This article was first published in The Universe
Can Evangelicals and Catholics be Friends?
By Dwight Longenecker
I was brought up in a strict Evangelical home
in America. We went to church twice on a Sunday, endured forty-five
minute sermons and had to memorise Bible verses. Our family wasn’t
anti-Catholic, but we assumed Catholics weren’t really Christians
because Catholics weren’t ‘born again.’ After high school I went
to the fundamentalist college which gave Ian Paisely his honorary
doctorate. The religion there was all hell fire and brimstone.
They told us the Catholic Church was the ‘great whore of Babylon’ and
the Pope was the anti-Christ.
By God’s grace I left that extreme religion and
came to England to become an Anglican priest. After serving for
ten years as a vicar I and my family became Catholics. I thank
God for my Christian family and the solid faith they gave me in
the evangelical tradition. I also thank God for fifteen years in
the Anglican Church. I explain to my friends that I haven’t forsaken
those other forms of Christianity. Becoming a Catholic meant accepting
more of the Christian faith. All the good things in the other traditions
are fulfilled in the Catholic faith.
The evangelical faith is incomplete without the
Catholic Church, but we are also incomplete without those Christians
who are separated from us. The evangelicals have some good traditions
we can learn from. Evangelicals tend to be excellent communicators
and preachers. We could do with those skills in the Catholic Church.
The Evangelicals love the Bible and study it with passion. Our
people could do with a better grasp of Scripture. Evangelical churches
are strong on fellowship. They really make people feel they belong
to a loving community. Some of our parishes could improve in this
area. The evangelicals have a strong tradition of sharing the gospel
in creative and attractive ways. Sometimes Catholics forget that
we are all called to share the good news of Jesus Christ with others.
I’ve discovered that many Catholics are learning
these skills. The Catholic Charismatic Renewal service is excellent
at proclaiming the fullness of the faith in the Catholic Church.
The Catholic Evangelisation Service proclaims the gospel and trains
others to spread the good news. Bible Alive is a publication that
enables ordinary Catholics to read a portion of the Bible each
day. The Alpha course has been taken up by many Catholic
parishes. It is an attractive tool for Catholics to learn more
about their faith and share it with others. The Cursillo Movement,
along with the other new movements in the Church are driven by
a passion for the gospel. They encourage people to read the Bible,
have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, and serve the church
with zeal and joy.
It’s not a one way street. Evangelicals are
also learning more about the Catholic faith. The new generation of
Evangelicals
are more tolerant and open-minded towards Catholicism. They are
less frightened of other forms of worship and are happy to experiment
and be open to beliefs and worship practices which would have horrified
their parents and grandparents. So in this country the trendy evangelical Christianity magazine
has articles encouraging evangelicals to learn about Benedictine
retreats, Ignatian spirituality and Catholic social teaching. The
same magazine has sponsored a series explaining points of misunderstanding
between Catholic and Evangelicals. The evangelical Premier radio
station has commissioned a series of programmes which explain the
Catholic faith according to the Bible, and Evangelicals are discovering
some of the riches of Catholic worship. I’ve heard of Baptist churches
where they have started using candles, celebrate communion every
week instead of four times a year and observe the liturgical year.
A Methodist minister I know wears vestments for his celebration
of Holy Communion, goes to monasteries on retreat and uses the
Divine Office for his daily devotions.
In the United States there is an increasing
amount of dialogue between Evangelicals and Catholics. Richard Neuhaus,
a former Lutheran minister who is now a Roman Catholic priest,
has initiated discussions with leading evangelical Charles Colson.
They have gathered Catholic and Evangelical theologians and issued
a statement which calls for Catholics and Evangelicals to work
together in areas of mission, moral concern and peace and justice
issues. The Vatican hasn’t been sitting idle either. There have
been formal discussions with Evangelical leaders in South America
as well as with the huge Southern Baptist Church in America. In
Germany a historic document was signed in 1999 in which Catholics
and Lutherans agreed on the basics of the doctrine of justification—or
how we are saved.
These promising signs have been brought about because
Evangelicals and Catholics are finally realising that there is
more that unites them than divides. At the heart of the matter
both Evangelicals and Catholics believe in a revealed religion,
not a relative religion. In other words, we both believe that God
has spoken and that settles it. The core of the faith has been
given by God. It was not made up by people. It was not simply the
result of social conditions and the quirks of human history. This
fundamental attitude about the faith means we have a gospel to
proclaim and a faith to live, and this is in contrast to the wishy
washy grey Christians who water down the faith to a beautiful hobby
or a system of good manners.
There is plenty of scope for Evangelicals and Catholics
to work and worship together. But we have to remember there are
also big differences between us. Evangelicals do tend to
minimize the faith. They want to cut out lots of things we Catholics
believe are essential. We have a big problem about proper authority
in the Church. There is still a large amount of distrust and misunderstanding
between Evangelicals and Catholics. In our efforts to work together
we mustn’t neglect the real points of division and disagreement
which still exist. Progress has been made, but we still have a
long way to go.
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