sententiarum collectio

Month: November 2019

Why Protestants Convert

I am grateful for each of the articles in this series about “crossing the Tiber”, particularly for the authors’ understanding, compassion, and holistic approach.

“If Protestantism cannot sustain and satisfy the souls and bodies of its adherents, we can hardly complain when they look elsewhere.”
“Eventually, we became so accustomed to the shocking notion that a Holy God could pardon filthy sinners that we forgot there was anything particularly odd about it. . . . Rather than standing confidently before Him clothed in the righteousness of Christ, we waltz casually into his presence with gym shorts and a latte.”
“Our historical awareness of the Christian faith must rise above the popular Protestants tropes of the “Ditch Theory.”. . . To be sure, the Ditch Theory is a caricature; and yet, its storyline is implicit in much Protestant teaching. As Tom Howard, a Protestant-turned-Catholic, writes, “[Evangelicals] speak of the ancient faith as though the Bible had swum into view just this morning and as though one’s approach to it is simply to open it, read, and start running.” And the more independent and separatist a church, the deeper the ditch, and, conversely, the more attractive will be the Catholic claim to an unbroken and historic church.”
“To reason from “my evangelical megachurch is a joke” to “Rome has the answers” might not be a compelling logical syllogism, but it is a compelling emotional one.”
“The Reformers were dedicated to Scripture above all else, but not to the exclusion of all else…They were avid students of human history and human nature. In a word, they were humanists.”

We’re All Carnies

We’re all carnies, though some people are in denial. They want to be above it all, above the mayhem of laughter and people and lights and animals and the dark sadness that lurks in the corners and beneath the rides and in the trailers after hours. So they ride the Ferris wheel, and at the top, they think they’ve left it all behind. They’ve ascended to a place where they can take things seriously. Where they can be taken seriously.

Let them have their moment. You and I can eat our corn dogs and wait and smile. Solomon smiles with us.

The wheel turns. The earth spins and runs its laps. We all go around.

N. D. Wilson, Notes from the Tilt-a-Whirl

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