I recently wrote about our parish synod effort to evangelize Catholics who no longer attend Mass. The committee decided to offer monthly sessions to our parishioners to help them reach out to family and friends who have lapsed. Committee members were assigned to work in pairs, each pair given a topic to present at one of the sessions. My turn came in July.
Fortunately for me, I had a very good partner to work with me. Our topic was Why am i Catholic. My partner Mike and I each wrote a script of what we would like to say. Mike combined them into a PowerPoint slide presentation we used to guide our discussion. We both wanted to try a testimonial approach to our talks, and it worked well as we were both able to tell our stories.
Mike’s story was especially interesting as he told about the time he unknowing fried bacon in front of his Muslim roommates in college. They considered themselves unclean for even being in the presence of forbidden food. Their year-long interaction on religious differences led Mike to delve deeper into understanding his own Catholic faith.
So, why am I Catholic? A part of my testimony centered on speculation whether I would be Catholic today if my mother had not raised me in the faith. I don’t know. Probably not. My dad’s family were all Methodists.
My grandparents on my mother’s side were devout Catholics who came to this country from Eastern Europe. Strong Catholic families probably have a lineage just like the line of popes going back in history to early Christianity. That Catholic faith was handed down from generation to generation. I think about how sad it is when one person in the family falls away from the Church, breaking that Catholic family line that may have existed for centuries.
My mother had nine siblings. Ten children in the family altogether, all of them raised in a good Catholic home. The children of those nine siblings are my cousins. As near as I can figure, about half of those cousins no longer practice the Catholic faith. Once that Catholic lineage is broken, it is likely lost forever.
When conversing with non-Catholics, often someone will say, oh my grandmother was Catholic, or I have an aunt who is Catholic. Most every family has Catholic ancestors. Somewhere along the line, someone left the Catholic family and subsequent generations never got to know the faith.
So, our synod mission is to bring back those we have lost, either because someone drifted away or didn’t return after the pandemic scare. We need to know why someone would leave the Church, and before we can draw them back, we need to appreciate how fortunate we are to be members of the one true Church established by Jesus Christ. Study the Faith, know the Faith, share the Faith, and never stop learning.
1 Peter 3:15. Always be prepared to make a defense to anyone who calls you to account for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and reverence.
