vital that we identify two underlying premises crucial to Protestants and Catholics alike in understanding both their own church and that of the other:
1 Not all Roman Catholics are alike. Not all local Catholic churches are alike. Catholicism contains a wide variety of traditions, some of which are embraced more by certain Catholics than by others. Despite its monolithic look to some, worldwide Catholicism has incredible variety. Not all Catholics think alike, worship alike, vote alike or act alike.
2 Not all Protestants are alike. There are clear distinctions between ‘mainline’ and ‘evangelical’ churches as well as inherent differences between and among denominations. Even within denominations, there are significant differences among congregations in terms of styles of worship and predominant theological approaches.
Now, of course, the reality is that an individual person’s perception of what constitutes Catholicism or Protestantism is determined by those experiences she or he has had. If you grew up and were educated in a local church whose approach has been pretty consistent based on the way the clergyperson and staff presented ‘the faith,’ your perception of being a Catholic or, say, a Presbyterian would be shaped a particular way. You may very well carry that expectation to future churches you join OR it may be that approach that turns you off to any churches that carry that particular label in your future.
Conversely, if you have experienced a variety of approaches either within your own church or denomination and that of others, your perceptions and expectations might be different. The bottom line is that our personal, local experience of Protestantism or Catholicism does not represent either tradition in its full expression! Grasping this is a crucial factor in ecumenical understanding and dialogue.
Allow me to get REALLY specific: When I began my ministry as the licensed pastor of my current church eleven years ago, I was scheduled to begin on February 25. In 2001, February 28 happened to be Ash Wednesday. In planning the start of my ministry, I inquired about the time of the Ash Wednesday service. I was told that this church has not had such a service in recent history and that this kind of service ‘is something Catholics do.’5 This statement was not intended to be derogatory against Catholics in any way. Rather, it stated a perception that had evolved within the congregation over the years, one probably based on the cumulative experience of congregants in local church experiences.
However, the reality was that in the year 2001, many Protestant churches both across the nation and in the state of Connecticut were holding Ash Wednesday services. Not only that but many of those services in plain white New England Congregational churches also included the imposition of ashes on individual foreheads and possibly even a midweek service of Holy Communion, a sacrament usually reserved in much of Protestantism for the first Sunday in each month.
This conversation bore an eerie resemblance to me of a couple of interesting ones I had back in my Roman Catholic clergy days. In one situation, as part of preparing to officiate a couple’s wedding, I received a request from the prospective groom that during the ceremony, he would like it if we could sing the hymn ‘Just a Closer Walk With Thee.’6 When I passed that request along to the music director in that particular Catholic church, she told me that we couldn’t because ‘That’s a Protestant hymn.’ Now, pardon the pun, but I stated my protest to her remark by saying that ‘the idea of walking close to Jesus strikes me as something that is pretty Catholic too.’ The REALITY is that this particular hymn was commonly used in many Catholic churches back then in 1996 or 1997. It just happened not to appear in the musical selections of the particular Catholic music publisher to which this director’s parish subscribed. She eventually backed down a bit and said that she would ‘ask Father’ and ‘we could sing it, ‘if Father gives his permission.’’ I will have more to say about that topic later on in this book!
In yet another situation, back in the days of the Persian Gulf war, my Catholic parish where I served as an ordained deacon, at the behest of several laypersons, held a midweek service to pray for peace. Our pastor asked me to conduct this service and I was glad to comply. As I was working closely with the youth of my Catholic parish then, I tried to get our many talented young musicians involved in both singing and instrumental musical worship. At the conclusion of one of the evening services, a member of the parish, a long standing and active Roman Catholic, came up to me and, after saying some nice things about the service, told me that the way the music was set up struck him as ‘really Protestant.’ When I asked him what he meant, he told me that in Protestant churches musicians place a lot of emphasis on ‘performance’ but that the Catholic ‘style’ is different. He was and is an extremely intelligent man but I wondered aloud to him what he would say about some of the beautiful solo renditions of the ‘Ave Maria’ that have been heard in Roman Catholic churches over the years. Were those performances as well? I wondered!
That example is not unlike the exceptionally kind woman who commended my sermon one day in a Protestant congregation years ago while also noting to me that ‘You can’t shake the Catholic out of you, can you?’ When I asked her what she meant, she said ‘You know, all those Alleluias you like to sing!’ I had never realized that the Catholic Church had a market on Alleluias!
What is unfortunate in all of this is that each of these worship expressions was really worthwhile and could enhance the experience of worship. The ‘performance’ of those young people in the Catholic Church spoke beautifully to that congregation’s yearning that our nation bring an end to war. ‘Just A Closer Walk With Thee,’ a beautiful piece of music at the time of a wedding, also provided for that young man the very real presence of his beloved, deceased and faithful Baptist grandmother who sang that song regularly in his childhood kitchen. And a few well placed ashes and appropriate Alleluias can do wonders for the Protestant soul and much to articulate its long standing, laudable commitment to the biblical message!
Behind these quite telling anecdotes lies a series of suppositions that Protestants and Catholics have about ‘the other.’ One which I hear in many different ways in my experience as a Protestant clergyperson is the Catholic preoccupation with set ritual and tradition. Those more prone to an academic analysis would choose to note that there is a real difference between the prescribed rubrics driven style of Catholic liturgy and the approach of a more ‘free church’ tradition which constitutes much of Protestantism, including my own denomination. Well ...
It was just a few days before my ordination as a pastor and teacher in the United Church of Christ. I was meeting with a deacon in the church in which I was ordained and reviewing with him the order of the service. When we got to the point where we discussed the distribution of the elements to the congregation, I said ‘So when I finish saying the words of institution, I will then say ‘Ministering to you in Jesus’ name, we now offer you this bread.’ At that point, the deacons can then just take the trays from the table and distribute them to the congregation.’
As I observed his body language, I suspected that he had the sense that I had said something wrong. I didn’t have to wait very long before he said to me ‘Do you mean that you will then give the deacons the trays to distribute?’ He then added that wonderful cross denominational phrase ‘That’s the way we do Communion here.’ I, never one to be without an opinion, responded (I hope kindly!) ‘But, this IS a church that came out of the Reformation, right? So, I have a problem with the idea that the elements in some way move down hierarchically from clergy to deacon to congregation. I’m a lot more comfortable just having you take them off of the table.’
Now, this wonderful man had no intention of vetoing the reforms set off in Europe back in the 1500s. He was just trying to organize the service well as he did so consistently in that church. Nonetheless, this brief conversation indicates that even in ‘low’ liturgical churches, i.e. congregations which would cringe at being called ritualistic in any way, there do exist prescribed rubrics, often unwritten, which are very much alive within that congregation. This is not to say that there is anything wrong with prescriptions or ritual traditions in worship, rather that to cite such as typical of a ‘Catholic’ rather than ‘Protestant’ approach may not be completely accurate.
I will also never forget an incident