Former Anti-Catholic Converts:

[JustaServant]

For anyone here who used to be anti-Catholic, what have you had to overcome since you converted?
For me, since I swam the Tiber, I can now see the kind of anti-Catholic bigotry I used to be a part of. I now realize I must be careful not to simply transfer that to an anti-Protestant attitude.

 

[Church_Militant]

For me, since I swam the Tiber, I can now see the kind of anti-Catholic bigotry I used to be a part of. I now realize I must be careful not to simply transfer that to an anti-Protestant attitude.

That is one thing that I also had to deal with as a re-vert. I find that it gets in the way of presenting the actual facts that can help to counter so much of the lies and propaganda that others have been fed.

It doesn’t change the truth a bit, but it does change how I seek to offer it in posts and dialog.

It also isn’t easy, when I come up against someone who doesn’t see that and comes at my Catholic faith with vitriolic rhetorical guns blazing. It takes a lot of prayer.
Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum.

 

[JustaServant]

That is one thing that I also had to deal with as a re-vert. I find that it gets in the way of presenting the actual facts that can help to counter so much of the lies and propaganda that others have been fed.

It doesn’t change the truth a bit, but it does change how I seek to offer it in posts and dialog.

It also isn’t easy, when I come up against someone who doesn’t see that and comes at my Catholic faith with vitriolic rhetorical guns blazing. It takes a lot of prayer.
Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum.

Some of my impatience might be that I used to be one of those people (not to the extreme of Jack Chick, but bad enough). The more time goes on the more I realize how almost every aspect of my evangelical walk was anti-Catholic.
It takes prayer and patience.

 

[Nita]

Some of my impatience might be that I used to be one of those people (not to the extreme of Jack Chick, but bad enough). The more time goes on the more I realize how almost every aspect of my evangelical walk was anti-Catholic.
It takes prayer and patience.

You could have been worse; just remember St. Paul, he was killing us!!!

Isn’t God’s “revenge” sweet?

 

[Meathead]

I used to be a horrible anti-Christian. About two years ago I started feeling oddly unfulfilled, and I remember waking up one morning realizing that everything I thought was right was wrong (I was an atheist, its quite embarassing to admit to believing in that garbage). I did a little soul-searching and started studying the Catholic Church more. I remember attending Mass with my mother (who hadn’t been to Church in 20-some-odd years) and deciding that the Catholic Church was a step in the right direction. I never regretted my decision, and it was almost as if all my anti-Christian beliefs had fallen off of me during the Mass.

Sorry if that was a little long-winded.

 

[brycelaliberte]

I actually had a developing library of books… Ya, pretty bad and I wasn’t even 16 yet! It was probably some heard-of and not-so-heard-of stuff, and I thought I had it all down why Catholics were wrong.

But, once I started getting over biases, and actually coming to understand the Catholic positioning on things, I started getting more and more enumerated.

The last big thing was Mary (in Rome Sweet Home Scott Hahn rightly says it is a really big thing for evangelicals to get over), but now I pray the rosary daily! I’ve had a very big change in me since then.

Can’t believe that was me…

 

[Fred_4]

I wasn’t so very anti-Catholic myself, although I believed that many of their doctines and practices were not necessarily as correct as they could be. Although, of course, I had never actually examined any of these “errors” in any detail, much less bothered to find the Catholic explanation for their beliefs. It was just kind of “known.”

But I was always somehow attracted to the liturgy, music, art, architecture etc. When I was an evangelizing Campus Crusader the thing that bothered me the most I suppose was Catholics who, it appeared to me at the time, couldn’t have cared less about God outside of Mass. I hope that I’m somewhat less judgemental now… by God’s grace.

 

[strngrnrth]

There’s anti-Catholicisma nd anti-Catholicism. I was mostly suspicious of anything organized or formal. But then I was also drawn to the Catholic Church. I just couldn’t figure out who was right. I was reading a lot about different view points and when I learned how ahistoric and sometimes cultlike a lot of the sources I had seen and heard about were, I decided not to listen anymore. I decided to learn about the church from people who knew what they were talking about. I had to overcome a lot of suspiciousness about organizations and about authority. A visit to Lifeteen Mass set me straight about that though. I wanted in so badly once I spent a while in the pews. I had visited Mass before but for whatever reason it was nly recently that I had a real hunger and knew I had to enter the Church.
The two basic kinds of anti-Catholicism I have seen are fear of complexity/beauty/formality/structure/large organizations, and contempt for things old/associated with poverty or humility/socially concerned/community oriented. I think these two types despise each other much more than they do the Catholic Church, as their points of view are basically opposed to each other. I hope i explained that wll enough.

 

[JustaServant]

The two basic kinds of anti-Catholicism I have seen are fear of complexity/beauty/formality/structure/large organizations, and contempt for things old/associated with poverty or humility/socially concerned/community oriented. I think these two types despise each other much more than they do the Catholic Church, as their points of view are basically opposed to each other. I hope i explained that wll enough.

You make an excellant point. And both types are the polar opposite of the modern evangelical church.

 

[JustaServant]

I actually had a developing library of books… Ya, pretty bad and I wasn’t even 16 yet! It was probably some heard-of and not-so-heard-of stuff, and I thought I had it all down why Catholics were wrong.
But, once I started getting over biases, and actually coming to understand the Catholic positioning on things, I started getting more and more enumerated.
The last big thing was Mary (in Rome Sweet Home Scott Hahn rightly says it is a really big thing for evangelicals to get over), but now I pray the rosary daily! I’ve had a very big change in me since then.
Can’t believe that was me…

I had the same problem. I’m a reader. The more I read Church history the more Catholic I became.

 

[Church_Militant]

Some of my impatience might be that I used to be one of those people (not to the extreme of Jack Chick, but bad enough). The more time goes on the more I realize how almost every aspect of my evangelical walk was anti-Catholic.
It takes prayer and patience.

You could have been worse; just remember St. Paul, he was killing us!!!

Isn’t God’s “revenge” sweet?

I just try to remember that if what the other guy is doing/saying is unpleasant to me then I should expect the same response from him if I stoop to his level…and that gets us nowhere. So I don’t go there.