Don't make my mistake

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Last night, an independent Baptist friend of mine invited me to dinner with about 4 of our friends and about 20 people from her church.

Before I had even gone to dinner, I felt this strong sense that I would have an opportunity to evangelize. My friend is a wonderful person and her church friends that I met were just as nice, but their church is actively and aggressively pulling people from the local Catholic church and doing very welll at it. Our community is already over 95% Protestant, so their aggressive ministry especially hurts the Church here. I read up on the differences between Baptists and Catholics. I reflected on past conversations with Evangelicals about Catholicism. I had my Biblical quotes for Catholic teachings ready to go. I rested and prayed before dinner.

And what happened? No one asked me a single question or made a single comment that invited a respectful talk about Catholic beliefs, and I walked away from a golden opportunity:

Everyone has Baptist/Evangelical friends who invite you to their churches, and these folks piled on the invitations as I left. How often do you respond by inviting them to our Church? I didn’t, and I wish I had.
 
Fogwalker said:
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And what happened? No one asked me a single question or made a single comment that invited a respectful talk about Catholic beliefs, and I walked away from a golden opportunity:
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It doesn’t seem to me like there was an opportunity at all. Nobody asked questions. I wouldn’t feel bad if I were you. Perhaps you could evangelise your Catholic friends instead, so they don’t fall under the baptist influence.
 
Sometimes the best testimony one can give is a life that is lived in humble adoration of God and of filial obedience to the Church.

When people invite me to their worship services, I usually decline politely because after receiving the Fullness of Grace and Truth in the Church why would I want to go anywhere else?

I don’t believe you made a mistake. You could not control the fact that no questions came up. But you are doing good in being prepared to give an answer for why we believe as we do.

God bless.
 
Fogwalker said:
Last night, an independent Baptist friend of mine invited me to dinner with about 4 of our friends and about 20 people from her church.

Before I had even gone to dinner, I felt this strong sense that I would have an opportunity to evangelize. My friend is a wonderful person and her church friends that I met were just as nice, but their church is actively and aggressively pulling people from the local Catholic church and doing very welll at it. Our community is already over 95% Protestant, so their aggressive ministry especially hurts the Church here. I read up on the differences between Baptists and Catholics. I reflected on past conversations with Evangelicals about Catholicism. I had my Biblical quotes for Catholic teachings ready to go. I rested and prayed before dinner.

And what happened? No one asked me a single question or made a single comment that invited a respectful talk about Catholic beliefs, and I walked away from a golden opportunity:

Everyone has Baptist/Evangelical friends who invite you to their churches, and these folks piled on the invitations as I left. How often do you respond by inviting them to our Church? I didn’t, and I wish I had.
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Maybe they were waiting for you to say something - you were severely outnumbered in that gathering and might have found it very difficult to address all their misconceptions and myths. I would study more apologetics but work on individuals, not a huge group. Also, for them to invite you and then you start evangelizing would be rude, IMO.

The reason they want you to come to their church is so they can convert you! One more trophy on their wall, that’s what you are, although they say it’s in your interest. :eek:
 
I think you did well. If you had started the conversation then it would have instead seemed like you were there to start a war. From the side of my mother who grew up Protestant the Catholics were “the know it alls who believed they were the only ones that were right and everyone else were wrong and they were people that needed to be stayed away from.” It was only by agreeing to disagree and my father and I quietly practicing our faith while i lived in their house for the last year that my mother actually agreed to come to a social justice class at our parish. When no one tried to convert her but instead stuck to the class topics - the ones she was there to learn about and she realized how much she had in common - she developed an interest in learning more. She is considering attending RCIA in the Fall.
 
That was one of things that drew me to the Catholic Church, was the fact that when I attended Mass no one tried to convert me. When I inquired about RCIA, the director of the program told me that RCIA was about discernment and if at anytime I did not feel I was ready to become Catholic, I could walk away and I would always be welcome back if I was ready at a later time. 👍
 
Fogwalker said:
Everyone has Baptist/Evangelical friends who invite you to their churches, and these folks piled on the invitations as I left. How often do you respond by inviting them to our Church? I didn’t, and I wish I had.
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You make some good points, but don’t be too hard on yourself. Many Baptists exist to be anti-Catholic.

Invite 'em next time.
 
CalCatholic said:
That was one of things that drew me to the Catholic Church, was the fact that when I attended Mass no one tried to convert me. When I inquired about RCIA, the director of the program told me that RCIA was about discernment and if at anytime I did not feel I was ready to become Catholic, I could walk away and I would always be welcome back if I was ready at a later time. 👍
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I can relate well with what you are saying. I loved that when I walked through the door they were genuinely happy to see me and did not even try to prostlyize me. I thought they would burn me at the stake when I walked throug the door the first time. What I really liked about it, was that I could take my time and do the RCIA at a pace that I could handle and there was no pressure to complete things.

