An Unfortunate Kerfuffle (or "Why Can't We Converts and Cradle Catholics All Just Get Along?")

"What's all the kerfuffle?"
I've hesitated to comment on this post by Fr. Longenecker, and the subsequent controversy that erupted, because, quite honestly, I'm not altogether sure where I come down on it. Although I am a convert from evangelical Christianity, and retain as part of my make-up much of what is positive (and, perhaps, negative) about evangelicalism, I am somewhat ambivalent about the movement called "Evangelical Catholicism", just as I am ambivalent about any sort of qualifier on Catholicism. To the extent I am interested in any form of Catholicism that has an adjective in front of it, it would be Traditional Catholicism, but even then, I consider the term redundant.

I became Catholic because I wanted to be Catholic. Period. I became Catholic because I wanted to be faithful to the Magisterium. Period. Do I still carry some of my evangelical underpinnings with me and do they in some way color how I practice my Faith? Probably, but only to the extent they are appropriate and consistent with the authentic Catholic faith as practiced for 2000 years. Do I try to have a "personal relationship" with Christ and to encourage others to do so as well? Yes, but I don't think that is any different than what the Holy Father has talked about in encouraging the faithful toward knowing and trusting Christ in a personal way, or what Fr. Longenecker and Fr. Jay Scott Newman (two very orthodox and tradition-minded priests if ever there were any) mean when they talk about "Evangelical Catholicism". It's just that, for my part, I think that term may carry too much "baggage", and, again, I don't think it necessarily helpful to place adjectives in front of "Catholicism".

Nevertheless, for anyone to call into question the orthodoxy or the "authenticity" of the conversion of either Fr. Longenecker or Fr. Newman, as commenter "Susan" has done in the above-linked thread on Fr. Longenecker's blog, is quite beyond the pale, not to mention insulting and condescending in a "I'm more Catholic than these 2 convert but highly orthodox priests" sort of way.

The commentary over at Fr. Longenecker's blog has sparked some discussion about who is more disdainful and/or condescending toward the other: converts to Catholicism or "cradle" Catholics. Again, I found cradle-Catholic Susan's comments, especially those directed to evangelical-to-Catholic convert Fr. Newman, to be far more insulting than anything I've ever read coming from a convert about cradle Catholics. Nevertheless, I have found myself cringing at some of the things said or written by fellow converts that imply that we are more in tune with the Faith than those who were raised in it.

Let me say this: among my immediate Catholic acquaintances, I may be more learned in "book knowledge" about the Faith than many, but certainly not all, of them; but what I do NOT have is the lived experience of being Catholic. George Weigel, in his book Letters to a Young Catholic (which, by the way, devotes a chapter to Fr. Newman and his parish - St. Mary's Church in Greenville, S.C.), talks about a "habit of being" Catholic. In other words, a "spiritual sensibility that allows us to experience the world" as Catholics. That's not something learned from a book, but rather experienced - and experienced more profoundly I would suggest - by a lifetime of living one's Catholicism. Weigel says "it's about seeing and hearing, touching, tasting, and smelling as much as it's about texts and arguments and ideas." I would suggest that it is here that those who have experienced nothing other than Catholicism, who have known only the experiences of being "other" in a profoundly Protestant country, who have been inculturated with a Catholic sensibility (i.e. who are "cultural" Catholics), have much to teach those of us who are converts.

It was for this reason that Sarah and I picked up our family and moved to Norwalk, Ohio. We know our limitations as Catholic converts. How are we to raise authentically Catholic children when we don't have the lived experience of being Catholic ourselves? When we don't have the family support structure to help us raise our children in the Faith? When we lived in an inherently Protestant environment without the sort of Catholic "infrastructure", such as affordable Catholic schools, etc., that can be found in regions of the country where Catholicism is more prevalent?

It is the cradle Catholics that we have met in our new environment here in Norwalk - some of whom are godparents - that will help us accomplish our goal of raising Catholic children. It is the Catholic school in this town - established and maintained for generations by the hard work and monetary sacrifice of cradle Catholic immigrants and their descendants - that will help us give our children an authentically Catholic education. It is the cradle Catholics who have done the heavy lifting in this Nation, to make Catholicism the force to be reckoned with that it is, who have made our transition as converts from Protestant to Catholic a smooth one.

In short, I thank God for the cradle Catholics in my life. The godparents, the priests, the RCIA sponsors, the friends, the bloggers, the kind lady next to us in the pew who smiles and says, "It's alright, I've been there, too," whenever our children get out of line at Mass. It is these folks who are helping us converts in the Anderson family learn the fine art of "being" Catholic.


UPDATE
Please note that I have unfortunately mischaracterized the post to which I linked regarding the discussion about "converts vs. cradles". The author of that post informs me that it did NOT grow out of the controversy over at Fr. Longenecker's blog, but rather was in response to other issues. I apologize for my mischaracterization.

It should be noted, however, that a similar "converts vs. cradles" controversy did grow out of the post by Fr. Longenecker, and has played out on Fr. Longenecker's blog and some other blogs that have taken up the issue that the original post addressed.