Why I am never leaving the Catholic Church.

am Catholic because Catholi­cism is true. It is not a lit­tle true. It is not some truth mixed with error; if I want­ed that, I would still be Protes­tant. I am Catholic because the Catholic Church is the only place you will find the full­ness of Truth. It is for Truth that I became a Catholic, and it is for Truth that I will die a Catholic.

•••

At the start of my con­ver­sion, I did what, as far as I was con­cerned, was the only log­i­cal thing to do for some­one who thought that God might be say­ing to him: “Become a Catholic”: I made a list of every­thing that I thought was Not True about the Church. I list­ed every teach­ing I dis­agreed with. And then I set to work. I began to lis­ten to the real argu­ments for those teach­ings, and the real argu­ments against them. I weighed every­thing I was unsure of in the bal­ance.

And what I found was that, one by one, I crossed items off the list.

I was not about to become Catholic because of some feel­ing. I was not about to become Catholic because I was escap­ing some­thing. I would become Catholic only if I was con­vinced that it was true in all that it taught. That was the only thing that mat­tered, for me: Is this true?

I almost got there that way. There came a point when I had solved most, but not all, of my dif­fi­cul­ties with what the Church taught. I was still not con­vinced about con­tra­cep­tion. I was still not con­vinced about Mary. I was still not con­vinced about the rejec­tion of sola scrip­tura.

But one thing I had solved was the author­i­ty of the Church to teach these things. I knew that the Holy Spir­it pro­tects the Church from ever teach­ing error. And so I said to myself: Well, if the Catholic Church can not teach any doc­trine that is false, then any remain­ing prob­lems that I have are my own error, and not the Church’s.

That was a key moment for me: the real­iza­tion that I am not the arbiter of Truth. The Church is, guid­ed by the Holy Spir­it. I am not the Church’s teacher; the Church is my teacher.

That is why I am Catholic, and will always be Catholic. If I go any­where else, I will be left to my own wits. And I can’t make it by my own wits. If there is any­thing I have learned in 46 years, it is that I can’t make it by my own wits.

 

C.S. Lewis says it too, in Mere Chris­tian­i­ty: “And above all, you must be ask­ing which door is the true one; not which pleas­es you best by its paint and pan­elling. In plain lan­guage, the ques­tion should nev­er be: ‘Do I like that kind of ser­vice’ but ‘Are these doc­trines true: Is there holi­ness here? Does my con­science move me towards this?’ ”

Peter Kreeft, com­ment­ing on Lewis, has this to say:

Now, that sounds very sim­ple. But it’s the essen­tial ques­tion to ask in mak­ing any hon­est choice. There’s only one rea­son to hon­est­ly believe any­thing: because it’s true. If you think dif­fer­ent­ly than that, let’s get that set­tled before we do any­thing else.

Their rea­sons are my rea­sons.

•••

Peo­ple stop being Catholic for all kinds of rea­sons. Some peo­ple leave the Church because a priest said some­thing mean to them, or treat­ed them in a shab­by and unwel­com­ing way.

Some peo­ple even leave the Church because the art isn’t good any­more.

I’m sor­ry, but that’s just non­sense to me. You know what: I wish no priest ever said a mean thing, ever. I wish every Catholic artist were Michelan­ge­lo and every Catholic parish looked like the Cathe­dral of Chartres. But what do you expect to find when you leave the Church? Is there some reli­gion out there where the cler­gy are all saints and none of the build­ings are ugly? Please. If you’re leav­ing the Church because of that, you’ll find it’s all the same on the out­side.

But what you will find dif­fer­ent, out­side the Church, is that there is a whole lot of error and a lot less truth. That’s the one thing I guar­an­tee you will find dif­fer­ent out­side the Church.

Leave if you wish, but I’m not leav­ing with you.

•••

When I became Catholic, I walked on air for a year.

And then God took that away from me.

The years since I have become Catholic have been among the worst of my life. I have lost four dif­fer­ent jobs. I have been suf­fer­ing from a depres­sion I can not see the end of as far as I look. I go to Mass, I go to Ado­ra­tion, and every­thing is dry bones.

I wish I could say oth­er­wise, but I must tell the truth about this. The Catholic Church does not promise that every­thing will be easy. It promis­es, instead, a Cross. Fr. George Schom­mer, who preached the clos­ing homi­ly for my RCIA class the year I became Catholic, said it: “You will be test­ed.”

And yet, I have nev­er once been tempt­ed to go and leave. I have nev­er once said, “You know what, I was hap­pi­er when I was a Pres­by­ter­ian, let me go back there.” As though I was hap­py then because I was a Pres­by­ter­ian, or as though the Chris­t­ian life is about our hap­pi­ness, or our feel­ings.

No. It is about Truth. It is about only Truth, for Christ is Truth, and in Him is our sal­va­tion.

This is impor­tant. If every­thing were about our feel­ings, then none of us would stay. Fr. Grumpy says some­thing mean in con­fes­sion, or the Cathe­dral Parish of Sil­ly Art grates our aes­thet­ic sen­si­bil­i­ty, and we’re off—where? To a lie? To our own wits?

No. Here I am, and with God’s grace here I stay, no mat­ter whether the cross will be eased or pushed down heav­ier on my shoul­der. I gave up every­thing I ever knew to fol­low Truth, and Truth alone, and I’m not turn­ing my back on it. Not ever.