:8) “Be” refers to what we are. What we demonstrate in our lives is more important than what we say. Talk is cheap. It’s no good talking about the Good News, if we are living like bad news. People will be watching us to see if we have the fruit of the Spirit--“love, joy, peace, longsuffering [patience], gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.” (Galatians 5:22-23) Our lives should demonstrate God’s love. Remember that we are dealing with people, not just issues. Having people be open to the Gospel is impacted by the kind of relationship that we have with them. We need to show love for them. We can look for opportunities to show them love, consideration, and understanding When we do speak with our family members and friends, we can ask God to show us what to say and how to say it--and how much to say. In our zeal, it is easy to overload people with more than they can handle at one time. There are two prayers from the Psalms that I find helpful:
A “watch” is a watchman, a soldier on guard duty. In this prayer, David asks God to be a sentry on guard duty, a sentry who will not allow the wrong words to come out of David’s mouth. We can ask God to do the same thing for us. This is an area where balance is needed. It is good to pray for God’s guidance and protection when sharing our faith, but we should not allow ourselves to be hampered by fear of making mistakes. God promised to make everything work out for good for those who love Him. (Romans 8:28). That includes our mistakes. If we love God, then our mistakes will work out for our good. If the people we are talking to love God, then God can make our mistakes work out for their good. So we can be spontaneous and natural when sharing our faith. We can trust God to reach people, in spite of our failings. We need to be careful not to develop false expectations, because they can lead to discouragement or confusion. It took many years for me to realize that some foundational teachings of Catholicism were unscriptural. For me, the light came on slowly and gradually, over a long period of time. In contrast, I have a friend who came to salvation within a few hours. Some Christians came to his door and shared the Gospel with him. He left Catholicism, became a born-again Christian, and never looked back. For him, it was a very quick process, almost instantaneous. Don’t assume that it will be slow and difficult (as it was for me), or that it will be quick and easy (as it was for my friend). Just love the people and pray for them, and ask God to guide you. Be grateful for any progress that you see, even if it seems to be small. It would be good to give them the Jesus video. This will help increase their love for Jesus and their desire to know Him better. The Jesus video is widely known for its excellence. It has been translated into over 700 languages. You can order it from the Jesus Film Project. Their phone number is 949-361-7575. They also have a website. The video ends with a salvation message and a prayer. Personally, I would tell people about that, to give them the option of deciding whether or not to watch that part of the video. You don’t want them to feel that you tried to sneak something up on them. Encourage them to read the Bible and get to know Jesus better. (Encourage them gently. Don’t nag them. In our zeal, we can become pushy without realizing it.) If you feel that they are ready to learn that there are some problems with Catholicism, I recommend getting the video Catholicism: Crisis of Faith. Watch it yourself several times and get to know it. Pray for them to be receptive. Then offer to watch it with them. If you can afford it, you may want to give copies of the video to family members. This video deals with unscriptural doctrines and practices in a gentle, respectful way. It reaches people on many levels--not just intellectually. You can order it by phone from D&K Press (800-777-8839). You can also buy it online at their website: Where do we go from here? Pray. Love them. Ask God to guide us. Share about how much Jesus means to us. There are no cookbook formulas or magic fixes. We have to depend on God every step of the way. A helpful website is Just For Catholics. It has a series of short, simple articles that explain salvation in ways that are especially appropriate for Catholics. These articles are available in several languages. It also has a Questions and Answers section, with about 150 short articles. You can refer your Catholic family members to this website, or you can print the articles for them. I have a book that is appropriate for Catholic family members and friends. It is called Another Side of Catholicism. You can read it online or buy it at Amazon.com. You can refer people to the website. We need to share our faith with the people we love, but at the same time we need to remember that we are not responsible for their salvation. We should do the best that we can, but if they fail to respond, we should not allow ourselves to become discouraged or depressed because of it. Ultimately, it is between them and God. God doesn’t have any grandchildren. Every man and woman has to decide whether or not to become a child of God. We can’t do it for them. But we can pray. And we can be encouraged, because God loves them more than we do. |
Copyright 2004, 2007 by Mary Ann Collins. All rights reserved.
www.CatholicUndertow.Com
|