Almost the Whole Story: What’s Been Happening At Our House Since Holy Week 07 and Why I’ve Been A Nut Case Ever Since
May 7th, 2008 by Michael Spencer
UPDATE: Ok folks. 120+ posts not counting the 5 or 6 I deleted. (Sorry Frank. I can’t help myself.) The majority of you’ve shown yourselves to be our friends and we appreciate and love you. A couple of you are more messed up than me, and that really is an accomplishment. I think we’ve said it all, so comments will be closed .
IM readers deserve to know what’s been going on in much of my blogging and commenting the last year +.
For those of you who prefer that I just be a nut job, don’t despair. There’s still plenty of time for you to be proven right.
But for those of you who have been reading between the lines, evangelizing me, praying for me or just confused, this should clear a few things up.
First time commenter, long time reader.
Wow. Grace and Peace be with you increasingly. What a struggle, but what a wonderful testimony.
Oh, and what a great quote: “God does whatever he pleases and Jesus pays my bills all the way to the resurrection. End of story.”
No wisdom coming from me. In as much as I can, I stand with you.
Brother, my heart breaks for you. Having been raise in the RCC I understand completely what you mean about not being able to share fellowship with your wife.
Nothing else to say other than I applaud your courage and will be in prayer for you.
May God give you wisdom and grace. I cannot imagine the pain of worshiping separately, though many couples do. Will you continue in your current position at the school, Michael. You’re in our prayers–you and Denise both.
Wow; you’re one of the bravest people I’ve read - at least, who’s brave enough to use his own name.
Have a joyful continued pilgrimage!
Michael, I don’t know whether this will encourage you or make things worse, but this is my own “nut case” story. Ellie and I, parents of three children, 11, 9, and 7, decide not to have any more so Ellie had an IUD inserted. (You can tell already we’re not Catholic.) Long story short, seven years later she discovers that she is pregnant. Because an IUD is in place, the doctor is recommending an abortion because of all the possible problems, which include death to both my wife and child. “Go home and think about it,” he says, “you still have a little time to decide.”
Ellie, a registered nurse with medical knowledge, whose own life is in danger, agrees with the doctor. Me, I go bonkers because my view is that God created this new life and I am not about to end it. We schedule a counseling session with the pastor of our very evangelical and pentecostal church, who I think will show Ellie that I am right. Instead, the pastor agrees with her and the doctor; he advises doing as the doctor recommends. If you were 17 and this had happened in the back seat of a car, he says, I might be telling you something entirely different, but you had completed your family, you weren’t planning any more children, he says, you had taken steps to prevent any more children. What if the IUD is implanted in the baby’s brain, he says, and she gives birth to a monster. What about your other children who would be deprived of your attention and energy, he says. What if your wife dies because the IUD perforates her uterus, he says. I say, what about if God has given us this child to raise, He will give us the strength to cope with whatever comes? They both look at me like I am crazy. The pastor prays with us and says, “Go home and be with your family and have a Merry Christmas, and decide in January.” The next Sunday morning he leads the congregation in singing, “Only believe, only believe, all things are possible, only believe.” You @#$%&!:! hypocrite, I think. Full of faith in the pulpit, but where are you one on one?
Ellie and I stay up late for several nights talking as we’ve never talked in all our years of marriage. She is scared; I am scared. What to do? About a week later, after much inner turmoil (I can’t imagine what a whole year would be like), I say to the Lord, “If we have the abortion, I am going to be in the psychiatrist’s office every week. If we don’t have the abortion and something is wrong with the baby, Ellie is going to be in the psychiatrists’s office every week. We can’t solve this problem. I give it to you. Lord, You are going to have to solve this problem.”
About a week later during the first week of January, Ellie had a spontaneous miscarriage. Afterward, she had a complete hysterectomy and the doctor found the IUD implanted not in the baby but in the very thinnest part of the uterine wall–I probably would have lost both my wife and my baby if they had done things my way.
I said all that to say, God–the real God, Jesus, not the one you have stopped believing in–knows everything that is happening in your life and He will be your problem-solver. (I know that probably sounds trite, but it is true.) Right now, only He knows what the solution is to your problem. Keep an open mind and an open heart. Don’t let a root of bitterness creep in. If you find yourself becoming bitter, tell God about it. Scream it at Him if you like. When you have reached the end of your rope is when God can begin to work.
I heard a wise pastor (not the same one) say that God seems to reserve the greatest suffering for His strongest saints. I am glad, in my own “nut case” example, that I am one of the weak ones.
We have to be like Job and say, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.”
Please forgive me for going on too long. I will be praying for you and Denise.
Wow…talk about a testing of faith…no profound words…just thank you for filling us in and I know God has MUCH more in store for you than you could ever imagine, Michael.
Hi Michael,
I am sad for the way things turned out. In all of this I pray that God will give you the peace that passes understanding and rest in your first and second passions. Thank you for the honesty.
We will be praying.
This long-time lurker and reader of your blog is praying for you and Denise. Don’t want to be a Job’s comforter - just want you to know that I bet many of your readers are feeling your pain and hurting with you.
As I was reading this, I said aloud, “Oh, no.” My wife asked what was going on. I told her. She said that I didn’t have to worry about that happening. We are UM, but she’s from an Episopalian and Orthodox background. Speaking only personally, I could handle either of those much more easily than what you are facing. Yet I like your attitude as you express it here. You have to decide what’s really important as painful as that is and has been for you. This and other posts from you have emphasized that point. The crap that we agonize, argue, and fight over usually isn’t all that significant when compared to our marriages and children. And. of course, God is in the midst of it all in and through Jesus and the Holy Spirit.
As Jesus told us the kingdom is near and around us, not just in heaven.
Thanks for your candor; and God bless both of you and your children.
That’s pretty much what I had inferred from the things you wrote. I’m glad you’re in a better place now. Good luck.
Michael,
I don’t know if you want comments here.
Through all our disagreements in doctrine, its been nice to have your honest discussion. It’s hard to say that one you haven’t met in person is a friend, but we are all one in Christ.
I don’t want to read my experience into this. But to give you background. When I started in the ministry 4 years ago, my wife left me, and took my son. I thought I was done. Nothing like announcing your getting a divorce on the second month anniversery of your ordination. I wanted to be done, in more ways than one.
I can imagine you feel much the same way. But I’m fairly sure one way or another, warts and all, God will continue to use you to reach others.
your brother in Christ,
Bror
prayers.
Wow.
Good luck.
I have read a book you have recommended, “Chasing Francis”, I hope you can look to that adventure to give you comfort, it has me.
God still loves, cares, forgives.
Abandoning one “version of Christianiy to find a Jesus shaped faith sounds good to me.
Again, good luck.
Rob
Michael,
I read the post last night and I just wanted to let you know that I an my family will continue to lift you and your family up in our prayers. Your honesty and candor has triggered a well of emotions in me as well. I pray as well that God would continue to show you His Way on this journey.
Jeff M
Michael,
please know that this gal in Penna. is praying for you (both)
“The rage and bitterness are leaving my emotional life, and I pray they never return.”
yet my prayer is that they not ‘never return’ but never sabotage your “most precious relationship.” Courage to love with emotional vulnerability is a virtue that like a muscle is best strengthened by frequent and strenuous use! Stoicism, or its second cousin apathy, is poison to true intimacy. Be honest in sharing your quite reasonable reservations with your wife and her parish priest also - as St Peter wrote (1Pe3:18) it is her responsibility to “… be ready always to satisfy every one that asketh you a reason of that hope which is in you.”
Have you and your wife heard of the Christian Marriage ministry Retrouvaille? My husband and I had issues about my reversion from lapsed cradle Catholicism and we found the retreat and follow-up program quite insightful, and made some valuable friendships in a community of fellow conjugal sinners, who in healing themselves, with God’s grace help heal others. There’s an international network, here’s your local contact for Kentucky:
http://www.retrouvaille.org/dates.php?community=3012
God Bless
There aren’t many blog entries that have touched me like yours. I’m not sure if I can fully understand all of the pain you’ve experienced / are experiencing, but what I could sense from your words was profound.
