My wife and Catholicism

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codefro

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Hello all!

My wife came over to the Catholic Church 2 Easter’s ago with me. We were former Evangelicals who became Anglican who became Catholic. I was the one pushing towards Catholicism since we were dating. It did not become intense until after we were already married.

My wife seemed to be raised with some anti-Catholic tendencies. I decided at first to become Catholic by myself. My wife soon found out she was pregnant with our first child and that somehow made her feel scared to keep our family together. So she only thought she would be going to mass and accompanying me to RCIA. That turned into her being enrolled in RCIA and going through all the rites and then beoming Catholic.

My wife has struggled with many Catholic concepts though. She did not like NFP, transubstantiation, Mary and the Saints, Purgatory, and Catholic obligations. At first she felt that these would just become clear over time. She very soon stopped taking communion. She was lax in going to mass with me. After she found out that our second child was coming she got really upset and stopped everything. She reverted back to her Protestant identity.

My wife loves Jesus Christ and wants to follow God. Yet she struggled with having a solid identity in Evangelicalism and bringing that with her into the Catholic Church.

As of right now she has seemed to have reverted. She doesn’t go to mass with me and was stand-off-ish about Catholic subject for a couple months. Now she is dialoguing again which I am immensely grateful for.

What I would like is some advice, maybe particularly from Catholic women who identify Evangelical Protestant spirituality (yet have brought that into their Catholic spirituality). My wife takes a lot on faith, and she doesn’t identify with logic and reason when accepting truth about religion. When we talk, to her it doesnt seem like faith is a big deal to Catholicism. She sees it all as works, idolotry, and just practices. She gets upset that she thinks Catholics only pray the rosary instead of just praying to God (which ya she doesn’t really understand what the Rosary does to the prayer). Anyways, I was trying to explain to her how Faith is HUGE in Catholicism (I mean we are in the YEAR OF FAITH for crying out loud) 😛

Anyways, anyone have advice. I am not forcing anything on my wife now. I just dearly want her to share her feelings and maybe I can have some thoughts to provide for her. Maybe catechism references or spiritual antecdotes? Also, I do see it as a kind of providence that she chose St. Faustina as her patron for confirmation. Please ask St. Faustina to pray for my wife.

Thanks everybody.
 
Unfortunately, I have no advice but, I will pray for you and your family. God has so many ways to handle these situations and I am certain that He will help you. Prayer is your answer, faith will sustain you while you wait.
Memorare

Remember, O most gracious Virgin Mary, that never was it known that anyone who fled to thy protection, implored thy help, or sought thine intercession was left unaided.
Inspired by this confidence, I fly unto thee, O Virgin of virgins, my mother; to thee do I come, before thee I stand, sinful and sorrowful. O Mother of the Word Incarnate, despise not my petitions, but in thy mercy hear and answer me.

Amen.
 
Let it rest for a while. The best thing you can do for your wife is live out your life in the best Catholic way you can and pray, pray, pray. The Holy Spirit will call her back in His good time.
 
Well, the problem she is having is seeing the things she objects to as a part of an integrated whole. Let me explain so you can explain it to her.

God is Our Father who first established his relationship with us in Adam and Eve–it was to be a family relationship not one of master and slaves. And God still wants us to be his family–to share in his divine life.

Mary was chosen before the foundations of the world because Christ was chosen before the foundations of the world to be our Savior. Unlike Eve, who fell into sin, Mary obeyed God and started God’s new family in her through the Incarnation of Christ, her Son. This is why we venerate her–because she is the mother of the new creation in Christ–because God chose her to be so. If she had said no, we would have had no Jesus to save us.

God is merciful and just. When we die forgiven of our sins he allows us to make up for the damage our sins have done on earth in purgatory. Unlike our Evangelical brothers who can only pray for the family of the deceased, we can pray for our beloved dead. It hit home to me how special this is when Rick Warren’s son died. Everyone was there to pray for him and his surviving family, but who among them offered prayers for his son’s soul? Why should be cut off from our loved ones when they die? Jesus said they are alive in God not dead, after all.

