Several of you kids have told me, at one time or another “Mom, you should write a book.” Having friends who are authors and seeing the immense amount of work that goes into such an undertaking…no way. Lol But with all the hospitalizations the past couple years, I did start feeling like I should write some things down, and that “feeling” grew into an unmistakable, persistent nudge, which I recognize from a whole life of listening for it.
I see too many people leaving our beautiful faith because they never fully understood it. There are so many distractions in this world– a game to go to! A movie to watch! Friends to see! With all these distractions, you aren’t necessarily taking to heart what your Momma is trying to teach you about faith. You think “yeah yeah, I’ll get to that later.” When you are young, eternity seems very far away. I don’t think you fully understand yet that this world, everything we see around us, is not what we were made for.
When you become adults, especially when you are raising kids of your own, faith becomes more important to you. By this time, you’ll have forgotten a lot of what I taught you. When you can’t remember “WHY am I doing this?” it leaves a gap for someone else to come along beside you and fill that gap with misinformation.
For now, y’all come to me as a resource when your friends question you and you aren’t sure how to answer. I hope this blog will serve as a reference for how to find those answers when you can’t text Mom.
As you may recall me telling you, I was baptized in a Baptist church when I was 8 years old. When I became serious about my faith as a young adult, when I began studying the Bible and saw it didn’t quite line up with what I had been taught as a Baptist, I began attending non-denominational evangelical churches. But it seemed as though none of the denominations had it quite right.
I was very excited to finally find the fullness of the faith in the Church that Jesus founded. I felt as though my faith had gone from 2D black and white to 3D color. I wanted to share it with the world!
But I didn’t recognize that I was full of pride then. Pride is as hard to get rid of as that hedge in our yard. It takes constant cutting away and uprooting.
I may 100% believe I am right. I may even be 100% right. But if my motives aren’t pure, if I’m arguing to prove my point instead of showing love and concern for souls, I am wrong.
If I’m saying it with anger, I am wrong. If I am impatient with them because I think they should be able to understand simple logic LIKE ME, then I am wrong.
“Now the works of the flesh are plain: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissension, party spirit, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and the like. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit. Let us have no self-conceit, no provoking of one another, no envy of one another.” (Galatians 5:19-23 RSV)
Where people—Christians!— are arguing over beliefs and doctrine, you will see these running rampant—anger, strife, selfishness, dissension, party spirit (factions.) The Bible says that this does not come from the Holy Spirit, so stay away from it! Did you notice that these things are listed right up there along with idolatry and sorcery? (Think about why that may be.) DO NOT ENGAGE. The devil would love to see you triggered.
If you start feeling angry when talking about your faith, ask yourself why does this make you angry? It usually stems from pride. I am right, and they are obviously wrong. I know the truth, and they obviously don’t. Are they too dumb to see that?
Strife is “contention, quarreling, selfish ambition.” Your motive is not to seek to understand the other person’s point of view, to see where you can find unity, but to win this argument. You won’t let go of a point, but will go round and round.
Selfishness is evident when you care more about being right than you do about the other person’s soul, or even their feelings. You become sarcastic, snarky, mocking or ridiculing. Do they feel God’s love when you respond that way?
Dissension and factions are what happens when you start feeling morally superior about your “rightness” and their “wrongness.” You forget that they are brothers and sisters to care for, but you treat them as “other.” It becomes “us” against “them” instead of “we.” The Bible clearly warns against this in so many places!
I stayed away from talking about my Catholic faith on the internet for a long time, because the world will go into full attack mode, but I’ve recently felt called to share. I have learned that I will probably turn off commenting on those posts so I don’t have to absorb all the “drive-by” attackers, who type out an angry knee-jerk responses. I don’t need to waste energy on that. I will only respond to messages that are sincere questions, clarifications, or polite objections and immediately delete everything else.
In my early phases of researching what the Catholic Church teaches and why, I enjoyed listening to/watching debates. You guys could probably find some good debates on podcasts or YouTube if you are interested. Here are some things to notice in these debates:
Who uses good evidence with credible sources to back up their claims.
Who acknowledges opposing views and then refutes them with logical reasoning. And who sidesteps the point and tries to draw attention to something else.
Who gets angry and who keeps their cool.
Sometimes when an argument is weak because they lack evidence to prove their point, they resort to these tactics:
Attacking the other person instead of the argument. Implying the other doesn’t have intelligence, moral character, mocking them. (Ad Hominem attack.)
Misrepresenting an opponent's argument to make it easier to attack. (Straw man argument.)
Relying on emotional responses rather than logical reasoning.
What helped me to understand the Catholic position better was consistent logic and credible evidence, delivered humbly and charitably. So when your friends ask you questions, if it turns into a debate, keep it logical, humble, and charitable! If it starts turning into something else, walk away. Go pray.
“Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.” Matthew 5:16
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