Being upended is never fun. (I’ve been through it a couple of times already.) However, sometimes that’s what it takes to begin to realize even greater depths to God’s mystery. To use another metaphor, imagine a great river. (I’m from Mississippi; so I’ll think of that one.) Sometimes (moreso in pre-levy days), the river would overflow its banks and flood the surrounding area. Of course, this would be devastating for the people living there. Homes would be washed away; even lives could be lost. However, when the flood waters receded, rich soil would be left, allowing fruitful harvests to continue.
God plants seeds, nurtures them, waters them, (Though, sometimes I’d prefer he use a watering can to a firehose.), and harvests the fruit. If the fruit that results after this is even a fraction of what you’ve produced so far, then great will be the benefit to all of us here.
You are a blessing for us, and may God’s blessings rain down upon you.
In Christ,
Kevin
Michael,
Hang in there, Michael. God always takes care of His people. You both belong to Him.
- Steve M.
Before I say anything else, thank you for being open with your readers about your pain and struggles.
When you write, “I’ve given up believing in a God who cares about things like ‘head of the home,’ ’spiritual unity,’ denominational churches and the
‘ministry marriage,’” you’re writing as if you believe that God really did speak to your wife and tell her to become a Catholic. I think you’re mistaken to believe that.
The words “told me that God had told her” were an immediate red light. Perhaps she heard an audible voice. Perhaps there was an angelic manifestation of the sort that caused Isaiah to cry out “Woe is me!” But usually when people say “God told me” they mean they had some sort of mental impression or urging to do something.
When God speaks, He does so unmistakably, not with hunches. I’ve seen too many Christians make foolish, impulsive decisions and create wretched works of art, while “crediting” God with “laying it on their heart.” I think that’s what’s happening here.
I can only go by what you’ve written, but here’s how I interpret the situation: Your wife feels an emotional pull to Catholicism. She has idealized the RCC as a place to find peace and healing from depression there. Perhaps she has demonized evangelicalism as the source of all her spiritual and emotional problems.
From that starting place, of course she would be elated to finally take the plunge into the Tiber. I’m sure she’s getting plenty of reinforcement and emotional support from Catholic clergy and laypeople (particularly converts) who are excited to have her converting. They are making her feel welcome. They are telling her that she’s doing the right thing. She feels she has purpose and direction, and you can feel that even when it’s the wrong direction.
I can’t help but think that it’s the same brain that has been telling her lies about herself — by which I mean her depression — that is now telling her to become a Catholic, regardless of the cost to her husband’s job or her marriage. Don’t blame God for that.
Michael,
Another lurker. Thank you for you transparency, always. We all grow as a result. Don’t know much else to say, except that you both will be in my prayers.
I have prayed God’s will be done for you and your wife. Wonderful, courageous honesty, and a beautiful example of humility. Thank you.
Michael,
Wow, I admire you more now than ever! Thank you for your honesty…it’s refreshing! I feel a book coming on, my friend!
One of the greatest lessons of my life was to learn that I was not invited to be part of my husband’s relationship with God. It was between the two of them. It almost destroyed our marriage (being that I was such a control freak and was sure I knew how to do “Christianity right”).
We have very different thoughts and view - but, thankfully both believe that Christ died for us - and while we do attend the same church - it’s not really where we want to be - we are there for a few more years because our son is being fed spiritually there - and that’s the priority now. I understand your frustration about wanting to worship together - I’ve been there.
We both have other outlets that allow us to grow on our own - outside of church on Sunday (i.e., bible studies, etc.). For example, I asked him last night if he wanted to go visit the Messianic Jewish Church on Saturday morning for their services. He looked at me as if I had asked him to cut off his arm…ha! ha! I laughed and told him that I am sure my best friend would go - he laughed and said, “Okay”. And it is - okay. He’s used to this with me - I love to visit other churches and denominations - asking questions (as you remember from the questions I had about the Apostles Creed).
Michael, I know that God will be glorified in this situation….and I am praying God fills you with peace and knowledge - allowing this season of your life to become the greatest testimony of your life!
You don’t know me, Michael. I’m a long time lurker; I’m praying for you and your family. Thank you for your relentless transparency. I know you and your wife’s honesty in seeking to love each other and follow our Lord is an encouragement to many, many people. Amidst all the ostentatious Victory-in-Jesus stuff, ya’ll remind me that the struggle is good and normal. Thank you.
Michael Bates: My wife is the most prayerful, Bible reading, devotionally passionate Christian I know. How do I know God didn’t tell her to do this?
Wow - this explains much, changes my view and makes me want to apologize again for for coming on too strong before. It’s clear I was touching a nerve. I’m sorry.
I was in a divided marriage for a few years (I was a non-practicing Jew) where I was the sitting on my hands in unbelief in pew at the beginning of my marriage, but my wife understood all this going into the marriage and took a chance on me anyway. This is very different from your case where you are both believers, but in different traditions, and the division is new. Much harder, unfortunately I have no good advice to offer, only a few consolations.
Michael, you’re in a unique position as a long time minister, schooled in theology, grounded by faith and most crucially you posses a rare self-effacing honesty. You have the foundation and the strong personal motivation to look across the Baptist Catholic divide with charity. That is pure gold.
You have been prepared for this cross. Christ has given you a unique perspective into the sorrow He must feel when He sees His Church, His Bride, His flock divided. I have no idea what He intends here but I’m certain it’s a real opportunity for His work.
Did she hear an audible voice?
The wretched works of art and foolish, impulsive decisions I mentioned above were almost always perpetrated by prayerful, Bible reading, devotionally passionate Christians.
What God has to say to us is in the Scriptures, not in inner impressions and hunches.
This really moved me. I cannot pretend to understand the struggles you must be going through, but please know that you and your entire family are in my prayers. All I know is this: the miracle of the Paschal Mystery is that God took the phenomenon of suffering, graced it, and transformed it into love. I trust He will do the same with the suffering you are going through.
Mr. Spencer:
I totally understand what you are going through. I was on the opposite side — it was my husband who made the announcement that God wanted him to become Catholic. I had already resigned my job at church for other reasons, so that part didn’t hit me so hard, but I can fathom the despair you feel.
It has been 6 years since my husband spoke those words and I felt everything crumbling. I assure you, God is in this. Like you say of Mrs. Spencer, my husband is the most prayerful, Bible reading, devoutly passionate Christian I know.
I thought he had lost his mind…and maybe his faith. I prayed like a Hannah in the Old Testament, like a crazy woman. I made him promise me that he would seek only Jesus, only truth. And he did so.
I learned a lot about Catholicism. I unlearned a lot of untrue things I had been taught about Catholicism. I began to see and understand more clearly why my husband believed God had called him to this.
We worship together. You and Denise can worship together. It’ll only look different. It hasn’t been stripped away.
My prayers for you, Denise and your children.
Wow. Thanks for sharing. That helps me understand you a lot better.
My dad is a Baptist and my mom is a Roman Catholic. They have been going to different churches every week for the 30+ years they have been married.
I was touched deeply by this piece and by what is happening in your life.
I pray that the peace of Christ will rule in your hearts. God bless you and Denise.
iMonk, your humility and openness are a blessing. Hard-fought, I know, but they are rare.
Mr. Spencer, thanks so much for sharing this painful personal struggle. I shall keep you in my prayers.
Michael, all I can say is that your last few posts have been excellent and reflect a real deep understanding of Jesus. If this problem of yours has been an influence (as I think you say it has) then there is surely good fruit resulting from this heartache.
Hi Michael,
It’s very difficult to be in this situation, because both sides have heartfelt beliefs and feel that they can’t compromise.
I was curious why Denise couldn’t worship at your service (if I interpreted your words correctly)? She can always attend Mass on Saturdays if she wants. Some of what you wrote implied that you couldn’t worship together. You may feel duty-bound to not worship at Mass, but I don’t see why a Catholic could not go to a Protestant worship service. This is what I recommend in such situations, as a way to avoid a painful rupture in worship practices.
I am on record, time and again, by the way, recommending to folks that they not push Catholic belief on spouses. It’s a matter of conscience for everyone and each person has to believe and worship according to their own conscience, under God. If constructive conversation on these matters is to be had, it can’t be forced, and timing and sensitivity are everything.
