Meeting Christ whilst going through the motions

I have now attended three RCIA classes covering such diverse topics as the nature of the Church, the sacraments of Baptism, Confirmation and Healing and Ecumenism. There was, it must be admitted, nothing too challenging or surprising which is probably understandable when almost everyone else on the course is converting due to a spouse or family member who is already a Catholic.

Sometimes it feels like I am only attending to tick all the right boxes, to show willing so I can do what in my heart I know is the right thing. But then I stop and realise that the last eighteen months has meant facing challenges in my own life and issues in my marriage that this has brought to the surface. The specific time since January that I have attended the RCIA group has been an intensive time of self-reflection where I have had to come face-to-face with my own sinfulness and failures, and to bring to the fore those dreams for my life that haven't come true.

Last week I was able to go on a retreat day hosted by our Bishop. The talks were excellent (especially the Bishop's passionate defence of the centrality of the Eucharist) but it was the chance to pray before the sacrament for an hour, thinking through the many heartaches and worries I have, giving them to God and praying for my family and my rather precarious work situation. In the midst of all of these worries I found Christ again, I knew his presence was there; and I knew that, in the end all would be well.

"Where the bishop appears, there let the people be"

Wherever the bishop appears, there let the people be; as wherever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church. It is not lawful to baptise or give communion without the consent of the bishop. On the other hand, whatever has his approval is pleasing to God. (St Ignatius, Letter to the Smyrnaeans)

St Ignatius of Antioch

For a while I owned the trade magazine for the religious publishing and retail industry here in the UK. After I sold it in 2002 I continued to write articles for the new owner. One rather daunting task was an extended round-up of titles on Church history - from the popular to the academic. With my growing awareness of the breadth of Christianity I made sure I included titles from Catholic and Orthodox perspectives and publishers.

In the extensive reading for preparation for the article I can remember being startled, ut somewhat encourage, by a number of things. The Real Presence in the Eucharist was there from the earliest post-Apostolic writers and, most importantly at that moment, the Episcopacy. My Christian formation up to this point was essentially Baptist - local Churches that are self-governing with a multiplicity of 'elders' governing the congregation. I had thought until recently at this point that this was the 'clear teaching' of Scripture. The evidence from the few generations after the apostles gave me considerable pause for thought.

In particular, the quote above from the early Church Father St Ignatius was light a lightening bolt that illuminated, initially briefly, the centrality of the Episcopacy for the validity of the Church. Without a Bishop there was no true Church, and no guarantee of the presence of Christ.

It took another eight years, and much more research, for this to form into a convinced belief in the importance of Apostolic succession. The implications of this became clear to me in 2011 but it took another eighteen months before I finally started to act on it.

RCIA and church-bashing

I was able to attend my first RCIA course evening last week and I was delighted that my wife was able to come along and support me. As the priest I have been meeting with predicted, I found the content a little bit basic - a study of the Resurrection and a short session on 'One Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church' - but it was interesting to see the variety of people also attending. The truth is, having worked through some of the Catechism, having read the Compendium to the Catechism and also digested other papal documents I don't really need any convincing.

It was quite wonderful to listen to the Deacon who was doing the presentations though. He was 90 years old, converted from Anglicanism in 1960 and was ordained deacon 25 years ago. His life experience, wisdom and gentle approach was perfect for the session.

However, at the end there was a time of open discussion and one lady - who completed the RCIa last year and was accompanying her daughter this time through - engaged in a certain amount of vocal criticism for what she saw as the spiritual 'deadness' in the Church of England. In fairness, the Deacon quickly closed this down with a comment about not bashing other churches and how important ecumenism was, but for wife the damage was done. She is currently completely committed to the Church of England and found this rather upsetting. Not so much because of the C of E, but because it displayed a sectarianism that she wasn't expecting.

By the time we were able to sit down with our Priest the following Thursday things had calmed down somewhat and we had a fruitful time talking through various issues with him.

This weekend we are attending the local cathedral for Candlemas (or the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord as I think it is now called). It is the first time in around a decade that the feast day has fallen on a Sunday and we plan to take some candles along to be blessed.

Back on the Journey

It’s been over a year since I last posted. Everything was put on hold just before Christmas in 2012 for some very good reasons.

St Peter's Basilica as painted by Panini

I was diagnosed a while ago with Adult ADD, and one tendency I have is to leap into any activity with plenty of energy, only to see the initial enthusiasm wane quickly. This momentous decision was such that my wife was, quite rightly, concerned that I was doing that again here, and she was particularly worried that I was using the entry through the Ordinariate as a short-cut, bypassing the process of discernment that the conventional RCIA offers. She also, with plenty of justification, felt I wasn’t giving proper consideration to some of her concerns.

I made the decision to slow everything down. In fact, I stopped pushing the issue at all, trusting in the Holy Spirit to work in my heart and in hers. About 2 months ago she came to me and said that if I still felt called to reception in the Catholic Church I should start to explore it again, but that it would be better to go the conventional route. I went back, read through the Compendium to the Catechism again and Evangelii Guardium which had just been released by Pope Francis.

We all visited Mass at one of the local Churches – one that was particularly family-friendly – and I slowly started to talk about some of the things I was thinking about. I made contact with a local priest (not part of the Ordinariate) and we spent time on the phone talking about the practicalities of joining the current RCIA course now. We recently also met-up for a coffee and agreed a provisional way forward.

One thing that I particularly pleased about is that my wife is going to join me in the RCIA classes, partly to walk through the journey with me and partly to help with her own journey.