All the veneration we give to Mary and the saints goes to God because they offer it all to him. When we praise a loved one of a friend they are pleased not upset. All that Mary and the saints accomplish they can only do through God, not of themselves–just like us here on earth. All the good things we do we do through God’s grace and not our own goodness. I’m sure she’ll agree with that.

Your wife needed to have all these issues resolved before entering the Church. That should have been part of the RCIA process. Maybe you both should talk to your priest about all this, if she’ll do it. After all, he’s there to help you both. But, as another poster wrote, you need to discern the best time to talk to your wife and just be the best Catholic husband you can be as you pray for her. Converting is like changing your nationality–you need to bring the good things of the former into the new identity. She never did that–no fault to her. And Catholic parishes can be quite impersonal unless you get involved in some aspect of parish life. Take you time with it and let her come to understand as she is able to. I will pray for you both.
 
codefro said:
Hello all!

My wife came over to the Catholic Church 2 Easter’s ago with me. We were former Evangelicals who became Anglican who became Catholic. I was the one pushing towards Catholicism since we were dating. It did not become intense until after we were already married.

My wife seemed to be raised with some anti-Catholic tendencies. I decided at first to become Catholic by myself. My wife soon found out she was pregnant with our first child and that somehow made her feel scared to keep our family together. So she only thought she would be going to mass and accompanying me to RCIA. That turned into her being enrolled in RCIA and going through all the rites and then beoming Catholic.

My wife has struggled with many Catholic concepts though. She did not like NFP, transubstantiation, Mary and the Saints, Purgatory, and Catholic obligations. At first she felt that these would just become clear over time. She very soon stopped taking communion. She was lax in going to mass with me. After she found out that our second child was coming she got really upset and stopped everything. She reverted back to her Protestant identity.

My wife loves Jesus Christ and wants to follow God. Yet she struggled with having a solid identity in Evangelicalism and bringing that with her into the Catholic Church.

As of right now she has seemed to have reverted. She doesn’t go to mass with me and was stand-off-ish about Catholic subject for a couple months. Now she is dialoguing again which I am immensely grateful for.

What I would like is some advice, maybe particularly from Catholic women who identify Evangelical Protestant spirituality (yet have brought that into their Catholic spirituality). My wife takes a lot on faith, and she doesn’t identify with logic and reason when accepting truth about religion. When we talk, to her it doesnt seem like faith is a big deal to Catholicism. She sees it all as works, idolotry, and just practices. She gets upset that she thinks Catholics only pray the rosary instead of just praying to God (which ya she doesn’t really understand what the Rosary does to the prayer). Anyways, I was trying to explain to her how Faith is HUGE in Catholicism (I mean we are in the YEAR OF FAITH for crying out loud) 😛

Anyways, anyone have advice. I am not forcing anything on my wife now. I just dearly want her to share her feelings and maybe I can have some thoughts to provide for her. Maybe catechism references or spiritual antecdotes? Also, I do see it as a kind of providence that she chose St. Faustina as her patron for confirmation. Please ask St. Faustina to pray for my wife.

Thanks everybody.
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Perhaps showing her some of the Early Church Fathers writings that talk about the Eucharist as the flesh and blood of Jesus would help her understand transubstantiation. St. Ambrose’s work “On the Sacraments 4.4, On the Mysteries 9” is a perfect example. You should get the book “Living the Mysteries” by Scott Hahn and Mike Aquilina. They take exerts from writings and homilies from the first 4 centuries of the Church that concentrate on each of the sacraments. That would be a good beginning…to show her what the church has always taught as truth from the beginning. If she doesn’t believe that the Eucharist is the Body and Blood of Christ, she won’t understand the importance of Mass and how the Eucharist nourishes our soul. Jesus and the Jewish Roots of the Eucharist is a great book by Dr. Brandt Pitre. It shows how the Eucharist was prefigured throughout the OT and we know that the OT always points to something GREATER that is fulfilled in Jesus Christ. God gave the Israelites the miraculous manna from heaven, multiplied the loaves in all four gospels, changed water into wine etc,…why would he do all those miraculous things and then only give us a “symbol” of his body and blood? Those miracles point to something greater which is Jesus himself in the Eucharist. The Eucharist is the “fruit” from the tree of life that was closed from Adam and Eve in the Garden so that their immortality would not be set in the sinful condition they were in…but when Christ died on the “new tree of life”…the cross…we can eat the fruit of the tree of life and live forever (John 6). It looks like bread and wine in appearance but under the veil is Jesus…just as the manna fed the Israelites physically in the desert for 40 years and stopped before they entered the promised land…so our souls are fed the heavenly manna as we journey through this desert of life before we enter our TRUE PROMISED LAND which is heaven and where we will be in complete union with Christ and will not need to receive the Eucharist…Just think…Jesus will not have any more glory when he comes at the Second Coming than he does in the Eucharist…it is just that we will be able to see Him in his glory!..the veil will be lifted!