Likewise, I would say that Protestants ought to grant those who feel led to Catholicism that right and prerogative, without all this pressure put upon them, as if they have two heads or are from another galaxy.
Not saying YOU are doing this! I’m just making a general observation. But of course if Catholics are not regarded as fellow Christians, just like any other fellow Protestant group, then extreme difficulty arises, because one person is trying to save the other from hell and the Great Whore of Babylon, etc.
This is why I have challenged, time and again, the more vocal Internet debaters for the anti-Catholic position, to engage the topic of the definition of Christianity in a live chat room setting. But they persistently refuse. There could be so much less conflict and pain if both sides would just talk intelligently about such fundamental issues.
Michael Bates writes, “I can’t help but think that it’s the same brain that has been telling her lies about herself — by which I mean her depression — that is now telling her to become a Catholic, regardless of the cost to her husband’s job or her marriage. Don’t blame God for that.”
I struggle with depression and yes I believe God speaks to me and as a minister speaks through me. If as Bro. Spencer writes, his wife is the most prayerful, devotionally passionate Christian he knows, indeed how does he know God didn’t tell her to do this? Does depression mean One can’t hear from God? I certainly hope not since many ministers I have known suffer from depression and from what I have read Spurgeon struggled. Hang in there Michael, thanks for sharing.
Grace be with you, Michael. My wife & I are in similar situation (tho with directions reversed, and without the vocational complication). Prayer and patience, all around.
Michael, there is much I’d like to say about this post but I’ll be pretty brief. My family has been in a similar situation, unaggravated by the ministerial career considerations, and we have come to a happy “place” with our decision.
In brief, please do not let anyone’s disapproval or “heartbreak” on your behalf make you forget that you and your wife reached the best decision(s)you could, lovingly and with respect for one another. Even if there was/is a struggle against sins of anger and resentment… well, I sin every day too, and must always ask for God’s (and my husband’s) forgiveness. You both followed your conscience to the best of your ability. Allow yourselves some peace with this.
May you both be blessed in continuing love for each other. My husband (who may comment later also) and I wish you both every blessing.
The pain and anguish that you have experienced is the same pain that Christ feels for the schism of His church. It is unfortunate that any of us have to choose between so many out-of-balance extremes. Whatever happened to the concept of a unified (not uniform) church? There is room in Christ for all believers, and room enough for disagreement in unity.
My wife and I are considering converting to the RCC. Our evangelical faith is broken. The emergent/missional church does not attract us. We have gone through one too many church splits to continue to believe in sola scriptura.
We have found a deeply moving spirituality in the RCC. They have the Holy Spirit. Their sacramentalism, the verneration of Mary and the other saints, and the rather rigid hierarchy of the clergy are all foreign to us, and cause me some concern. Yet the Holy Spirit moves me there. And if the Spirit dwells in the RCC, who am I to argue?
I only want to grow in faith and faithfulness to Jesus Christ. If the RCC can help my wife and I to that end, then I am sold. I only wish the universal church were still unified so that we wouldn’t have to go through all of this turmoil. If we convert, our families will probably not understand.
I sense that the global church is moving towards unity. There are even a good number of “Evangelical Catholics” who have managed to reconcile Protestant and Catholic beliefs and practices. So, my spirit is hopeful and a little frightened at the possibility of stepping out of the boat.
My prayers are with you.
Michael Bates,
You are being rather presumptuous, to say nothing of putting the cart before the horse. If we don’t know God, the Scriptures will lead us into foolishness.
Michael Bates, even if iMonk isn’t offended by your posts, I am. Please try to be helpful.
Michael,
I can’t really say much. But God leads us upon paths inexplicable, often to break down our theologies, are carefully thought-ought schemes, our everything. Especially us from an evangelical background of sorts, because we have that subconcious desire to explain, and be fulfilled at the same time. And having gone through much of the same sphere of theories on Christian family life, I know it is really difficult to have that overthrown.
It helps to go back and the look at the “perfect” family lifes of the old testament saints - Abraham, Jacob, David, Samuel etc etc. And yet, they were the great saints of the OT. We have to break with our rationalistic, fundamentalistic way of reading the Scriptures. We have to concentrate on the Person of Jesus Christ. You see, it is easy to read “In this world you’ll have many troubles, but keep courage, I have overcome the world” - but it is much more difficult when those troubles are not clearcut good vs evil troubles, and when the cut into the closest bonds we have. That’s why it helps to “Be looking to Jesus, the author and finisher…..”
I’m not so sure God’s messages are always so unmistakeable. A friend of mine once mused, “I wonder how many times God tried to talk to Moses in a whispering breeze or something else small like that before appearing in the burning bush. In my experience, I’ve often found that God does try to speak to me in a still small voice, but I’m so bull-headed that I don’t recognize that it’s God until he bashes me on the head with a sledge hammer. Even though, I don’t always get it until the second or third blow.
I don’t know M.S.’s wife, but from what he writes, I’m more than willing to believe that this was more than a whim or just going with some inner hunch. She seems to be a very spiritual person who would carefully “test the spirits” to make sure she’s being led correctly.
Another lurker here. In the spirit of full disclosure, I am a cradle Catholic who has always been interested in the different expressions of Christianity.
I am sorry that you feel that your wife’s faith suggests that you do not have a true calling to ministry and that you are not part of the true church, or even that you are ultimately excluded from communion.
I will pray for both of you. The only advice I can give you is to continue to put your trust in Jesus Christ.
Michael Bates:
First, let me echo the commenter who says your posts could use a bit less vinegar, but I know you mean to be constructive.
Second, I am sure you are aware that no one studying the scriptures alone would be able to say “God led them” anywhere, whether it was Macarthur’s church or the local RCC.
Third, you are well aware that subjective experiences of the Holy Spirit are everywhere in scripture and unless you have a clear word on when God stopped personally relating to human beings in a subjective way, then I can assume it’s not crazy to say, “after reading scripture and praying, I believed God has specifically led me to _______ church.”
Fourth, don’t get me wrong. I give no quarter to the extrabiblical claims of any church, but the table of contents to the Bible isn’t IN the Bible, and someone “felt led” by various means to create the canon.
Bates, why do you think it is so impossible that God is calling her to join the RCC? What in scripture is so inimicable to her joining them?
There are all sorts of reasons why I may think it’s a bad idea, but scriptures fall WAY short of saying that no one should join a church like the RCC or even that a couple MUST be a part of the same denomination. I have seen God call people to do all sorts of ‘bad ideas’.
I’m not even close to knowing all the reasons why MS’s wife believes that she’s being called to join the RCC, and while there are enough problems with it that I would never recommend it, there’s certainly nothing in scripture that categorically bans a move like that.
So, the question comes up again - how do you (or MS) know that God isn’t calling her to this?
As for depression, I’ve been dealing with bipolar disorder for about a decade now. (Wow, it’s always a shock when you can start speaking of your life in terms of decades.) Anyway, depression and I are on a first name basis.
Actually, I’ve found that depression can be one of the times when I hear God’s voice most profoundly, and given that I’m usually laid up in bed hugging my pillow or a teddy bear, I have plenty of time to ponder it and am least likely to do anything presumptuous.
SusanF, I am trying to be helpful. Trost, the Scriptures are how we know God. MichaelC, depression doesn’t mean one can’t hear from God; but most of what people (depressed or not) call “hearing from God” is just their own hunches and vague inklings.
I grew up believing that God expected us to discern His will from inner promptings — somehow distinguishing between the promptings that were from Him and the hunches and inclinations that were strictly my own, somehow filtering out the effects of my emotional state. Garry Friesen’s book Decision Making and the Will of God was helpful in showing that that view was contrary to Scripture and that I could rest in the sufficiency of what God has revealed to us in His Word.
There are all kinds of things in life not revealed in scripture. I agree that we should avoid an unhinged mysticism. Ironically, my wife has been a strong advocate of a non-subjective approach to decision making. Her strong sense of divine leadership on this is just one of many aspects that are new and surprising. But life is about change, and I thank God that he meets all of us in the freedom of his Spirit.
My issue used to be on “spiritual unity” in the family, but it appears to me God doesn’t particularly have an opinion on that one. I was wrong.
Grace and peace to you and your wife Michael. Thank you for being honest. Grace to you.
