“So you think I’m a sinner?”
I had just finished giving a parish talk to a group of about 40 people on the topic of mercy. In my talk I noted that everyone needs mercy, because we’re all sinners. I didn’t particularly dwell on the topic, but I made clear that our sinful nature, and our sinful decisions, are why mercy is necessary. The woman continued, “Everyone here has come to church during the week to hear a religious talk, so I’d say we’re all good people. Why do you think we’re sinners?”
Adventures in Catholicland
For over 20 years I’ve been involved in evangelization work at both parish and diocesan levels. During that time, I’ve spoken at more than 100 different parishes, presenting the faith to thousands of people. The vast majority of my talks have been in parishes, before crowds of 30-50 people. I have had countless interactions with those who attend, either during a question-and-answer period, or chatting afterwards. In addition to the exchange noted above, here’s a sampling of some of the encounters I’ve had:
- I gave a talk on Confession, and a man noted, with pride, that he hadn’t gone to Confession in years, and the Church didn’t require it anymore.
- In one talk I mentioned the possibility of people, even people in the audience, going to Hell. Soon afterwards our bishop received complaints that I was condemning the audience to Hell.
- After mentioning the Church’s teaching on artificial birth control in a talk, I was approached by a woman afterwards who told me, “I’ve never heard that discussed in a Catholic church before.” She was in her 60’s.
- After speaking at a parish whose pastor was a well-known dissenter from Church teaching, a man told me how much he loves his pastor, noting that he makes everyone feel “welcome.”
- A woman came up to me after a talk to let me know that the Church was “awful” before Vatican II, but now it was moving in the right direction. When I asked her to specify how it had been awful, she simply said, “in everything.”
- After referencing Pope Benedict XVI in a talk, I was asked by a man why I didn’t talk about Pope Francis. “He’s changed everything that Benedict did.”
To these examples I could add countless more.
Amy the Average Catholic
Over the years I’ve gotten to know my typical audience, which I would describe as “average Catholics.” They are not people who have left the Church or are antagonistic to the Faith. Neither are they hard-core Catholics, the type that might travel hours to hear Scott Hahn speak or go to a Steubenville Conference. They attend Mass regularly (perhaps 2-3 times a month, maybe more) and identify as Catholic, but do not follow Catholic news or Catholic blogs. They form their impressions of the Church and her teachings from hearing the weekly homily, talking with their fellow Catholics, and following the mainstream news.
I have encountered many good and decent souls among my parish visits, but over time I’ve formed an impression of what I would call The Average Catholic. Let’s call her “Amy” (the Average Catholic is usually female):
We are all good people going to heaven. Amy the Average Catholic assumes she – and all her friends – are going to Heaven. Usually she ignores the topic of Hell; when pressed she would dismiss it as a medieval invention. Amy doesn’t believe there is anything fundamentally wrong with herself. Sure, she might eat too many sweets, or could work on her patience. But any problems she might have would only require a life coach, not a Savior.
The Church’s teachings on sexuality are an embarrassment. Amy believes the Church can be a force for good in this world, reminding people to be kind and to take care of those around us. But when it comes to moral issues, especially those related to sexuality, Amy is embarrassed by the Church’s teachings. She wishes the Church would just avoid those topics.
The Church is a place to socially gather and feel welcome. If asked, “Why are you Catholic?” Amy would probably answer vaguely that she grew up Catholic, and it makes her feel good about herself. She goes to her parish to see friends and hopefully hear a nice homily. It’s a place she feels welcome, and it’s what decent people do.
The Church evolves over time, and is better the more it is like the world. According to Amy, the Church has an unfortunate history it must get beyond. It’s not really the Church’s fault; after all, everyone used to be discriminatory and old-fashioned. But now that we are in the 21st century, the Church needs to be updated and become more like the world. Otherwise, the Church is in danger of being left behind.
Essentially, Amy the Average Catholic is an Episcopalian.
Conform to This World, or Transform It?
