by
Jennifer Fulwiler
Originally posted at: http://www.ncregister.com/blog/jennifer-fulwiler/5-questions-before-you-leave-the-catholic-church
Author Anna Quindlen has been in
the news lately, promoting a new book called Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake.
She recently spoke with NPR's
Terry Gross about a wide range of topics she covers in the book,
including her recent decision to leave the Catholic Church. She summarized this
decision by telling Gross:
The pedophilia
scandals, the church's reaction to them, and their constant obsession with
gynecology -- taken together at a certain point, it was probably two or three
years ago, I said, 'Enough.' Every time I sit in the pew I ratify this
behavior, and I'm not going to ratify it anymore.
I'm sure that
Quindlen's words resonated with many. She's a gifted writer, and has
undoubtedly put words to what others have thought when they make the decision
to leave the Catholic Church. Like Quindlen, many people who abandon their
Catholic faith still believe in God and still strive to be good, moral people;
they choose to leave because they think that they will find these things they
desire -- God, freedom, equality -- outside the walls of the Church. Such a
move certainly fits in with popular cultural beliefs. Common wisdom states that
the Catholic Church is a corrupt organization that places oppressive,
unnecessary rules on its members. The way to find freedom, the thinking goes,
is to ditch the institution and create a spirituality and moral code that works
for you.
To modern ears, this
all sounds right. But is it true?
As someone whose faith
journey has gone in the opposite direction, I would encourage Quindlen, as well
anyone else who has followed her path or is thinking of following it, to
consider the following five questions before abandoning the Catholic faith:
1. Are
you sure members of the Church hierarchy are worse than anyone else?
When people cite the pedophilia
scandals as a key reason for abandoning the Church, I worry that they're
setting themselves up for deep disappointment. The fact that priests abused
children is an idea so horrific that one can hardly bear to think about it, and
the fact that some bishops didn't take action to stop it is almost worse. But
the chilling fact -- perhaps so chilling that we don't can't accept it -- is
that this is not a problem with Catholic priests and bishops; it's a problem
with human nature. A priest is no more likely to abuse a child than a male
schoolteacher, and a bishop is no more likely to
cover it up than a school administrator.
The problems may have
seemed worse within the Church because it is a single, worldwide organization,
so it's easy to link all the bad occurrences under one umbrella. But if, for
example, all the nondenominational churches on the earth were part of a
cohesive worldwide system, you would almost certainly see the same issues at
the same rates. Instead of each instance being lost in the anonymity of
disconnected communities, when they were all considered together it would seem
epidemic.
Other organizations are no more
safe for children than the Church -- in fact, based on personal
experience, I believe they are now less safe. Thanks to the
pervasive stereotypes about Catholicism, people are lured into a false sense of
security when dealing with other organizations, and end up adopting the
dangerous mentality that "it couldn't happen here."
2. Are you sure your faith life
would be better outside of the Church?
Keep in mind that leaving the
Catholic Church means leaving the sacraments -- sacraments with real power,
which are not available outside of the Church that Jesus founded. If it brings
you joy to commune with Jesus spiritually, how much better is it to commune
with him physically as well? And how lucky are we to have the sacrament of confession,
where you can unload all your burdens, hear the words
"you are forgiven," and receive special grace to help you
to be the morally upright person you strive to be?
Now, those who are considering
leaving the Church may struggle with believing in the supernatural power of the
sacraments (in which case I'd recommend checking out these resources). But even if that's
the case, within the two-thousand-year-old Church is an unfathomable treasure
chest of spiritual wisdom. We have the Rosary as well as all the other
time-tested prayers of the Church. Then there are the lives of the saints,
countless stories that offer an inexhaustible supply of information and
inspiration about how to have a rich spiritual life. And of course we have a
worldwide network of monasteries and convents, and all the great religious
orders. I suppose it's possible to utilize some of these spiritual resources
without being a practicing Catholic, but if you believe that they're good and
helpful, why sever them from the source of their wisdom?
3. Are you sure the Church's
teachings are wrong?
There is a pervasive
sense in modern culture that whatever spiritual tradition places the fewest
moral restrictions on its adherents is most likely to be right. This idea might
feel good since it appeals to our natural desire for autonomy, and certainly it
is accepted as an immutable fact by modern society. And so if a person follows
the path of least resistance carved out by our culture, it would be easy to
drift away from all these "oppressive" teachings of the Church,
without ever pausing to ask:
But are they true?
Let's take just one example: The
Church's crazy-unpopular prohibition against contraception. The Church says
that it's neither good for individuals nor for society for couples to use
artificial birth control. It's understandable that someone's first reaction
upon hearing that would be to reject this wildly counter-cultural teaching. I
know that when I first heard it, I thought it was one of the most backwards,
bizarre ideas I'd ever heard. But when I took a closer look, I was shocked by
the wisdom behind this thinking: I realized that contraception doesn't solve the
problems its proponents claim it will solve. I discovered that it makes women lose
control over their bodies. I thought of the women I've known who
have had abortions, and realized that almost every single one of them were
using contraception when they conceived. They had been told that it would be
just fine to engage in the act that creates babies, even if they were sure they
couldn't have a baby. Then, when they saw the two lines on the pregnancy tests,
they felt trapped and scared,
believing that they had no choices outside of the walls of the local abortion
facility.
