Has anyone ever known a protestant who defended the Catholic faith and later converted?

Gnarwhal said:

My mom impressed me the other day. My family are all evangelicals, but they never took issue with my conversion and even took interest in it. My mom and sister came to my confirmation (dad didn't just because he can't sit long in a pew without major discomfort). So I've been lucky in that regard, in the sense that none of the non-Catholics closest to me had any issue with my conversion.

Recently I found out that one of my mom's close lifelong friends apparently DOES have an issue, and she brings it up often when she and my mom talk. I personally don't care cause I find this friend of her obnoxious and try to avoid her anyway. However, my mom told me recently about their conversation and how her friend trotted out all the usual propaganda. What I found interesting though is that my mom went to bat for the faith. Her friend was tossing out all the usual lies about Our Lady and my mom was disputing them, and even went so far as to tell her "Don't you think if the God of the universe chooses someone to bear his Son that makes her pretty special?"

My mom's always been a peculiar case to me. She's always seemed to find some appreciation for Catholic teaching, worship, etc. She values the beauty in our sacred art, architecture, and especially music (she's a musician). Yet she's never been able to bring herself to convert. I think she has some hangup she's not willing to name or explain, but I think it comes from her Baptist upbringing (which she's always resented, ironically).

But I'm curious and hopeful that her defense of Our Lady could be a positive indicator that maybe she's softening up a bit. I don't know if I'll ever be the one to escort her to RCIA since I've been trying for eight years, but I pray it happens with or without my help. If she converted my dad would do it at the drop of a hat, he's rather fond of Catholicism and only stays where he is because of my mom. And then I wonder whether my sister and her husband might be open to converting if my mom did.

Anyway, does anyone know of any Saints or anecdotes or individuals they know personally who kind of set a precedent for this?

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Gnarwhal said:

My mom impressed me the other day. My family are all evangelicals, but they never took issue with my conversion and even took interest in it. My mom and sister came to my confirmation (dad didn't just because he can't sit long in a pew without major discomfort). So I've been lucky in that regard, in the sense that none of the non-Catholics closest to me had any issue with my conversion.

Recently I found out that one of my mom's close lifelong friends apparently DOES have an issue, and she brings it up often when she and my mom talk. I personally don't care cause I find this friend of her obnoxious and try to avoid her anyway. However, my mom told me recently about their conversation and how her friend trotted out all the usual propaganda. What I found interesting though is that my mom went to bat for the faith. Her friend was tossing out all the usual lies about Our Lady and my mom was disputing them, and even went so far as to tell her "Don't you think if the God of the universe chooses someone to bear his Son that makes her pretty special?"

My mom's always been a peculiar case to me. She's always seemed to find some appreciation for Catholic teaching, worship, etc. She values the beauty in our sacred art, architecture, and especially music (she's a musician). Yet she's never been able to bring herself to convert. I think she has some hangup she's not willing to name or explain, but I think it comes from her Baptist upbringing (which she's always resented, ironically).

But I'm curious and hopeful that her defense of Our Lady could be a positive indicator that maybe she's softening up a bit. I don't know if I'll ever be the one to escort her to RCIA since I've been trying for eight years, but I pray it happens with or without my help. If she converted my dad would do it at the drop of a hat, he's rather fond of Catholicism and only stays where he is because of my mom. And then I wonder whether my sister and her husband might be open to converting if my mom did.

Anyway, does anyone know of any Saints or anecdotes or individuals they know personally who kind of set a precedent for this?

Click to expand...

Bob Crowley said:

When I was Presbyterian, my old pastor was having some doubts about the Protestant position. He even went so far as to say "I sometimes wonder if Protestants get into heaven... I don't think God accepts the division of His church as easily as we do..." (or words to that effect).

I said to him "If you believe that, then why are you still Protestant?" He thought for a moment and then replied "They (the Catholic Church) have done a lot of damage at times".

We left it at that. It was late in the day in the sense that I would shortly leave his church as I was getting married and would move some distance away. He had cancer and died about four months after I departed so we both left at about the same time so to speak.

I think he mentioned he had started RCIA but added "That's if I live long enough". I had no idea what RCIA was at the time so I didn't take a lot of notice. But he would not have lived long enough.

He predicted I'd become Catholic, with a couple of other comments thrown in. My father was Catholic (but he lost his faith - I think he's in Hell personally due to an incident the night he died, and church teaching anyway) but when the pastor said he thought I'd become Catholic I responded "It seems to me that God has taken me out of the Catholic Church through my father."

He said "I think God might want you to go back there". A few yearrs later I did.

I didn't come from a strong family Presbyterian background. My parents married in 1953 a year before I was born. He was (lapsed) Catholic and she was Anglican. Back then there were dogmatic opinions about who could marry who and where. My mother happened to work in what was then one of Brisbane's biggest retail stores called McWhirters. but they've long since closed. They were in a suburb next to the City itself called Fortitude Valley.

Right behind McWhirters was a Presbyterian Church. The builiding itswlf is now heritage listed, and being used as a nightclub (shows how the church is going). I can't prove it but I suspect my mother sweet talked the then pastor into marrying them. She could talk to anybody.

But he probably insisted on a quid pro quo - any issue would have to be baptised Presbyterian. That's where they married, and that's where I was baptised.

My later sister (six years later) wasn't baptised at all, although I think she had herself baptised as an adult as she was moving towards Christ when she died of leukemia at the age of 45 (another of my old pastor's predictions viz. "I don't think your sister will live very long. I think she'll get leukemia").

So in a family of four we had a lapsed non-believeing Catholic, a half believing Anglican, a nominal Presbyerian (until I took it seriously at the age of 28) and one non-baptised. Until I took it seriously none of us went to church although I had a bit of Sunday School when I was young.

To quote the pastor "Your family is like a microcosm of modern Western Christendom - more mixed up than scrambled eggs".

Anyway if he'd lived long enough, I think he might have become Catholic. He wasn't virulently anti Catholic saying to me once "Protestants tell a lot of lies about Catholics and the Catholic Church". Lying is a sin incidentally.

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Shane R said:

I've suspected for a while that the flow both ways, Catholic to Protestant and Protestant to Catholic, is about even in the US. How one parses the numbers can be interesting. I tend to think Catholic converts are more learned than evangelical converts. And I think those who choose Anglican or Lutheran churches represent a separate category of Protestant converts.

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Shane R said:

I've suspected for a while that the flow both ways, Catholic to Protestant and Protestant to Catholic, is about even in the US. How one parses the numbers can be interesting. I tend to think Catholic converts are more learned than evangelical converts. And I think those who choose Anglican or Lutheran churches represent a separate category of Protestant converts.

Click to expand...