From this experience, I have come to the inescapable conclusion that how the Church has been teaching and proclaiming the Gospel for decades isn’t working. It doesn’t bring people into a deep relationship with Christ, it doesn’t change their lives for the better (or at all), and it doesn’t change the world in any measurable way.
Instead of proposing the Church as an alternative to the world, Church leaders for decades have preached non-confrontation with the world. This skewed emphasis has had its impact: Amy cares more about her parish’s recycling program than she does about the eternal salvation of the person sitting in the pew next to her.
This problem isn’t confined to leaders who promote heretical beliefs. Of course hierarchs such as Kasper or Cupich cause terrible harm. The deeper problem, however, is one of emphasis. Our Lord said, “Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well” (Matthew 6:33), but too often church leaders seek first earthly acceptance. They avoid topics deemed “controversial” by worldly standards, and in doing so, stick with a spectrum of subjects ranging from “be kind” all the way to “be nice.” They treat topics like sin and damnation like embarrassing relatives at a family gathering. Thus, for years Amy hasn’t heard a word about her eternal destination, or been challenged to live differently than the world tells her to live. Into that void her mind has been filled with the priorities and mores of this world.
St. Paul wrote, “Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind” (Romans 12:2). Unfortunately, for decades the Church has acted as if conformity to this world will magically lead to the world becoming Catholic. Instead the Church has become like the world. I have seen firsthand the results of this disastrous policy, and for the sake of Amy and all average Catholics, the Church must urgently reorder her priorities.
And in case you were wondering, my answer to the question “So you think I’m a sinner?” was a simple “yes,” followed by, “and so am I.”
How sad…
“Essentially, Amy the Average Catholic is an Episcopalian.”
Really, she’s a Moral Therapeutic Deist. Episcopalians are just a subspecies of that.
Actually Eric is correct, she is an Episcopalian. The Moral Therapeutic Deist does not have the veneer of Christianity.
Well, neither do most Episcopalians.
Not anymore… the last remnants in the “high church” wing that are slowly moving to the Ordinariate.
Actually they all have this VENEER of Christianity. Which is what makes them worse. If they are downright MTDs then it would be easier to show them for what they are. But because there is this VENEER, then the lie is more insidious.
My impression is the same. “Good” Catholics have assured me that God approves of everything from IVF to going to a Protestant church “for the fellowship.” What it comes to is simply that most American Catholics neither know nor believe basic teachings of the Church. We may argue about whose fault that is. But what are we doing about it?
Exactly! What are we going to do about it.
We need to evangelize. I don’t whether posters here actually go out and engage the real world.
The real world is one’s family – The Domestic Church – and it is there where one can actualise the corporal and spiritual works of mercy and evangelization begins there.
The new evangelisation is the old protestantism.
Those who home school are scolded for not socialising their children as though Catholic familial life is outside of any socialising.
Who did Jesus forth to evangelise and convert the world? The very same Hierarchy that has not done that for well over fiddy years
I have, when the opportunities were presented – which have been reasonably frequent because of the sheer number of people I’ve made an acquaintance with over the years in my line of work.
Some people can be surprisingly honest and frank about their beliefs (and their struggles) when you simply provide them with your time and a listening ear (first and most important step in evangelization I’ve discovered).
Apart from neo-Catholics the most fertile ground I’ve struck have been many non-religious people who yet believe that there ‘has to be some kind of God’ in order to make sense out of the extraordinary order (and incredible diversity) that is to be found in physical creation. I tell them about God as he has revealed Himself to be via scripture and tradition and very often I get surprisingly good responses.
For those who are non religious the biggest problem I strike is once you progress to the stage where you tell them of the need for Baptism in the Church, they call a halt right there – the reasons they give are clear – they regard the Church as corrupt (citing the bad press the Church has copped over the last 15 years). So I leave them to God in prayer. At least the seed has been planted.
May the Lord keep you always and bless your ministry. And may your kind increase.
Try posting an article in your local, dime-a-dozen diocesan newspapers about traditional Catholic doctrine and how it has effectively been marginalized. Probably won’t even read your letter, much less publish it.