Living without artificial
contraception has its challenges,
but it's the only system that gives women real freedom. As with so many other
Catholic teachings that seemed crazy at first glance, once I took the time to
understand the details of this view, I saw that there was a wealth of wisdom
behind it beyond anything I could have imagined. It had seemed crazy simply
because our culture has it so wrong, and the Church is the last institution
left that's willing to proclaim what's right.
4. Are
you sure the Church's doctrines aren't divinely inspired?
In my own conversion to
Catholicism I faced serious challenges, including the fact that I was diagnosed
with a Deep Vein Thrombosis (blood clot in a major vein) which was caused by a
genetic clotting disorder that's exacerbated by pregnancy. My doctors told me I
absolutely had to use contraception. It threw me into a crisis where I had to
discern how serious I was about this religion, and how much I was really
willing to risk to follow it.
Thanks to some wise advice,
I realized that the situation was really quite simple: Is this Church guided by
God in its teachings or not? If it's not, then there's no reason to listen
to anything it says; if it is, then to say that I knew better than the Church
was to say that I knew better than God.
When I looked at the
unfathomable body of wisdom contained in this organization, considered that it
has stood strong while empire after empire has fallen away around it, and saw
that it has been unwavering in its core doctrines despite the imperfections of
its hierarchy, I simply didn't think that humans could pull this off on their
own. Then, when I began to transform my life according to these teachings, I
was completely convinced. Following the "rules" of the Church brought
an explosion of grace and peace and love into my life, and into my family's
lives as well. I became convinced that these teachings are not human-made, but
come from Someone who knows us better than we know ourselves.
5. Are
you sure we don't need the Church?
At the end of the NPR
interview, Quindlen says, "I've never really gotten past that quote from
Anne Frank in her diary, where she says that people are really good at
heart." I too have always been touched by that quote, and I think it's
worth putting some serious thought into. Because if it's true that people are
ultimately good at heart...then that means that the staff who worked at
Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen, lining up children in front of the gas chambers,
overseeing Anne Frank and her family in slave labor, were good at heart too.
How on earth, then, could normal, good people participate in something so evil?
The answer is
chillingly simple: Through the power of human rationalization.
To look at the smiling faces of
the employees in these pictures of
an on-site staff retreat at Auschwitz is to understand that they had
all rationalized their behavior. Nobody ever wakes up and says, "I'm going
to do something evil today!", not even the staffers at Auschwitz.
The only way evil ever works through us is when we convince ourselves that what
we're doing is actually good. The most dangerous force in the world is the
human capacity for rationalization.
I think that some folks
reject the concept of the Church's divinely-inspired moral code because they
don't see why it would even be necessary. Why would God even care to institute
something like that? Why can't each person just get in touch with the spiritual
realm and find what's good and true for him- or herself? The answer to that
question can be found in the smiles on the Auschwitz's
employees faces.
Though the individual
members of the Catholic Church have made plenty of mistakes, sometimes gravely
serious ones, its doctrines have always been a bulwark that protects human
life. To a healthy American adult this may seem like an insignificant concept,
since the only life that is devalued in our time and place is that of the
severely disabled, the unborn, and others who literally do not have a voice.
But that could change. The zeitgeist could shift, just as it did in Europe in the 1930s, and new groups of people may
suddenly be seen as inconvenient and expendable. And one day the life that the
Catholic Church stands up for may be your own.
Acknowledgment:
Jennifer Fulwiler is a writer from Austin, Texas
who converted to Catholicism after a life of atheism. She's a columnist for Envoy
magazine, a regular guest on the Relevant Radio and EWTN Radio networks, and a
contributor to the books The Church and New Media and Atheist to Catholic: 11 Stories of Conversion.
She's also writing a book based on her personal blog, ConversionDiary.com. She and her husband
have five young children. You can follow her on Twitter at @conversiondiary.
This attitude of hers it is really surprising. If the Church is this grave state is due to its hierarchy and because, is the legacy of the late Pope JPII. In part, he was responsible for all these assaults against the Church of Christ. However, it is clear to me that this is the Church of Christ for one reason only because all the powers of evil are working overtime to destroy it. As I said above, she is using wrong and false premise to live the Church. She must rejoice for she knows that these horrible things must come to pass in order for the Church as His founder, be rise from the tomb by the glory of Christ. Pray for her return
ReplyDeleteI liked this much! Many Filipinos were easily persuaded by other sects.. and I think the primary reason is their lack of Education about their faith.,. they don't exert much effort to study what their faith is all about.. so when some people of other beliefs turn to them with persuading words of lies, they then turn to it and claim to have know the truth at last..
ReplyDeletemy analogy about this is "the flash light and the spotlight"... The flashlight is the other sects and the spotlight is the catholic faith. someone who has not studied his Catholic Faith carefully is like someone possessing an unlit spotlight. When you show to this person a lit flashlight, he will claim that the flashlight is the best for it gives light.. but he never knew that the spotlight he has been holding is better than the flashlight that was show to him which he claims as best...
hehe.. just a simple reflection.. ^^
well said
ReplyDeleteGod bless Hark
THANK YOU FOR THIS INFO. HEHEHE. WHEN I WAS STUDYING IN NEW ERA, AND INVITED TO THEIR "DOKTRINA" I THOUGHT THAT THE DOCTRINES OF THE CATHOLICS ARE WRONG. THANKS TO FATHER ABE ARGANIOSA AND TO ALL APOLOGETIC BLOGS.
ReplyDelete