My issue used to be on “spiritual unity” in the family, but it appears to me God doesn’t particularly have an opinion on that one. I was wrong.
God sure does have an opinion on that. He wants profound unity not only in marriages but in the Body of Christ (John 17 and many Pauline passages). That is an objective truth.
Identifying the sum of doctrinal propositions of such unity is, of course, the difficulty, because folks disagree on such content. But can’t we all agree that there is such a thing as “Christian truth” and “biblical truth”; that it is not relative to the person or group, and that there must be some objective way to discern it?
The one thing no one can say, it seems to me (Protestant or Catholic or Orthodox or “non-denominational” storefront church in Podunk) is that God has no opinion on spiritual unity and that there is no one truth to be discovered.
Protestants traditionally (but well past the “Reformation” period) have dealt with this conundrum by the notion of primary and secondary doctrines, with the latter being the dozens of doctrines and practices where they disagree and have found no way to determine the one true doctrine. I find that idea, however, to be totally absent from Scripture.
So we Catholics continue to argue in may ways that the Catholic Church is the fullness of Christian truth, embodied in the historical institution of the Church, led by the Holy Spirit and protected from doctrinal error.
And Protestants continue to argue that folks can disagree on the “secondary” issues and still have unity. Nuh-uh. That ain’t a biblical view. The original Protestants didn’t argue this way at all. They felt that they had spiritual and theological truth and fought for it. It’s only when liberalism came in and continuing Protestant sectarianism, that this other worldview of acceptance of the necessary presence of contradiction and error somewhere, started being accepted.
Dave Armstrong:
Thanks for your always gracious input. One comment…
>But of course if Catholics are not regarded as fellow Christians, just like any other fellow Protestant group, then extreme difficulty arises…
I can assure you Dave that in the competition to draw the most inclusive circle, I win hands down.
But that hasn’t made any difference here. My well known efforts to accept my RC brothers has now earned me the loss of mutual communion and visible fellowship with my wife for the rest of my life, not to mention the simple pleasures of mutual conversation about the faith.
God. He’s got quite a sense of humor
“I’ve given up believing in a God who cares about things like “head of the home,” “spiritual unity,” denominational churches and the “ministry marriage.” It was my foray into certain theologies that made me believe one could be certain about these things and the God who cooked them up. I was a fool.”
Before I say much on this, I want to say that my worry is less THAT you don’t believe in the items on the list, or a particular item, than WHY.
The underlying assumption seems to be that if God valued something, He would actively work to protect it. If He didn’t protect it, then He must not care about it. That is false. (It would be false even if every item on the list were unbiblical, too.) And that approach could lead to rejections of other Biblical things later. “In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). That decisions you made led to suffering doesn’t mean you were a fool.
If you’re regretting not only your sins, but your faithfulness (Perhaps wrong-headed sometimes, or ill-tempered—like the rest of the disciples), I think you must be in a pretty rough spot.
Dave Armstrong:
Well apparently the Roman Catholic (or Protestant) view of spiritual unity and a dollar will get me a cup of coffee, because it amounts to:
You’re married, but the church and your local RC hierarchy are the spiritual authorities in the home.
Protestant husbands can just deal or join.
As I said, if there is a God who operates on a system where I am supposed to be feeling pain over the lack of spiritual unity in this marriage, he’s found an odd way to express himself on it.
It makes far more sense to say that the God of the Bible actually divides marriages and families all the time, as can be read in various stories, and a man in ministry is a fool to believe God will keep his family united in one church as a way to maintain that ministry.
In fact, the bigger fool may be the one who thinks Jesus is keeping score on organized religion at all.
No such God exists.
peace
MS
Rick: Am I wrong that Jesus basically spoke as much about dividing families as he did about unifying them?
What comfort should I take that God wants my wife and I to go to the same church? I’ve assumed that for 30 years, and it wasn’t so. If he want it, he does nothing to make it happen, so am I supposed to pray to such a deity for unity? Why?
Michael S. - Thank you for being open and honest here in this forum. This kind of gut-wrenching sharing, while I’m sure is painful for you, is an encouragement to me and I pray it is to others as well. I wish we could see more of it in our churches today. I will be in prayer for you and Denise.
Michael Bates - Friesen’s book is one of my favorites as well. However, in my estimation, now is just not the right time for this kind of conversation. Save it for a later time.
Sometimes I wonder if God looks at Christendom and cries. There can be so much good in the variety of denominations and churches. Yet we also manage to create a great deal of hurt with those differences.
I live in a small town without many churches to choose among. Found a church whose teachings are ministering to me in important ways. But I can’t take communion there because I’m not a member, and I can’t become a member because I don’t agree with absolutely everything they teach.
When I’m sitting Sunday after sunday watching a communion I can’t participate in, maybe I should stop focusing on my own pain and begin to pray for others who also hurt because of denominational differences. Michael, you and your wife will be in my prayers. Thanks for sharing.
As you love your wife and she submits to you, try going to a foreign language Catholic or Orthodox Catholic service.
Your wife would probably agree to this suggestion, and you would be able to tolerate the church as you would not understand the words, but would understand the singing.
You both would be happier.
Pick your language based on your city, and most big cities have multitudes of languages from which to chose.
Thomas:
I’m not real clear on what you’re saying.
She’s very happy at her parish.
We can’t go together because she attends mass at a time when I am leading worship at my ministry. (Read the post folks.)
She wouldn’t want to go to a foreign language, and I know everything that’s going on, line by line, without explanation.
And as for this…
>…and she submits to you…
That’s not part of our marriage.
peace,
MS
Michael,
This was a harsh blessing to read. It was harsh because of how evident your pain is. It was a blessing because of the honest, blunt courage it takes to pursue the path you’re on. The heroism displayed by both you and your wife are heroic.
I found this in a liturgy book I picked up at a garage sale. I am not a Catholic, but may I offer a Catholic blessing to you and your wife?
When Christ took flesh through the Blessed Virgin Mary, he made his home with us. Let us now pray that he will enter this home and bless it with his presence. May he always be here among us; may he nurture our love for each other, share in our joys, comfort us in our sorrows. Inspired by his teachings and example, let us seek to make our home before all else a dwelling place of love, diffusing far and wide the goodness of Christ.
Amen
On the will of God books:
My wife has read, recommended and written about Watke’s book “The Will of God: A Pagan Notion?” She is well versed in the “reformed” view of this subject.
Michael,
I feel for you and will continue to pray. I surmised as much from some things you wrote.
Lots of things could be said in response to what you wrote, but I think this can wait. In the meantime, being reduced to Jesus and nothing but Him is not the worst place to be for healing to take place.
Your hard-won determination to love and honor your wife does you credit and will not go without its reward.
God bless you both!
I can assure you Dave that in the competition to draw the most inclusive circle, I win hands down.
Charmingly stated.
But that hasn’t made any difference here. My well known efforts to accept my RC brothers has now earned me the loss of mutual communion and visible fellowship with my wife for the rest of my life,
I still don’t understand why she can’t worship with you in your service. There is nothing contradictory at all in doing so, as long as she doesn’t go against anything she has come to believe. I would strongly urge her to do so. And perhaps one day you can at least attend Mass. You don’t have to kneel. You don’t have to violate anything you believe. It’s a gesture of unity.
not to mention the simple pleasures of mutual conversation about the faith.
This is clearly a personal issue. I don’t know either of you and it’s none of my business, and I have never been in your difficult situation (my wife and I always being either both Protestant or both Catholic), but it is not due to the nature of either faith community that difficulty in discussing the issues is present.
Why couldn’t, for example, both of you agree to read books the other would recommend, and then try to talk about it again at such a time when understandable passions and commitments are less like a throbbing, bleeding thumb that needs immediate attention and more like a small pain in the neck that one doesn’t like, but learns to live with?
My main objection is to extrapolate to God that somehow He doesn’t want unity because this situation has arisen. That doesn’t follow. I can understand the emotions of the situation, but I think you’d agree, based on what you’ve written, that emotionalism is not the way for you two to progress to the peace and harmony you both desire. It has to be resolved by objective means. You may continue to theologically disagree, but I don’t see why that means that there has to indefinitely be tension and strife.
