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If one is a Christian for long enough, they will likely have the experience of seeing friends or family members make the decision to leave the Protestant church to begin attending or joining the Roman Catholic church. It is also not unusual for a Protestant Christian to think deeply about the Roman Catholic church and wonder whether it might have the greener grass. I find that many Protestant Christians do not know where to go, what to read, or what to do so that they can be better equipped to deal with this moment – either when it happens, or in anticipation that it will one day happen.
Until recently, I confess that I did not have a favorite resource I would send people to on the topic of Roman Catholicism – either in helping a Protestant understand what Roman Catholics really believe, or in helping someone who is interested in Rome to hear clear and solid reasons why they should rethink making such a move in the first place.
Recently, however, three books were released that (in my opinion) form the perfect trifecta of resources on this topic. The three books that I now recommend, are entirely complementary to one another:
- Why Do Protestants Convert? By Brad Littlejohn and Chris Castaldo (https://amzn.to/4cPpg4i) $12 Paperback (Davenant, 2023)
- What it Means to Be Protestant: The Case for an Always-Reforming Church, by Gavin Ortlund (https://amzn.to/3T6sCsT) $20 Paperback (Zondervan, 2024)
- Roman Catholic Theology and Practice: An Evangelical Assessment, by Gregg R. Allison (https://amzn.to/4dHhJGg) $26 Paperback (Crossway, 2014)
Let me offer a sort of “mini-review” of each book where I explain why the particular book is solid and worth reading. I want readers to see why these three books are important, especially for someone who is either considering a move from a Protestant church to Rome, or for someone who simply wants to better understand why it seems like so many are going to Rome, and what it is that Rome actually teaches. One thing that especially ties the first two books together is a conviction that Protestantism is not best represented by the stereotypical flashy modern megachurch. Rather, Protestant history is best represented by the magisterial Reformers and those who follow after them. They are also convinced that the answer to the problems many Protestants are troubled by as they consider a move to Rome are actually found deeper in Reformation history and in the early church, rather than in a move to the Papacy.
I recommend that Why Do Protestants Convert? be the first thing someone read, especially if they find themselves impacted by either their own or someone else’s desire to go to the Roman church. One of the great strengths of Littlejohn and Castaldo’s book, and the reason I recommend reading it first, is that it is short but packed with quick, helpful, pastoral dynamite that might lead the reader to other relevant areas of study. At only about 100 pages, it is not intimidating, and is an easy read. The authors look at nine motivating factors that drive some to Rome, and offer the beginning sketches of an answer to them (I will give an outline of those nine reasons at the end). This book does a great job of charitably appraising motives while showing that those leaving for Rome will not find what they are looking for in the Roman Church.
Secondly, I recommend readers move to Gavin Ortlund’s book What it Means to be Protestant. This is a work of Protestant apologetics, and is largely constructed in a positive way so as to lay out the Protestant position and rationale, contrasting it with the claims of Rome. One reason I appreciate this book so much is that it represents more recent attempts at a “retrieval” perspective on the Reformation. Rather than simply arguing that Rome’s gospel is not in line with Scripture, Ortlund is at pains to produce example after example from the early church fathers showing that it was not the Reformers who were innovators who brought their own ideas into the church. Instead, it was the Roman Catholics whose pronouncements and anathemas often had no basis whatsoever in church history. The final two chapters of the book offer a case study in the innovations of Rome, offering two more in-depth examples: the bodily assumption of Mary, and the veneration of images. Ortlund draws from Church Fathers, but even from Roman Catholic writers to show that neither of these doctrinal positions in Rome had any support whatsoever in the first 500 years of church history. They were entirely unknown, and in fact were contradicted. Often it is believed by some going to Rome that by going to Rome they are embracing the true historical church. In fact, Ortlund persuasively argues that in fact the Protestant tradition in its most robust incarnation represents a true and healthy return to antiquity. This book ends with a fair and helpful appeal to those considering a move from one Christian tradition to another.
Third, I recommend reading Roman Catholic Theology and Practice: An Evangelical Assessment by Gregg Allison. Many of the books written by Protestants walking readers through the theology of Roman Catholicism are quite dated (Roman Catholicism, by Lorraine Boettner, for example), and often do note engage with Rome’s evolved doctrine, Post Vatican II in the ‘60s. Gregg Allison does readers a great service by walking through the theology of Rome based on the Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church, and then offering appreciation and critique from a conservative Protestant perspective. This is a great book for someone who knows more about Roman Catholicism by reputation rather than by experience. Of the three, I would say it is the most optional read, especially if time is of the essence. It is good, but is more of an opportunity to go deeper.