Average Amy is far from understanding her faith, but a good lot of the rest of us are in trouble too. So much has been lost and getting it back takes time. Time that when you are raising the next generation is practically sliding through your fingers. It is interesting that at this moment in time we have the internet. On the one hand a source of diabolical influence, yet also a source of truth and hope to Catholics (and others) who while they may be living isolated from other Catholics are able to come together online for information, support, mentorship etc.
I do worry at the cautions we need to take with internet use, it troubles me deeply, but I have also received incalculable benefits from those good Catholics, who have and are being internet apostles.
Amen Sharyn. I came to the truth of Catholicism because of the internet. Ann Barnhardt to be specific. I might have eventually gotten here as I was questioning my Protestant faith….but that is how I found out. And praise God. I cannot imagine what I would be believing had I simply walked into a typical NO parish.
I could write so much about all the graces received! I just thank God! and think please let me be a good apostle according to God’s will.
I hope someone gets that comment to Ann.
She knows. I’ve written her.
I suspect that we all know these Catholics. It’s easy to not be aware of the shallowness of understanding and it’s shocking when it raises its head.
But isn’t it natural? Aren’t most people like Amy? I’ve read recently that Jewish tradition puts at a tenth or a sixth the number of Jews who followed Moses out of Egypt. The idea is that that’s a threshold rate.
But the rest? I think Amy would be among those who stayed in Egypt.
I hope I wouldn’t.
No. They left Egypt and then joined the Canaanites in Baal worship.
“Amy is an episcopalian” … and 50 years ago, even Episcopalians were more Christian than Amy.
But the good news is that I used to be Amy. It’s possible to be cured.
Pretty true. However, it is not Catholic news or blogs that makes us authentic catholic. It is our baptism.
Any man Baptised – even Protestants – is a Catholic until he achieves the age of responsibility (7) and choses to reject the authority of the Church and any Catholic who does not adhere to every single Doctrine of the One True Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church is a DEAD member of that Church.
On any given Sunday, a real Catholic man is witness to the walking dead going up to receive Communion.
Yet now we have the modern papal teaching of the ecumenism of blood.
Worse; we have the modern church – at V2 – teaching (see L.G.) that those who are outside the Bonds of Unity in Worship, Doctrine, and Authority are our christian brothers even though they are material and/or formal heretics who have not even tenuously maintained one of the Bionds necessary to be a Christian as taught in Mystici Corporis:
Actually only those are to be included as members of the Church who have been baptized and profess the true faith, and who have not been so unfortunate as to separate themselves from the unity of the Body, or been excluded by legitimate authority for grave faults committed. “For in one spirit” says the Apostle, “were we all baptized into one Body, whether Jews or Gentiles, whether bond or free.” [17] As therefore in the true Christian community there is only one Body, one Spirit, one Lord, and one Baptism, so there can be only one faith. [18] And therefore if a man refuse to hear the Church let him be considered — so the Lord commands — as a heathen and a publican. [19] It follows that those are divided in faith or government cannot be living in the unity of such a Body, nor can they be living the life of its one Divine Spirit.
Ecumenism is the Universal Solvent of Tradition and the entire corpus of work at V2 was a dead water-logged corpse that had been repeatedly plunged into the Ecumenical pool so as to wash off any accreted Traditional truths that differentiated between the One True Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church and the uncountable false faiths so beloved by the majority off those in attendance at V2.
Of course, it must be written that everything in V2 that came directly from Tradition remains binding but the modernist revolutionaries can not bind
IANS to their novelties.
Indifferentism is a rotting disease that began at the head of the fish and so we have the modern papal praxis of praying with protestants/jews/muslins/atheists and we have V2 teaching that material and formal heretics are our brethren and that prots have the means of salvation and sanctification etc.
It sure would be nice for the Hierarchy to forego one of their happy face meetings with protestants and Messias-Deniers – telling them how much we have in common (Hell, man; IANS has a brain that is about 80% water and a grape is about 80% of water and if IANS has not consumed too many fermented grapes, he usually can out think a grape any day of the week ) but that commonality means jack in the world of spiritual sanity.