That doesn’t necessarily follow at all. Certainly it is possible for folks to have an amiable conversation about theological differences, even when married!
So I think the primary factor there must be the dynamic of the relationship and your two personalities, which is none of our business (and forgive me for any unintentional intrusion), but is also not theological in cause, at bottom (and the latter is the primary point I am trying to make, awkwardly and inadequately though I am making it).
This isn’t a wake, folks. Say what you like. I’ll moderate accordingly.
Thanks Wolf.
Just a note about Catholics attending a Protestant service. It it permissible, however if a communion service is offered the Catholic must not participate.
This is easy for me to say, because it has not been my pain, broken dreams, or hurts, but thank you for sharing your journey with us! I am grateful for the ministry you, and your wife, have with us.
Thank you!
I think the real ecumenical frontlines where folks partake of the sufferings of Christ, groaning for healing of wounds, are within the marriages where faithful spouses struggle with their theological differences (for want of a better phrase).
While dangerous, frontlines of any type have somewhat compensating advantages, perhaps.
We can’t go together because she attends mass at a time when I am leading worship at my ministry. (Read the post folks.)
She can go on Saturday! That ain’t when your service is, right? It takes two to bend in these situations. Sounds like she’s being pretty inflexible if she would refuse to go to Mass on Saturday in order to maintain some sense of continuity of your former worship practices, and also attend yours. I don’t know all the details, but that certainly seems like one good avenue to go.
But I don[’t know all that has gone on. I’m sure she has her side of the story to tell, too, right?
I work with many people in one of my jobs, who are in this situation, so I give similar counsel all the time. I always urge Catholic converts to be as respectful and considerate of the feelings and opinions of their Protestant spouses as they can be. There are many ways to do that, that are often overlooked or spurned.
I think it is supremely important to emphasize common ground. There is so much! Virtually the entire Nicene Creed, etc.
Dave,
Again, thanks for the good responses.
First, she can worship with me whenever she wants. But I’m not going to church without her, and I’m not able to go with her. So that means we occasionally go to a church where she doesn’t belong and where I don’t worship.
Frankly- and I am a bit of an advocate of cutting the BS, if no one’s noticed- I don’t see the unity thing in going to each other’s churches. At every turn, we’re confronted with the myriad differences, and the whole “unity” bit is “how far can the Protestant walk toward the Catholic?” Well Dave I’ve been on that road for 30 years. Catholic books, retreats, services, spirituality….and now here we are. The exact result all my truly reformed critics predicted all along.
Then these conversations. First, everything my wife now rejects I taught her for 30 years as her pastor. Everything she now embraces that is distinctively RC is premised on views of authority and justification that I reject. How long can we talk about the devotional side of the faith before we walk into Marian dogmas, infallibility, papal authority, purgatory, indulgences, differing views of church history…we can’t even use the same Bible translation.
If these issues could be avoided- and perhaps they can- then praise the Lord. But look who you are talking to here Dave? Do I come off like a guy who can look past the biggest schism in the history of the faith and just enjoy the common ground? If we believe the Apostle’s Creed together, then why are we in different churches? I will never get around that one.
peace brother
MS
Mr. Spencer,
I am no theologian and my posts are often naive or pointless. Sorry.
I was drawn to this web site because of the stark honesty I see here and in the responses.
I was raised SBC and went though several iterations of evangelical movements, churches etc.
I have been studying RCC doctrine for some time now and frankly I am still confused.
The family members (including my wife) and friends that I have shared this with all think I am kidding, just being eccentric for its own sake or that I’m insane.
I don’t know what your wife heard but something or Someone is calling.
I have prayed for you and your family and will do so in the future.
Her parish has one service at 8 a.m. Sunday. That’s all. After that, it’s a 40 mile drive.
I can feel your pain and will plead for and your behalf, but am compelled to say that in and through your sharing there is great hope and in truth I found your honesty extremely refreshing, uplifting and encouraging! Wow! It must be (a tiny bit) like Jesus experienced on the cross. Expect good things, Brother! Blessing galore.
If Jesus spoke about dividing families as much as about unifying them, then you know this from his Word, not from experience. My point was not to defend one or another item from the list, but to say that you don’t find out what is right or wrong from whether or not you were successful in pulling it off.
My point was not really to defend any item. (And to tell you the truth, I only have guesses as to what half the items mean. We don’t have such terminology in our circles.) More that you have to be careful in how you identify these things as true or false. Use the wrong method on them, and the method could hurt you later.
If a friend of yours told you he had rolled the dice to decide whether or not to stay married, and the dice said “Yes,” you would be troubled. Not that he was staying in his marriage, but that the dice were deciding. Likewise here. The decisions in any case may be good ones. But the grounds of the decision should not be success.
“What comfort should I take that God wants my wife and I to go to the same church?”
I would want to know where such a belief came from in the first place. I can guess some verses that might make it more fitting under many circumstances. But not as an absolute.
“I’ve assumed that for 30 years, and it wasn’t so.”
What do you mean by assumed? I think when you listed it above you meant someone taught this. I don’t know whether they backed it up with Scripture. If the Scriptural case was good, then it was good counsel. If not, then not.
“If he wants it, he does nothing to make it happen,”
Hmmm. If I made the best case I could for such an idea, it would be from John 17:11. Among other things, Jesus prays that we would be one. That is not nothing. On the other hand, the counsel from 1 Corinthians 7:15 seems to suggest that peace means not using force to settle religious differences. It also says that there is no guarantee of success in resolving differences.
“so am I supposed to pray to such a deity for unity? Why?”
I don’t know what “unity” meant in the teaching you were given. We may have a bit of a gap here. Anyway, I think that we can pray that we would have the unity Jesus wanted for us, whatever that is. And I think He is actively working towards it. The Pauline counsel for peace is one piece of the puzzle, too. To figure out what this means in practice, I think we have to look to the broader counsel of Scripture.
Whether or not it’s what you would like to have, I think you and your wife DO have a degree of unity in this. You both believe in Christ and worship him. I think it is because of Jesus’ prayer that it is this good. The church survived the early Christological controversies. Imagine if this were an earlier century and one of you was becoming an Arian. Hard to imagine. Why? Because the church was protected. But the final answer to the prayer will be seen on the Last Day.
“22 Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.
25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her”
But in context, isn’t her submission contingent on whether you are submitting to Christ (not saying you are not)?
Hypothetically…just for the sake of argument…let us say that Christ ‘wants’ you to become Catholic, but for whatever reason (doctrinal issues that you presumably find unpalatable or false), you refuse.
At the point where you refuse submission to Christ’s Church (again assuming for the sake of argument that the RCC is Christ’s ‘true’ church), do you not then forfeit the right for you wife to submit to you?
Her submission is clearly also tied to your being willing to give yourself up for her, so the submission being discussed is not a blanket to make her do any and everything you want for her. I mean, if you asked her to murder someone, she shouldn’t submit to that, right? So there are conditions under which she must follow her conscience, no?
And the entire passage in which submission is discussed take place within the contexts of the church, not outside of it.
It seems obvious to me that the wife’s submission takes for granted that the husband too (and thus both) are being submissive to the church, and thus to Christ.
Now, I realize certainly that you likely find the claim that the RCC is that one and the same church, but assuming again for a moment that it is, is what I’ve laid out not even possible?
I apologize for rambling a bit…but the bottom line I am trying to convey is that yes…she should be submissive to you, but only to the extent that you to are being submissive.
IF (again, I know you disagree), she is right about the RCC and you are refusing to submit to where Christ wants to lead you, then I think this might explain how this all fits together.
Hopefully just some food for thought. I’ll be offering prayers for you.
Blessings in the name of Christ.
Rick: You know what Reformed Bible teachers have been telling me about spiritual unity and submission in marriage and the home. They never stop talking about it in most reformed churches.
I’ll wager that in the Gospels, Jesus promises and predicts more family division than he does family unity.
I just don’t see what the big deal was in the churches I grew up in to say that spiritual unity in the home was so important to God that I could assume my wife and I would always agree on its importance over our differing preferences. We could have found a third way, another option, etc. But no. It’s been the either/or from minute one, and all at the direct command of God. My choices are then to tell my wife she’s nuts or a liar, or to force some kind of “submission” which is abusive. Or I can just deal with it and make no adjustments in theology. (Not an option for me) or I can be honest for once and say that God doesn’t have any guarantees on any aspect of my marriage, and it’s a waste to plead with him or be angry with him as if he’s not coming through.