Scott Hahn’s book…“Hail Holy Queen” is a great book for understanding Mary and God’s role for her in salvation. Perhaps showing her how the Hail Mary is from Scripture (Luke 1:28 and Luke 2:42) and getting a book on the “Scriptural Rosary” would show her that the Rosary is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. You pray a scriptural verse with each bead according to the Mystery that you are contemplating on that day. If you did that every day, you would know the Birth, Life, Death and Resurrection of Christ very well!

If they offer the Great Adventure Bible Study at any of the parishes around you…take it together. It will change your life:)
 
I was a Protestant, then married a Catholic. He would joke about my being protestant on
occasion. To me what faith your wife follows is personal between her and God.
Please give her some breathing space as God knows when the time is right for her.
As for myself married to a Catholic, I did go to Mass with him, but of course couldn’t take
the wafer and wine of our lord. I prayed asking God where he wanted me in regards to a
religion. I read the bible. And I studied many different religions and was surprised to find
many in fact almost all of our religions are all off shoots of the Catholic religion.
God answered my prayer one day out of the blue and I have been Catholic ever since.
I became my parents Godmother and my husband became their Godfather when they
became Catholic too. My husband wisely gave me the time I needed to sort it out for
myself and he waited years, but it happened. :heaven:
 
I was at a talk this evening on Lumen Gentium, and the line was used that the Church is both ‘seed’ and ‘fruit’ of the Kingdom of God.

Glossing over a great many subtleties what this means is that the Kingdom (and Reign) of God began the Church (as a ‘fruit’), and gave to the Church the mission of building up the Kingdom of God (by being the ‘seed’). The Church’s God-given duty therefore is to evangelise and spread the Kingdom of God. Note that word - evangelise; this is the mission of the Church. All of the pomp and ceremony surrounding Catholic practices are based fundamentally on the need to preserve the teachings of Christ; without doubt the Church has changed, but to go back to the analogy - plants change appearances over time, but it does not make them any less of a plant - the end point remains the same.

One thing that the priest speaking mentioned towards the end of his talk was that the Church is a pilgrim people, a constantly shifting arrangement of souls - some rush ahead, some drop back, some leave and rejoin the mass. Your wife is playing her part in that pilgrim people, as we all are; if she is one who leaves the mass of pilgrims then there is the choice to leave her be or, as you are doing by asking this here, convince her to return. The methods for doing this are many, but they all rely on her making the free choice to return. I will pray for you and yours.

Best wishes

Martin
 
Have you ever watched The Journey Home on EWTN? It can be watched online. I love this show . Your wife maybe able to relate more with people who have converted and maybe it will help to answer questions or help her understand some of the things she struggles with.
 
If your wife likes to read, I would suggest the book The Belief of Catholics by Fr Ronald Knox ( a convert himself BTW). Since she has troubles with several aspects of Catholic teaching, it will be difficult to address them all individually until she opens her mind to a Catholic way of thinking. That is where this book comes in. It does not go through a myriad of doctrines. Instead, it explains the things Catholics belief independent of the authority of the Church, and then explains a Catholic “mindset” if you will.

Think of it as a Catholic version of Lewis’s Mere Christianity. But much better in all aspects.

A great book, that has unfortunately been largely forgotten.
 
I have Prove It, The Catholic Teen Bible from Saint Jerome Press. I just bought it at my church for $10 or $11. In it there are inserts that answers many tough questions regarding God, our religion and beliefs including why pray to the saints and Our Blessed Mother, and there are bible passages to go with these explanations.
 
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