Some Pentecostals Turn Catholic

Areport and comment on religious trends and events being covered by the media.  This week’s item is from the Detroit Free Press, April 2001.  A three-year odyssey will end today when a Pentecostal congregation in Detroit and its pastor take the remarkable step of joining the Catholic Church.  After years of study and some agonizing disagreements the Reverend Alex Jones and the 64 remaining members of his Maranatha Christian Church will give up their old religious affiliation to become lay members of St. Susanne Catholic Church in Detroit.  “No one can recall anything like this ever happening,” Arch Diocese of Detroit spokesman Ned McGrath, said Friday.  “Joining the Catholic Church feels like returning to a spiritual home,” said Jones.  He is studying at Sacred Heart Seminary in Detroit toward ordination as a Catholic deacon which would allow him to preach at Mass.  Their spiritual journey began in 1998 when Jones’ church had two hundred members and they asked him to teach a class about ancient Christianity.  Jones immersed himself in Christian history.  As Jones’ studies continued, he said, I discovered the word, tradition.  All my life I have been taught that was a bad word, but the early Christians were very concerned about this.  Soon, he changed the style of worship at Maranatha to include a Eucharist, modified after a traditional Catholic Mass.  That sparked disagreements and members began leaving until Jones was left with 64 people who began Catholic studies last year.  “Losing so many good friends was the most painful part,” he said.  But, Jones said Catholicism has a close connection to the ancient church so he feels as though he is heading home.

T. A. McMahon:

Dave, as a former Roman Catholic and a part of Reaching Catholics for Christ, this grieves me but I can see certain elements in what this pastor went through, why he went the way he went.

Dave Hunt:

Well he tells you why—some of the reasons.

T. A. McMahon:

First and I’ve seen this more often than not, getting into church history which is actually Catholic history. They seem to think that some of these early church fathers were very Catholic in their views and therefore we ought to get back to the Catholic Church.

Dave Hunt:

Not all of them were, of course.

T. A. McMahon:

No, that’s the perception.

Dave Hunt:

The way this thing ends is he says Catholicism has a close connection to the ancient church.  Well, if I want to know what the ancient church was like I will go to the Bible.  And as far as the so-called church fathers, Paul tells us, in fact Paul is speaking to the elders of Ephesus, his favorite church, I would think he scarcely had anything to correct them of; he trained them for three years himself.  And he said, “After my departure grievous wolves will enter in,” that is, in the church, “not sparing the flock and of your own selves will men arise speaking perverse things.”  So, if the elders of Ephesus, so soon after Paul’s death, would go astray I don’t have confidence in—supposing Ignatius of Antioch studied under Peter—what does that mean?  What we want to know is the Bible.  What does the Bible teach?  That’s where I will learn about the early church.  Then he talks about tradition.  He says tradition was a bad word, but the early Christians were very concerned about this.  Wait a minute!  They talk about apostolic tradition.  I make this challenge to any Catholics who may be listening, I hope we have a few listening and I mean it in all sincerity.  You show me one tradition that your church has that you can prove as apostolic tradition—I’m not talking about Bible now, I am talking about tradition.  This is something other than the Bible, something that isn’t in writing, an oral tradition that the apostles taught and you can prove that, I’ll become a Catholic!  It’s that simple.  Now this man thought he was drawn into some tradition and that’s why he became a Catholic, because he thought Catholic traditions go back there.  Wait a minute!  If it was the apostle Paul himself speaking and they didn’t have tape recordings in that day and if they did have a tape recording of the apostle Paul I would have no way of recognizing his voice.  This is why God put it in writing and he put it in writing, not isolated here and there, it’s part of the book, the Bible is one book and it all hangs together and we can examine it and we can prove that this is God’s Word.  Tradition?  No.  Any traditions that the Catholic Church has they have developed, as you know, down through the centuries, gradually developed.  These have no relationship to the early church, they don’t have any relationship to the apostles and they are not biblical.  That’s the problem.  What we need to do is get back to the Bible.  We call our ministry, The Berean Call; they searched the scriptures to see whether what Paul said was true.

T. A. McMahon:

Dave, there is another aspect to this.  These 64 people who converted from their Pentecostal beliefs, I would think that this pastor, over the years teaching this congregation talked about You’re not saved by your works.

Dave Hunt:

Well, we don’t know what he’s about.

T. A. McMahon:

I would just guess that.  I think that’s a reasonable assumption.

Dave Hunt:

You would hope.

T. A. McMahon:

Yes.  Now, the process of them becoming Catholics, not after they become Catholics but this process of converting is pure works.  It takes about a year; you have to go through certain things.  You have to learn prayers; you have to do certain works and so on just to be accepted.

Dave Hunt:

Show me that in the Bible, Tom.  Where does it say you would have these qualifications to become a member of a particular church?

T.A. McMahon:

It’s the antithesis of what the Bible teaches.

Dave Hunt:

Show me where this church had a headquarters in Rome.  It simply isn’t true.  Paul writes to the individual churches and the Bible is our authority.  So, they have strayed so far from scripture.  They talk about the Eucharist.  Well, now they have come to believe—I thought Jesus was in a resurrected glorified body at the Father’s right hand never to die again.  The scripture says by one sacrifice—he offered himself once for the sins of the world but now they have to believe that that little wafer is being turned back into Jesus.  And, Jesus, instead of—Well, is he still in the body, resurrected, glorified body in heaven, but yet he is on this altar being offered over and over and over?  It’s a denial of the sufficiency of the once for all sacrifice of Christ upon the cross.  So, they have had to give up what the Bible teaches in order to take on the tradition of a church that claims to be the one true church and I am really sad for them.

T. A. McMahon:

Now Dave, we just had a few minutes to address this, but if somebody is interested in following up on our concerns about this, they can get the June newsletter and in that we deal with this issue, not just of evangelicals so-called converting to Catholicism but the whole idea, should we be evangelizing Roman Catholics?

Dave Hunt:

Why convert to Catholicism?  If I am a Christian I’ve been born again through faith in Christ, then show me where it says in the Bible I must convert to Catholicism?  See, that’s the problem, Tom, a real problem.

T. A. McMahon:

Write to us, call us and we will get you some more information.