>Hypothetically…just for the sake of argument…let us say that Christ ‘wants’ you to become Catholic, but for whatever reason (doctrinal issues that you presumably find unpalatable or false), you refuse.
At the point where you refuse submission to Christ’s Church (again assuming for the sake of argument that the RCC is Christ’s ‘true’ church), do you not then forfeit the right for you wife to submit to you?
Well there’s the whole RC view of submission in a nutshell. 1) Premised on the assumption we should all be in submission to an organization that claims to be an exclusive franchise of Jesus Christ in the world, 2) my wife should submit to me as I submit to this organization.
I think it goes without saying that I am not “invincibly ignorant,” and therefore I am, as I read it, most certainly damned for my rejection of the organization of the Roman Church as the true and exclusive body of Christ outside of which there is no salvation for those who, knowing that, refuse it.
So there is no basis for submission in our family other than the general Christian command to love one another, which is enough to keep us busy for years I assure you
Oh, Michael and Denise, how I pray for you both as you enter this new relationship. Here are a few words from my favorite poet, Ruth Harms Calkin:
I sit here at my desk
With Your Word before me–
A red pencil in my hand.
Suddenly the word KEEP
Looms from the page
Black and bold:
“He will KEEP
KEEP
KEEP
What which I have committed…”
Really, Lord?
This haunting anxiety?
This brick barrier which is
Blocking my peace?
This sinister intrusion?
It’s so heavy, Lord
The weight of it is breaking me.
But You said You’d KEEP
So I give it to You now
Palms down.
RELEASE!
RELIEF!
LAUGHTER!
JOY!
Frankly- and I am a bit of an advocate of cutting the BS, if no one’s noticed- I don’t see the unity thing in going to each other’s churches.
The unity I was referring to in that recommendation presupposed that worshiping together was very important to you. It isn’t theological unity so much as it is marital unity and consideration of the other. I was going by what you wrote:
“Because of the church she has chosen to attend, we will rarely ever attend worship together again. We will no longer be together in any kind of worship setting except the occasional seasonal worship experience or required school event. Our shared Christian fellowship will be minimal.”
Now, I interpreted this as an expression of personal, emotional agony, not abstract theological difference. I am saying that there are ways to still worship together. Everyone knows you don’t agree on everything. That ain’t the point. I’m not advocating warm fuzzy pseudo-ecumenism. I despise that. But it is two Christians worshiping together insofar as they are able.
How long can we talk about the devotional side of the faith before we walk into Marian dogmas, infallibility, papal authority, purgatory, indulgences, differing views of church history…
It may be that you have to avoid those “hot issues” for the time being. But you can discuss things like the incarnation, the Holy Trinity, the deity of Jesus, the Resurrection, salvation by grace alone, heaven and hell, angels, the inspiration of the Bible (setting aside the deuterocanon for now), baptism, many moral teachings held in common. There is a world of things you can discuss in unity. Just avoid those where you clash. Most married couples have those areas that they avoid for the sake of peace, whether it has to do with various areas of finance or childrearing, or sexual frequency and various sensitivities in that regard, and so forth. Why should theology be any different?
But these are personal, personality, marital issues, of how to talk about this stuff, not solely theological and ecclesiological. Nothing in catholicism per se requires that there MUST be marital friction. People can talk, just like you and I are right now and have in the past.
A Protestant-Catholic marriage has tensions because it is a difference, period, not because it is specifically a theological difference. And the way this rather painful, agonizing difference is worked out is like any other difference in marriage: by compromise, a lot of listening, and both parties being willing to bend and give in, in areas where they are allowed to do so.
I’m very concerned that this not become another excuse to criticize Catholicism. I disagree strongly that it is the nature of Catholicism to make married couples miserable because one is Protestant. There will naturally be an unavoidable strain, from differences, but that goes back to why married couples have a hard time with any number of differences and disagreements.
we can’t even use the same Bible translation.
Huh? I use RSV, which seems to be the translation of choice of many catholics I know. Is that a “Catholic” translation? Of course it is not. It is a “modernized KJV.” I use it in all my books. This is not a dividing point, or shouldn’t be at all.
Do I come off like a guy who can look past the biggest schism in the history of the faith and just enjoy the common ground?
You look to me very much like a guy who loves your wife and wants to be happily married; a man in pain right now (quite understandably so). You look like a guy who can willingly avoid certain things (not necessarily forever) for the sake of this marriage and the woman that you dearly love. And I’m sure the same goes for her. This is not the worst possible thing. Imagine if she had become an atheist or a Muslim? You wanna talk about marital friction!? She is still a Christian; you say so yourself.
It’s right to feel the pain of separation on both sides (I’m the only Catholic in my entire extended family), but for heaven’s sake, why can’t we rejoice in what we hold in common, too? What in the world is wrong about that? It’s not head-in-the-sand or pie-in-the-sky: it is acknowledging a reality where two people have strong differences, but they also have a helluva lot in common too, as Christians. When there is tension it is only sensible and smart to emphasize the commonalities. Once things calm down, then you can do the “heavy” conversations (if you are able to disagree amiably with each other).
If we believe the Apostle’s Creed together, then why are we in different churches? I will never get around that one.
Simple: a guy named Martin Luther decided that he would no longer believe in an infallible Church (even the Orthodox hadn’t gone THAT far: they simply denied the supremacy of the pope). He decided to adopt Bible Alone as the principle of formal authority, or rule of faith (quite contrary to what the fathers believed). That’s why we’re separated, because the Church is the only plausible, feasible principle of unity. The Bible can’t be that in and of itself because it has to be interpreted and then we are right back to questions of authority.
I’m not arguing my side at the moment: simply stating facts as to where the difference arose. The principles changed; the rules changed. That is far more important as to the cause of continuing divisions than even stuff like indulgences, Mary, and the pope. This is rather obvious, I think, when one sees what Luther continued to retain in his theology (and I just finished writing a book about him, so I know a little bit about it: some learned while writing the book).
Michael:
I’m no expert on the whole idea of wifely submission, etc in the RCC, but I do know that it’s got a rich history of female saints whose stories begin with them either
1) Escaping the authority of their fathers, refusing to marry men chosen for them
2) Wives (and husbands) who, after children have been raised (usually!) leave traditional married life to join a convent, monastery, be a hermit and so on.
Not exactly the same, I know, but there is this sense in Catholicism that yeah, God is a greater authority than any family member.
That said, and with all due respect, I just can’t relate to a husband saying of his wife, “I’m her pastor..this is what I’ve taught her.” That’s outside my experience. People are on journeys together. They teach each other. Maybe I just don’t get the relationship of a married minister to his wife. To all Protestant ministers think of themselves as their spouse’s pastor with pastoral authority over them?
Dave,
Very gracious as always, and a lot of calm wisdom. Which I need (if anyone’s noticed:-)
Let’s say the local RCC asks me to come over and speak on the Trinity.
Here’s the problem. Every word I speak will come from a Protestant view of authority. They will sit there thinking “He stole that from us, and won’t acknowledge it. The poor dupe thinks sola scriptura got him the Trinity.” And I’m up there thinking “I feel like a fundamentalist up here reading verses, when I know at the end of the day, these dear folks are going to say “it’s true because the church teaches it.”
We’ll get along, but that’s what’s happening.
I’ve spent a lot of times with RC friends. Of course, I wasn’t the pastor and primary teacher for any of them for 30 years before they joined the RCC.
I wrote a while back that I miss my Merton-Catholicism. No tension. Lots of mutual respect and acceptance.
Amy W tells me not to watch or listen to EWTN, and I guess I made the mistake of letting the whole apologetics thing shake me up, because now I just feel like there are no conversations. Just judgments on one another. We’d do better to talk about anything but.