Conclusion
Someone considering going to the Roman Catholic church deserves to know what they are really getting into. While reading three books may seem a bit much, I’m appreciative of something that Brad Littlejohn says here by way of challenge:
“Before endangering their soul, damaging their friendships, and tearing apart their church or school community (for let’s face it, that is what happens in many conversions), then, the would-be convert owes it to themselves and to their Protestant friends and mentors to do their homework. And it may turn out that once they do so, they’ll find the answers they were looking for much closer to home than they imagined.”
My hope is twofold: First, that Protestant churches would embrace the best and healthiest version of their true Protestant heritage, which is really a bulwark against many of the motivations that drive so many to Rome. Second, I hope that any Protestant Christian who has seen weaknesses, shallowness, and problems in their own contexts will consider what these books set before them: that rather than finding the answers in Rome, perhaps the true answer is that one ought to move deeper into a more robust and historically rooted Protestantism. After all, the argument of the Reformers was that it was Rome that had embraced novelty and rejected antiquity, and it was the Protestants who were reclaiming it. In reality, it was the Reformers who were more catholic than the Roman Catholics. Hopefully these three books together will be a great help along the way to those who wonder what is right, or who want to help those who are asking questions.
Why Do Protestants Convert? By Brad Littlejohn and Chris Castaldo
This book briefly examines nine motivations that drive many of those who leave Protestant churches to join the Roman Catholic church. The reasons are organized under three headings: psychological reasons, theological reasons, and sociological reasons. The nine reasons that they mention:
Psychological Reasons:
1) Authority Hunger. We live in a very anti-authoritarian age. It is very appealing to some to go to a church that makes such extraordinary claims about its own authority.
Yet the Reformers were very aware that even Rome itself was in denial of the very authority God had placed over it. When they took Roman Catholics to the Scriptures, they were rebuffed by claims to its own authority. While it claimed authority, its authority was “a shortcut rather than the real thing, since it nullifies freedom rather than sustaining it; rather than guiding the soul in pursuit of the good, the hierarchy claims to itself possess the good, so that the laity can simply rest in obedience – learning doctrine if they are so inclined, but trusting implicitly if they prefer” (p. 20).
2) Holiness Deficit Disorder. “It is a plain fact that precious few of our Protestant churches give their worshippers a sense of being in the presence of the holy, a sense of ascending into the very presence of the Almighty and falling before His throne to cry, ‘Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created’ (Rev. 5:11)” (p. 20).
The authors remind us that the Reformers were convinced that the apparent holiness that Rome displayed was a
“painted façade, a simulacrum of the real thing. Rather than revealing the supernatural in the natural, the extraordinary in the ordinary, their transubstantiation could only replace bread and wine with heavenly substances.1 Rather than granting the faithful believer access into the Holy of Holies to feast before the Lord, they left him to gawk from the outer courts while the priestly class interceded on his behalf and brought some morsels of grace out to sustain him on his weary pilgrimage. Thus, rather than inviting the believer to blink dazedly in the blinding light of God’s presence, clothed in the righteousness of Christ, they encouraged him to rest content with a mediated access, dressed up in the hand-me-downs of the saints and apostles” (pg. 22-23).
3) The Inner Ring. Borrowing from C.S. Lewis, the authors point out a natural human desire to belong to a sophisticated, influential respected group. If one is looking for inner rings, “the Roman Catholic Church has more rings within rings than the Ptolemaic model of the cosmos” (p. 27). Many have noted that if one desires to be a conservative in America, it is generally acceptable to be a Roman Catholic, and a bit of an embarrassment to be a Protestant. While acknowledging this yearning, the authors remind us of the sizeable contributions of Protestants to theology, science, and philosophy. For the moment, Roman Catholicism may be the flavor of the hour, but these things do tend to ebb and flow as the tide.
Theological Reasons:
4) The Quest for Certainty. “Beset with intellectual chaos, uncertainty, and choice, converts look to Rome to resolve the struggle, a struggle that some believe is an outworking of the Protestant Reformation…” (pg. 36-37). The hope is that finally the long hope and quest to know the truth for certain will have found its destination in Rome.
And yet has the authority of Rome prevented the sort of chaos that one sees in Protestantism? “The infighting among traditionalist, conservative, and liberal Catholics highlights the sizable dent in Rome’s claim to speak with the living voice of divine authority, revealing that interpretive certainty cannot be realized in the sola magisterium position of Rome any more than in one’s private interpretation” (pg. 31).
5) In Touch with History. Some converts believe that to be Roman Catholic is to be deep in the history of the church. This is a real problem in many mainstream protestant churches where to be new and novel is more exciting and enticing: “The more independent and separatist a church, the deeper the ditch, and conversely, the more attractive will be the Catholic claim to an unbroken and historic church” (pg. 41).
