Sunday, August 30, 2009

My friend the future Catholic Priest

I had lunch today with a buddy that I've had the privilege of knowing and ministering with over the past handful of years. It was a very encouraging conversation. He is a solid, solid Christian brother who, despite leading worship and being heavily involved with us at an Evangelical Free Church, continued to attend a Catholic Mass throughout the time I've known him. He had previously been planning on pursuing a post graduate degree and would have done very well for himself had he done so, but felt an obvious call on his life elsewhere. He knew that God was leading him into ministry. Seminary, more specifically. And Catholic Seminary in particular. I have to admit, my encounters with Catholicism have left me less than impressed and have left a sour taste on my tongue. But I know my friend's heart and we had some great discussion on his calling and what that will look like going forward along with some good discussion that helped me dispel some of the bad perceptions I have of Catholic Theology and the Catholic Church in general. I'm not really sure where I'm going with this, but I guess what I want to say is that I feel very, very good knowing that a man of such solid faith in Christ is going to be moving towards a position of ministry within the Catholic Church and I look forward to seeing how God uses him!

4 comments:

Unknown said...

well said, my brother

David Baxley said...

I have had a similar journey over the past few years. You know how much Amy love Mother Angelica. I think it has been evangelical leaders that have made evangelicals have a bad taste in their mouths about Catholics more then our actual experience with Catholics...don't you think?
And probably vis versa for them as well.

Mason Rebarchek said...

I think there's truth to that. I think a lot of my negative feelings stem from a smattering of encounters with small town priests while growing up and the way the media only reports on the negative about the church. Additionally, I think that my personal preference for style of worship doesn't match the Catholic chuch...

David Best said...

good thoughts.