One thing that I really enjoyed about the Church was that they understood my school schedule at that time. At that time I was taking over 22 semester hours and could not attend RCIA classes, they worked with me and I studied on my own. I did end up going to two of the classes. The Church has always been quite generous and understanding. I thought that the Church was impersonal and cold, but I have found it to be otherwise much to my delight.

God bless.
 
OP, I don’t think you made a mistake at all. You showed those people that Catholics don’t have two heads, and that you can be an active part of a lovely evening without ever have to excuse yourself to go worship Mary or whatever pagan thing they probably expected. Good for you!
 
Think about evangelizing in the little ways. Not in direct settings like this, especially in many to one set ups. Too many unpredictable effects. The others will be on guard against each other. It won’t be an open truthful conversation. Too many other eyes, ears, minds, and anticipatory responses, and barriers.

Evangelize in tiny little ways. Smiles, tackling chores with them with a real sincere smile, being humble, letting the Holy Spirit work through you…the transparent you.
 
Fogwalker said:
Last night, an independent Baptist friend of mine invited me to dinner with about 4 of our friends and about 20 people from her church.

Before I had even gone to dinner, I felt this strong sense that I would have an opportunity to evangelize. My friend is a wonderful person and her church friends that I met were just as nice, but their church is actively and aggressively pulling people from the local Catholic church and doing very welll at it. Our community is already over 95% Protestant, so their aggressive ministry especially hurts the Church here. I read up on the differences between Baptists and Catholics. I reflected on past conversations with Evangelicals about Catholicism. I had my Biblical quotes for Catholic teachings ready to go. I rested and prayed before dinner.

And what happened? No one asked me a single question or made a single comment that invited a respectful talk about Catholic beliefs, and I walked away from a golden opportunity:

Everyone has Baptist/Evangelical friends who invite you to their churches, and these folks piled on the invitations as I left. How often do you respond by inviting them to our Church? I didn’t, and I wish I had.
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Mate Im happy you feel it clearly. I was always talking about the Lord, I couldn’t stop for a looong time after I became a personal believer in our Lord. Now some 7 years later I have started to notice that whole days or evenings can pass in the company of friends without actively sharing experiences about the Lord, prayer or anything of that sort.
Anyway in the past I have come to realise its not apologetics that attract people, its seeing you love Christ. Lets face it, where people are most enthusiatic about Jesus, where they celebrate their faith, where they experience healings, where they gladly go and evangelise… these have the fruits of the Holy Spirit and to them other people are attracted. Thats not about denominations or churches…
In the past I had Pentecostals saying to me, wow Grace you are a more firery Pentecostal than we are, you read more books from our “saints” than we have! I was told by baptists and non-denominational people that they’d never met any Catholic like me (truth is as I found out they had never met anyone, only images of prejudize given through anti Catholic books) …
at that time I wished to associate myself with people who were on fire with Christ… I abandoned the fellowship of youth in my Catholic parish after one or two times because they talked about everything but Jesus, and I fell in love with the pentecostal young adults who were ever ready with their Bibles (and no they are not anti-catholic in my country so I never struggled with them and when I sometimes explained, eg about why works are important for salvation, the communion of saints, they listened and agreed with my words because they felt I was there to worship the Lord with them, and we were truly brothers and sisters, not competitors).

Im not saying any of this to brag… I have immensely fallen of the horse and need to be re-evanglised. All I am saying is that the power of the Holy Spirit doesn’t depend on eloquence, but on being filled with Christ and focused on Him. Once Evangelicals see a love for Him as active, joyful and courageous as their own (and they often have great faith ) then they will come with their questions to you and talk about you. I don’t think God wants you to say: what can I teach these people, and prepare for some lecture… I think He might want you to ask yourself: what can they teach me?
Thats the experience I had anyway… I wanted to teach them… hahaha… but they taught me so much… I still brag about the faith and love of these people whereever I go.
 
mark_a said:
You make some good points, but don’t be too hard on yourself. Many Baptists exist to be anti-Catholic.

Invite 'em next time.
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But be sure to invite them to a mass where you know a little about what will be going on. Earlier this year I invited my most evangelical friend to mass, and the mass turned out to be a marian mass, which at least in its language was bordering on sounding idolatrous. She was super polite afterwards though her prejudixe had just been affirmed of course… 😦
 
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