It’s been about five weeks since I was welcomed back into the Catholic Church. Some people were happy for me. Others were disappointed, as they saw me as someone with unwavering Protestant convictions. I still hold to many such convictions. I have just added a few Catholic convictions to my minimalist set of beliefs.
The Catholic Church is not a perfect fit for me, but I decided to join it in large part believing this to be the best path forward for my family: my wife is a former Catholic. My son goes to a Catholic school. And so forth. Were I a single man, I would probably have become Eastern Orthodox instead. This would be a much better fit for me.
If it weren’t for Richard Rohr and other contemplative Catholics, I don’t think I would have ever even considered returning. I am still happy I decided to join the Catholic Church, but I am not now nor do I ever expect to become a Catholic who is zealous for the Papacy, devotion to Mary and the Saints, the Rosary, and so forth. I have been so deeply formed by Reformed Theology (think Karl Barth, Thomas F. Torrance, and Jurgen Moltmann) that I cannot ever come to accept many Catholic teachings and practices. I see many Catholic teachings and practices as theologically permissible, historically supportable, but not necessarily essential to the gospel of Jesus Christ, the core of Christian Faith.
When I think about my faith I think mostly in terms of theological labels, rather than ecclesiastical ones. I consider myself a Christian first, a Universalist second, and a Catholic thirdly and almost exclusively in the sense that I belong to and am an active member of a local Catholic parish.
When you become a Universalist, a lot of things that used to be of extreme importance are relegated to being of relative importance. Being a Christian is of extreme importance to me. Being Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, Evangelical, or Pentecostal is always a secondary matter for me.
The two great theological questions that I have wrestled with for decades at this point are:
1. Will God save all without exception?
2. Is God’s grace completely free and unconditional??
I answer both in the affirmative, knowing full well that a lot of the tradition, a lot of the Bible, and most of the churches deny both. But in my view you cannot truly have a good news gospel without affirming both. The questions just raised above are of utmost importance to me. They define the core of my faith, and religious practice. I am not interested in old, worn out debates between Protestants and Catholics. Both are right in many respects. Both are wrong in many respects. What I aim to do is to synthesize the two in my own life and move forward, now as member of the Catholic Church, later perhaps once again as a member of a Protestant Church. Who knows? I’m no one of any ecclesial significance. I am not ordained. I am not a scholar. Nor am I even a deacon anywhere!
At the moment all I am really doing is to heed the advice from the Apostle Paul:
Now about your love for one another we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other. And in fact, you do love all of God’s family throughout Macedonia. Yet we urge you, brothers and sisters, to do so more and more, and to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.
–1 Thessalonians 4:9-12