The authors helpfully point out that the argument of the Reformers was that Rome was besought with novel innovations, and had lost its ancient past. “Far from trying to break with tradition, the Reformers were seeking to recover it, a legacy that we must recapture and emulate in our own day.” (43).
6) Tangible Grace. Some are driven to Rome by the “anti-sacramental impulse of many evangelical churches.” The sense is that for Roman Catholics, they have something superior in a physical sacramental system where one can touch and interact with the holy, the enchanted, whereas Protestants merely have a mental and intellectual faith.
I could bewail this myself. I recall a man visiting our church recently, and he said, “I can tell you take the Lord’s Supper seriously here, and that you think there’s more going on than just something in our heads. There’s something spiritual here.” He told me that his broadly evangelical church treated the Lord’s Supper like a reminder snack that anyone could come up and have a taste of during the service if they wanted. There was very little seriousness around the supper or fencing of the table. Sadly, this is true in much of Protestantism, but as our own PCA church testifies, it isn’t intrinsic to Protestantism, and it certainly isn’t necessary to go to Rome (or to resort to the doctrine of transubstantiation) to find the place where heaven and earth meet each week.
Sociological Reasons:
7) Tired of Division. Many people yearn for church unity, and think they will find it in Rome. Yet Rome’s “unity” is an organizational unity, yet from the Protestant perspective, our unity is meant to be deep and substantial, not merely organizational: “Scripture calls Christians to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (p. 54).
The claim of the Reformers was that the Roman Church had actually themselves damaged the unity of the Spirit that had existed in the church by rejecting and departing from the rules, authorities, and standards that God had given his church from ancient times in the Scriptures. It was Rome who pronounced anathemas on the Protestants. The authors also spend a great deal of time highlighting the substantive unity that exists among Protestants. In contrast, they remind the readers of “Rome’s policy nowadays of turning a blind eye to heretics or sectarians within her own ranks” (p. 56).
8) Tired of Shallowness. The authors address the complaint that Protestant churches are often entirely intellectual exercises, and the ministry of the church doesn’t reach down to the soul, to the deep and emotional core. The argument is made that Protestant churches have stripped the world of beauty and enchantment and merely left it as an intellectual place to be studied or known. Because of this, the Roman Catholics have Flannery O’Connor and Graham Greene, but Protestants seemingly have nobody of that caliber. The argument is that this is because of something anemic in Protestantism.
Yet the authors are very insistent that the Reformed doctrine of the Lord’s Supper demonstrates the exact opposite. Rather than a merely intellectual exercise, Calvin and the Reformers (Zwinglians excepted) believed that in the Lord’s Supper, God’s people really fed upon Christ. Because of this, the Reformed churches set forth an enchanted and supernatural view of the world that may not be appreciated by many. Besides, they remind us, Protestants have a rich history of artists in their ranks, including Handel, Bach, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Shakespeare, Spenser, Milton, Melville, Donner, Herbert, Coleridge, Eliot, and C.S. Lewis only to name a few. “The fact that we lack such artistic and cultural giants today says something about the educational failures of late modern American Protestantism, to be sure, but not, we can suggest, anything fundamental to Reformational faith” (pg. 63).
9) Tired of Irrelevance. “Young evangelicals are painfully aware of being a cultural laughingstock for their pro-life protests and anti-gay-marriage wedding cake showdowns, for their apparently unshakeable allegiance to the hypocritical shenanigans of the Republican party and their prudishness in a culture of shamelessness” (p. 51). While some of those who cannot handle being on the cultural downslope abandon biblical ethical values altogether, others bolt for Rome where elite culture seems to look with less disdain. For some the move is less from embarrassment than from a sense of respect for the achievements of Roman Catholic scholars, theologians, publications, and institutions.
The authors remind readers that these advances for Roman Catholics are not due to “shortcomings inherent to Protestantism.” Not only does Protestantism have a truly rich heritage of intellectual thought and achievement, but there is an explanation for why the institutions and respectability of Rome have thrived, while those of Protestants have not. Protestants lost many of their institutions due to the rise of liberalism and failed to respond to their exile by “creating the kind of institutions that could foster a robust and relevant public witness” (p. 54). On the other hand, during its years in the cultural “wilderness” in the United States (up through the 1980s), Roman Catholics invested their “sheer global scale, wealth, and organization” to build effective and lasting institutions, and much of that labor has paid off, to be sure. The authors agree the Protestants have much work to do on this point, but the answer is found in our own Protestant heritage, not in abandoning it altogether.
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