So could the Hierarchy, pretty please, reconcile all of the novel V2 claims with this Indulgenced Prayer of Pope Pius IX:
O Mary, Mother of Mercy and Refuge of sinners, we beseech thee, be pleased to look with pitiful eyes upon poor heretics and schismatics. Thou who art the Seat of Wisdom, enlighten the minds that are miserably enfolded in the darkness of ignorance and sin, that they may clearly know that the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Roman Church is the one true Church of Jesus Christ, outside of which neither holiness nor salvation can be found. Finish the work of their conversion by obtaining for them the grace to accept all the truths of our Holy Faith, and to submit themselves to the Supreme Roman Pontiff, the Vicar of Jesus Christ on earth; that so, being united with us in the sweet chains of Divine charity, there may soon be one only fold under the same one Shepherd; and may we all, O Glorious Virgin, sing forever with exultation: Rejoice, O Virgin Mary, thou only hast destroyed all heresies in the whole world. Amen.
Well, go on…IANS is listening
Well we must also be careful to judge only the actions and not the hearts of men. If we judge uncharitably by the look of people we may pass over a saint in the making and condemn ourselves through our lack of charity in the process. Love is important, and love delivers Truth. While Jesus can call them white washed sepulchres, he saw ALL they did and read their hearts too
And then so many fall into error on their own.
It is both our Baptism and our continued acceptance of all the Truths of Faith as laid out by the church through the ages
Excellent observation, Mr. Sammons and all of them are true but sad.
IANS has told family members they had to go to Confession because they went to a protestant building rather than a Catholic Church on Sunday.
The family members went to confession -each to a different priest – and each was told they had fulfilled their Sunday obligation by going to a protestant service.
The VAST majority of nominal catholics don’t know jack about the Faith but they are amongst the most judgmental of men on the face of the earth:
I am a good person.
I can choose to use B.C, or not.
My friend Janey just died and she is in Heaven.
We used to teach that non Catholics went to Hell now we changed that.
Those are statements from my sisters and mother and IANS is aught but one of scores of millions of Catholics from a large family who is the sole one who has kept the Faith and whom the rest of the Fam thinks he is hopelessly atavistic.
And what can be said of laymen goes in spades for our Bishops and Cardinals.
Catholic apologists, especially converted, like to cite that because the Roman Catholic Church has existed until now, it must be authentically of Christ. Truth is: It is a different organization in each of many epochs of history; it just keeps the name. And also: There is a unique “Catholicism” for each “Catholic.”
The name is not all the Catholic Church keeps.
Among other things, she keeps the following thing: the hatred of the Catholic Church by people who do not adhere to the teachings of the moral law taught by Christ.
Examples: fornicators, divorced-and-remarrieds, contraceptors, abortionists, homosexuals, Protestants, Muslims, Jews, Freemasons, Communists, atheists, agnostics, Satanists, secularists, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
The overwhelming majority of them hate the Catholic Church, and it will be that way for all eternity, as those in Hell will never cease hating the Catholic Church.
Wow. Textbook-perfect Modernism. Your beliefs have been unequivocally condemned by the Church. You are not Catholic at all, you are a heretic. Stop pretending.
”
Your beliefs have been unequivocally condemned by the Church.”
That is correct— I believe God’s Word in the bible. That the “Church”
condemns my beliefs points up the “Church” has a false gospel. [Gal. 1:6-8]
Aah, that explains it. I apologize, I thought you were posting as a Catholic. I makes me wonder, though, why you bother to participate in this conversation at all.
”
why you bother to participate in this conversation at all.”
I believe in sharing the gospel. [I Cor. 15:1-4]
Dear Gerald. Do you know the four approved Creeds of The One True Holy Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church and what their existence is witness to or do you just project your own personal prejudices, proclivities, and preferences, onto others and expect them to be taken as objectively normative?
Is Matt 16:18 a lie?
It is not a lie, it has been lied about. The context is totally about Christ as King of Israel, and His Kingdom reign; still future.
Bye bye
I could sense that Eric Sammons, the author, was a convert from
some Protestant or Evangelical denomination before I saw it confirmed in “About The Author.” Sorry to be the one to break this to him, but the “Catholic Church” isn’t “worldly”— it is the world.
