An Honor

This past spring I made a life-changing decision: I left the Catholic Church that I had been raised and schooled in all of my life and became a Protestant, a Presbyterian to be exact. It was the wisest thing I have ever done.

My best friend always used to tell me that I was the “most Protestant Catholic” she had eve met. By that she meant that I was not big on saints, relics, man-made commandments that were supposed to supplement God’s original twelve, the Rosary, transubstantiation, confession, or a lot of the other trappings of the Catholic faith. The only thing that I cared about or believed in was Jesus, the Father and the Spirit…God in other words.

It was not until I began teaching religious education at my parish that I realized just how right my friend was and just how wrong I was to be a Catholic, let alone be trying to teach Catholicism to fifth graders. I realized that I wasn’t really teaching them Catholicism…I was teaching them about God, about having a real relationship with God by following the example of Christ, and seeing the Spirit not only within others but within themselves. To look upon all people with the realization that saints are not just special people the Church decides to elevate to some higher standard, but that all people including themselves were saints because they believed in Jesus and followed his teachings. This was pretty unorthodox teaching for a fifth grade CCD class…and while the kids thought I was “awesome” I don’t think the hierarchy of the church would have agreed.

I tried, desperately, to teach “the party line”…but just couldn’t. I finally resigned from the teaching and did great deal of soul searching. I read about different Protestant denominations and decided that the one that seemed to match my mindset was the Presbyterian Church. There was no hierarchy; the people ran the church through a governing body called The Session. There was no teaching that only men could be ministers of the Gospel, in fact, the pastor of the congregation I decided to join was a woman! And so, after attending several services, I approached the pastor and asked how one went about converting.

The answer was simple: keep attending services, taking part in the fellowship hour after services each Sunday and talking to the members. This was the best way to learn about what they believed and why. And so I did this for several more weeks. Finally, I went to the pastor and said I had decided to convert and become a member of her congregation.

Several weeks after that, I was voted into the congregation by the Session, and stood beside my best friend to profess my faith and be welcomed into the community.

That was back in March. Since then I have joined the choir, taught vacation bible school, hosted the fellowship hour and was invited to join the Christian Education Committee. I’ve been more active in this church in six months than I ever was in the Catholic Church in almost sixty years! Not because I didn’t want to be active, but because there were only certain things a woman could do in the Catholic Church. Here I’ve had no such limitations.

Now I have been nominated to become a member of the Session. I would b taking the place of a member who had to drop out due to personal matters and will be finishing out her term for the next year. I never expected to be offered such an honor in such a short space of time. It’s truly a miracle in my mind and I am so very grateful to the Lord for guiding my steps to this new life.