Well there’s the whole RC view of submission in a nutshell. 1) Premised on the assumption we should all be in submission to an organization that claims to be an exclusive franchise of Jesus Christ in the world,
We don’t claim to be that at all. We claim to be the one Church that was set up by Jesus, and the fullness of theological truth, but by no means do we deny that Jesus is active and present (even to salvation) in Protestantism. I have provided you information in the past, myself, to demonstrate this, right from Vatican II. Our view of y’all is infinitely better than most of your confessions think of us, where we’re either the antichrist or whore of Babylon, or engage in “Baal worship” (Lutheran confessions) or rank blasphemies and idolatries in every Mass (Calvin, Luther, Zwingli et al).
2) my wife should submit to me as I submit to this organization.
Are you contending that a wife has to submit to a husband even in a matter of conscience like religious belief? I find that utterly astonishing, if so. You can’t force someone to believe a certain thing. They are free as an individual before God to make that choice on their own. That doesn’t come under submission, and I would say that any notion of submission that would preclude religious freedom and freedom of conscience is abuse and not a biblical teaching, and conscience and following God at all costs are clearly superior to the prerogatives of a husband in headship.
That said, I would say that your wife should respect your feelings and do all she can to maintain existing common ground in these matters, including worshiping together. If it means an 80-mile drive to do so, she should do it in a heartbeat. And I would say that IS respecting you as the head, insofar as she can do so in good conscience. She violates nothing in Catholicism to do that. Many people drive 40 miles one way to work every day. One day a week wouldn’t or shouldn’t put anyone out.
Greg, I HAD NO AUTHORITY over her as her pastor. NONE, and I never meant to imply I did.
It’s just a personal thing. She’s listened to me preach and teach for 30 years. All the churches, all the ministries have been TOGETHER. Good times and bad. We believed the same things, had the same Gospel and the same heart for our kids and our people.
How I feel about the end of that is not a matter of “authority over her.” It’s a matter of all that our lives were as minister and wife, a relationship I idealized, I admit. Too much.
Dave,
Thanks again.
Obviously, avoiding an abuse of conscience is why I’ve treated all of this as I have. Trust me, within my fundamentalist Baptist tradition, what is going on in this house makes me a complete failure as a husband and disqualifies me for ministry, so I’d like to avoid the suggestion I am pressuring anyone’s conscience.
But I disagree with the view that individual conscience trumps spiritual unity in the family. That is why a COMPROMISE was the best solution, in my view. But in the RC view, that is not the case. If Denise and I had an AMiA church next door, going to it together would change nothing.
And Dave, I don’t buy or promote any of that weird rhetoric, but the RCC does believe it is the exclusive franchise of Jesus. That doesn’t mean the rest of the stores have no merchandise, but you guys are clear on where the original warehouse is located.
That language (exclusive franchise) doesn’t mean I don’t realize you affirm that God works in other bodies and traditions as they are related to the RCC. But it is why I am not a god called, legitimately ordained, valid minister of the Gospel, and my wife cannot consider me so and be a good RC. I am a useful servant of an ecclesial body whom God may have used, but that’s as far as it goes.
peace
MS
umm…can I clarify?
I advised Michael not to listen to EWTN programming simply because of its apologetics nature and he reacts REALLY STRONGLY against Catholic apologetics. I just didn’t think it would help at that point in time and would engender even more negative feelings on his part.
Greg,
you ask: “To all Protestant ministers think of themselves as their spouse’s pastor with pastoral authority over them?”
Can’t speak for all, don’t want to speak for Michael. But a great friend, mentor, and prof, once told me “you can’t be your wifes shrink, nor can you be her pastor.” Of course, your wife will go to church, maybe even Bible study and learn from you, hear the gospel from you, take the sacrament from your hand etc. But you will never have the same pastoral relationship with your wife, or your children, as you do with the rest of your congregation.
Sorry if I misspoke Amy…My apologies for misspeaking.
You’ve probably heard of Taize. It is a style of worship designed specifically to bring people from different Christian traditions together - while still allowing individuals to remain in full communion with their own congregations.
If there is no such service in your area, maybe you and your wife can work together to start one. It might turn out to be a blessing for other people as well.
We were part of a liturgical house church for a year up to the point this began. My hope was it would be the church experience we craved.
You can see the result. Ending my sponsorship of that group was one of the saddest of sad events in all of this.
Compromise has simply been the road to the RCC, and that is as it should be, really. Why should my wife wander among liturgical evangelicals if she believes the RC’s view of the eucharist and the church?
Hi Michael,
Thanks for your kind words. You’ve always been a gentleman and a class act yourself, in our interactions.
Let’s say the local RCC asks me to come over and speak on the Trinity.
Here’s the problem. Every word I speak will come from a Protestant view of authority. They will sit there thinking “He stole that from us, and won’t acknowledge it. The poor dupe thinks sola scriptura got him the Trinity.” And I’m up there thinking “I feel like a fundamentalist up here reading verses, when I know at the end of the day, these dear folks are going to say “it’s true because the church teaches it.”
No No NO!!!!! That’s not how most Catholics I know would think about it at all. We would rejoice in the truths you taught about, knowing that we hold them in common. We would be glad to learn more about a highly important subject. It wouldn’t matter a hill of beans that you were a Protestant, anymore than it matters that William Lane Craig is a Protestant philosopher when he defend=s the Resurrection or gives his brilliant version of the Cosmological Argument. I love that stuff, and so do most sensible Catholics. We quickly forget that the source may happen to be a Protestant and rejoice in the truth presented.
Only a stupid, polemically-motivated, over-zealous Catholic would think the way you have characterized. Now, granted, if there were some big debate about the topic, some of that might come out, but even then, I think you have caricatured our position.
I’m an apologist, and I have written about this very thing, and I would never present it in such terms. It’s far more complex than that. But in a nutshell, I would say: yes, the Trinity can be explicitly proven from many biblical passages. I do this myself. I presuppose that it is clear and undeniable from Scripture Alone.
What we actually say about the authority issue with regard to the Trinity is that (much as you would say, I’m sure) human sin and false premises can cause sinful human beings to distort this Bible and find in it a non-trinitarian view. We see the examples all around us: JWs, Christadelphians, Mormons et al. So an authgoritative Church is very useful to dogmatically declare things.
It doesn’t follow from that that the Trinity was not clear in the Bible alone without the Church. If you read the fathers opposing the Arians, you see this dynamic very clearly. They argue for the Bible, but then they end the argument by appealing to the Church and apostolic tradition. The forst thing is the material element and the second is the formal. They’ll say, “the Church has always taught the Holy Trinity all the way back to the beginning; therefore it is true, because the Church is protected by the Holy Spirit, and the teaching goes back to Jesus and the apostles.”
But the Arians had no such history they could produce, so they had to fall back on Bible alone: but they distorted the Bible with bogus proof texts that Jesus was supposedly created.
Both things are true: both/and: the Trinity is true because the Bible teaches it, and it is true because the Church has always taught it. The second is not “over” the first, as if the first has no validity in and of itself.
We believe exactly the same about the canon of the Bible. The Bible is what it is, independently of the Church declaring it to be so. The books do not become inspired merely because the Church said so. They are inspired because they are God-breathed. Vatican I and Vatican II both state this. Nevertheless, it is good to have an authoritative list of canonical books because, in fact, fathers disagreed somewhat on those in the early centuries, and an objective statement was necessary to avoid continuing disagreement.
We’ll get along, but that’s what’s happening.
I’ve spent a lot of times with RC friends. Of course, I wasn’t the pastor and primary teacher for any of them for 30 years before they joined the RCC.
You can always find people who will think in stupid ways. In the end, you can only go by official Church teachings. But I have not found this particular thing to be the case very often, and I was a committed evangelical for 13 years and have been a committed Catholic for 17, and an apologist in both camps.
I wrote a while back that I miss my Merton-Catholicism. No tension. Lots of mutual respect and acceptance.
That’s because Merton doesn’t write much about doctrine. It’s easy to get along on that spiritual plane. But the informed ecumenical view is not all that different. Yet you don’t seem to think much of it.
Some have told me not to watch or listen to EWTN, and I guess I made the mistake of letting the whole apologetics thing shake me up, because now I just feel like there are no conversations. Just judgments on one another. We’d do better to talk about anything but.
Are we not talking sensibly right now? It is entirely possible with us. It may not be with your wife in the near future, though, for many understandable reasons.
