Last week my niece was confirmed and received her first holy communion. She wrote some of her thoughts on this over on her blog:Just a Bird Squawking. I want to share some of words that really popped of the screene for me.
Over the course of the process – from classes last fall, conversations, and reading, especially in my Reformation class last quarter – my head almost exploded at the truth of the Catholic Church.
I was a cradle Catholic. And as such I really took my Catholic Faith for granted during my teen and young adult years. But when I did start to look at my faith when it was challenged I too was amazed at the beauty, logic and truth of what is the Catholic Church. Mallory is light years ahead of where I was at her age!
A lot of what I focused on – reading Scripture, seeing God as a Person, learning to evangelize, and the importance of prayer – are valuable, and have been neglected in the last generation or so among many American Catholics and especially in Catholic schools (NOT by the Church!).
I’m not sure how Mallory picked up on this. Perhaps from Catholic kids she knew in school or in her neighborhood. But it is a very perceptive. Even all these years later I do not think the Catholic schools are doing a great job of passing on the faith! And I base that on the opportunity I had just this year to sit and listen to Catholic school students getting ready for confirmation! There is something lacking in their preparation – still!
I also know I can’t on my own without the institutions, sacraments, and guidance of the Bride come to the Truth and to know God as he really is. There’s a reason why Jesus did the weird things He did setting up the Sacraments and establishing a Bride, His Body.
This in a nutshell is what brought me back to the faith. I didn’t know why the church taught the things she taught, but I knew she didn’t just pull them out of the sky! And when I set out to learn the reasons behind the teachings I couldn’t wait to learn more and more. So why would I expect my children and grandchildren to have to recreate the wheel! It’s there for them! The deposit of faith is where it has always been, in the Catholic Church.
I also fear that I don’t know how to grow in my faith without some of the crutches I had (the powerful music, lighting, and stages of many Protestant churches, for example, or their view of sin and suffering that kept my relationship with God dependent on the presence of drama in my life).
I smiled when I read these words. I had been following a discussion over here blasting the rosary as being a sort of a crutch. That article says, “Yes, God graciously gave His people symbols in conjunction with worship.However, each one of those signs and symbols; water for baptism, bread and wine for communion have 1.) the distinct and express command to use; 2.) Christ’s example of use; 3.) direct typology to the Person of Christ.”
I guess the music, lighting etc don’t count?
Mal also wrote:
I’m currently reading about the mass in all of its detail, and I’m eager to attend again to notice all of these things!
Professor Scott Hahn wrote very eloquently about the first time he attended mass. Hahn is a bible scholar and professor and he was so moved and astonished with how much of the mass came out of all the different parts of sacred scripture! That discovery was what helped move in to convert to Catholicism.
All of Mallory’s article is beautiful and inspiring. She is a young woman of deep faith. I am honored to have been her sponsor.
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