Those apostle Paul wrote to in Romans-Philemon were believers and nothing at all like today’s “Catholics”— or even “Christians.”
I’m glad your spidey-convert sense was working so well. 🙂
You need to return to the Catholic Church, Gerald. It is Christ’s ark on which we can be saved from the storms of the world. As St. Cyprian said in the 3rd century, “He cannot have God as his Father who does not have the church for his Mother.”
I’ll pray that your deception is removed and you return to your mother, the Catholic Church.
Thank you sir. But be sure you don’t count the prayers.😎
Do not blame “Amy”! She lives in a culture that relentlessly teaches women to consume – more and more and more – and then they will be happy. Amy took the time to attend your talk because she knows something is missing from her life – and is hoping you can help her find it.
Nothing in my article blames Amy.
Great article, thanks for sharing your experience.
Our pastor is Amy in a Roman collar, so to speak. Everyone as far as I can see loves him! He’s retiring soon. Yippie!
I think this is why, gradually, more Westerners find Orthodox Christianity appealing. Most modern RC parishes seem to exhibit Amy Catholicism, where the atmosphere is fun and non-threatening, and the Mass feels akin to an entertaining concert or a educational town hall.
Eric, that is absolutely brilliant. So very true. Definitely will be circulating among my friends.
Excellent Eric. This is the kind of thing we should be hearing at Sunday Mass: ‘What it means to be a Catholic.’ One gathers from all the “niceness” in the Church that it serves the purposes of keeping the folks smiling and coming and most of all contributing money. Most priests, Instead of instructing people on the need to save themselves from hell grease the slide that gets them there.
A good start would be for parishes to offer daily confession along with Mass and let everyone know why frequent confession is necessary if they wish to save their soul and avoid going to hell.
Having confession for 45 minutes a week , as most parishes do, is ridiculous as it implies that o15 people or so need to go out of the 1000’s in the parish. Effectively, the Church is saying Confession is no longer necessary. Scandalous to be sure.
A fine article, which in a few words outlines the reasons why – in the course of time – so many people will continue to leave the Church, that ultimately there will be only a small remnant of faithful Catholics. And it is these Catholics who will form the heart of the Mystical Body of Christ.
I think we already do form that remnant
Thanks Eric for summing things up so well!! I’ll use these ideas in my RCIA teaching, God Bless!
I’m surprised Amy even attends Mass. Without theological underpinning, church is pretty boring. I’d rather walk my dog in the park on Sunday mornings.
I’m linking to a decidedly NOT Catholic site here, but this lays it out rather well. http://adam4d.com/mtd/
MTD describes perfectly how many self-identified Catholics believe and practice…down to the youth group leader silliness of seeing how many marshmallows can fit in his mouth.
Weeds belong in the world, not in the Church.
The Truth can be painful… but here it is. There would be virtually no “Amy’s” in the Church today or at least very few if the Priests and Bishops in the Catholic Church actually believed the Holy Scriptures and realized that they have a responsibility before God to teach the people what the Scriptures (read that God) actually expects of those who say they are His followers. They (the Bishop’s and Priest’s) if they are true to their calling should be willing to lay down their lives for their flock because they love them and want them to enter into Heaven and avoid Hell. They should make it impossible even for the theologically challenged to not understand the basic teaching of our Lord as recorded in Holy Scripture. Instead they are for the most part impotent wimps who are afraid to tell anyone anything that may hurt their tender feelings. The scriptures call the people of God sheep. It is obvious that the sheep are without, for the most part true and faithful Shepherds.
God Help us.
The article is a very apt depiction of the typical liberal left Catholic. They can be highly antagonistic not just to Tradition, but any effort to preach the basics of the Faith. They want to double down on fifty years of Vatican II failure, of collapsing vocations and the mass closing of religious houses be they convents, monasteries and parish churches. Usually they are late middle aged, and can be found in Folk Groups, and even some parish councils. Honestly, I think even the Episcopalians would find them annoying, people who hate something they barely know about.