Michael,
Your point about being continually reminded of your differences if you go to church with your wife makes sense. I sensed it myself before my conversion and I knew (and still know) much less than you. As a minister you can’t possibly miss the differences and on some days they would be extreme. The Assumption of Mary, a Holy Day of Obligation each August 15th is one such example.
It’s not fair to you to expect that you just stop believing what you’ve preached for 30 years, and this shouldn’t be a one sided test of how tolerant Michael can be (you must be pretty tough though judging from the blog).
If you can suffer in silence then I think attending mass with your wife on the days where schedules permit would be a powerful sign of your love for her and that alone is reason enough to go. However if you think going might start a fight or create resentment I wouldn’t go.
I’m more bothered by you not wanting to attend your own evangelical church again, assuming you would’ve continued to go otherwise.
Also Mike I’m glad you don’t paper over the differences between the Catholics and Protestants. They really aren’t that small and it’s dishonest to pretend that you could ignore them. The best we can do is tolerate without approving, and show respect for the person across the divide, if not for their beliefs. It’s simply false to pretend there is no divide.
Hi Michael,
But I disagree with the view that individual conscience trumps spiritual unity in the family. That is why a COMPROMISE was the best solution, in my view. But in the RC view, that is not the case. If Denise and I had an AMiA church next door, going to it together would change nothing.
How does one compromise in matters of conscience? This is a huge can of worms. If she thinks and believes in faith one set of doctrines is truth and you subscribe to another, with equally heartfelt faith and sincerity, though they actually intersect about 60-70%, the other areas where they differ do not allow either party to ignore what they themselves believe.
So how does one compromise in such a situation? Become an Anglican? She can’t do that, because Anglicans ditched the papacy (due to a certain prominent personages problems with lust), and today they ordain practicing homosexuals. They disagree with you in other profound ways, so that you can’t subscribe to their creed, as a Baptist, etc.
So what is accomplished by going there? Very little. Both of you still disagree profoundly with things there: some the same, some separately. Therefore, it is no solution, because going to such a “compromise” place violates both of your consciences and principles.
So what else is there? Lutheranism? The same thing would apply on a lesser scale: she would disagree with all that Lutherans tossed out (I have documented 50 things that Luther dissented on by 1520). You don’t accept stuff like baptismal regeneration and the real presence in the Eucharist. LCMS has closed communion, too, so neither of you could partake. What does it solve? Nothing.
Orthodoxy? There, you would have more problems than she, but neither could partake of communion.
So there is no “compromise” in this sense. She can’t change what she believes, and you can’t, either, except by the usual means of persuasion and God changing folks’ hearts. The only way to “compromise” is to do exactly what I have suggested: go easy, avoid hot topics, stress common ground, and worship together insofar as you can do so. When she is at your service, at least she’s in a place with you where YOU fully accept the creed or statement of belief (and much of it she can agree with).
If you go with her to Mass, then you are in a place where she fully accepts the belief-system. At least one party is accepting the beliefs of the surroundings, whereas in attending these other churches, that is never the case for either of you.
This is what people do when they have differing beliefs that don’t allow compromise, by their nature. One can’t be half pro-life or half pro-choice. I can’t say that sodomy is permissible on Tuesdays and Thursdays,. as a loving concession to well-meaning homosexual persons. No; I have to say (with all love and no hatefulness) that it is wrong all the time.
So what in the world do you mean when you say that “a COMPROMISE was the best solution”? How does that work? I can’t imagine any scenario that would be anywhere near satisfactory. But we can tolerate differences that we have with each other. it’s a lot harder (and, I think, more praiseworthy) to get along with existing profound differences, than to minimize these and adopt some “compromise” that is pleasing to no one and compromises both people.
WOW!~~that’s all I can say to your post and the comments. I have no advise to offer but will pray for you.
OOOPS, I should have added Michael, that wasn’t one of those “threatening to pray” statements but sincere. I can’t imagine the struggle you and your wife have been through and I have been enjoying your blog for many months. So I feel like you’re a friend who could really use some prayers right now.
Michael,
I read this (and the comments) and wanted to weep for you and your wife. What you are both going through is very hard. May God be with you both.
Many in the comments are seeking to give you advice. While this may be helpful in some ways, I can’t help thinking that what you really need right now is a hug. Consider this a virtual hug.
As one who grew up in rural baptist fundamentalism and has flirted with the RCC without converting, I can imagine the mixture of feelings going on within you. The baptists I grew up under would have considered your wife’s movement as a conversion to paganism. Thus, I can understand why you would be wary of attending local churches. Some of the people commenting don’t seem to be aware of how strong anti-catholic feelings are within certain sections of the SBC.
Peace be with you brother.
Michael,
What a tough situation. I’m sorry. Jesus definitely promised division. He also prayed for unity: unity among his followers in the Spirit and in truth. So that’s what I’ll pray for. I know–easy for me to say. I’ll admit that I’m a wimp and hate division.
About sensing God’s leading. I am a sola scriptura guy, and yet I believe in God subjectively leading us, through promptings, dreams, good advice, circumstances, etc. It’s all a very personal process. However, Satan, the great imitator, can also lead through false impressions, bad advice, etc. The answer to how you would know if the leading your wife sensed is legit lies partly in the fruit. E.g., if you sense a leading to have an affair, you can pretty much guess who’s at the source of the ‘leading’. Spirit and truth.
At the risk of sounding like I’m minimizing your pain, I will also pray that your fellowship with Jesus will grow so much that it dwarfs your current agony.
MODERATOR: I am allowing this comment solely for the education of the audience reading this thread. THIS is what I’ve heard for the last 30 years.
>>And as for this…
>…and she submits to you…
That’s not part of our marriage.<<
This is the problem of course. Men and women are not equal, and the modern worship of equality leads many women to depression as they are not designed to carry the responsibility of making family decisions.
It is like trying to ballroom dance where both partners lead. Obviously, one partner (the woman) needs to follow. To follow means to submit. It boggles my mind that this is not practiced in your marriage.
Many “fundamentalist by not listening” Baptists are more like Muslims or Mormons, in that they “force” women to submit. This is also clearly wrong.
Rather, a man should love his wife, whether she is rebellious or submissive. A woman should submit to her husband, whether he loves her or not.
There never exists a situation where a woman submits to her man and is subsequently forced to sin. God will protect her. Have you not read the story of Sarah, Abraham and the Egyptian Pharaoh?
>It boggles my mind that this is not practiced in your marriage.
Welcome to the real world, Thomas. Everyone isn’t like you. I love my wife as Christ wants me to, but she can’t submit to me in these matters. I don’t own her.
Abraham and Sarah and the Pharaoh? God wants me to lend my wife to a Harem to save myself?
If you want to start citing old testament examples of the treatment of women, I think we should cut to the chase and start talking about beating them.
Dang. Thanks for your honesty, Michael. I have never been through anything quite like this but I do know what it’s like to watch perfectly good desires and dreams go up in smoke for no apparently good reason. I know it sucks.
If I may say (feel free to stop reading, if I may not), some of the things you wrote about not being part of the true church, not having a real calling, never having served a true communion — if I understand you here — are, well …. hmmm …. Look, I would just encourage you to make room for other perspectives on these things that might come to you as you work through this time in your life.
Anyway, will send up a prayer. Thanks again for the honesty. If nothing else, maybe you’ve encouraged some others of us out here to be similarly honest in our churches and communities, which is something evangelicaldom sorely needs.
>>Abraham and Sarah and the Pharaoh? God wants me to lend my wife to a Harem to save myself?
If you want to start citing old testament examples of the treatment of women, I think we should cut to the chase and start talking about beating them.<<
I am unfamiliar with any Old Testament examples of Godly men beating women.
However, starting with Eve, whenever women took the initiative while ignoring their husband’s headship, bad things happened.
Conversely, when men became warrior poets, strong and courageous whilst being meek and gentle simultaneously, redemption was close at hand.
aaakk!!!….I think I blinded myself by reading Thomas’s comment.
So….Thomas…..
Assuming for a moment that your view was correct….a very big assumption, indeed….What would a man in Michael’s position do? Yell, scream, threaten with God’s wrath? Be unkind, ignoring, petulant? Disfellowship her from the local congregation?
His wife is her own person, as are all wives. To