Things Catholics Don't Believe: Introduction

Introducing a Series of Essays Explaining Some Misunderstandings about the Catholic Church and Her Teachings

The Venerable Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen once said, “There are not one hundred people in the United States who hate the Catholic Church, but there are millions who hate what they wrongly perceive the Catholic Church to be.” This quote has always struck me as being deeply witty and heartbreakingly true. I categorize those who hate what they wrongly perceive the Catholic Church to be into two groups. The first comprises those who have been ‌victimized by someone within the Church (note that, whenever I refer to “the Church” with a capital “C” I am speaking specifically of the Catholic Church), often a member of the clergy, and are, for reasons that are often ‌understandable, holding onto that grudge and applying it to the Church at large. To such people, I can only offer my sincerest apologies and prayers. The Church, like any other institution, consists of sinful, wretched, and stupid people. These individuals sometimes exploit Church authority, harming innocent victims. Such behavior is ‌inexcusable and is deeply saddening for me. However, I believe this represents a tiny minority of the otherwise good people who populate the Catholic Church.

The second category is that which I hope to address in this series of essays. Namely, people who misunderstand what the Catholic Church actually teaches. The vast majority of people with bones to pick with the Church whom I have met fall into this category. Moreover, I worry that there are many Catholics who themselves have a weak understanding of their own beliefs and are, therefore, particularly vulnerable to strawman arguments. I was once such a Catholic myself. When I arrived at my high school, which was run and staffed overwhelmingly by fundamentalist Baptists, many of whom were deeply anti-Catholic, I was ‌unprepared for the attacks I faced. My lack of preparation stemmed in part from my prior lack of exposure to my opponents' beliefs. Things like young earth creationism, sola scriptura, and even the concept of “getting saved” were alien to me. But I think the bigger problem was that I had a poor understanding of the things my own religious tradition taught. So, when I was presented with what were, at best, caricatures of Catholic teaching by the staff and students (many of whom were former Catholics themselves) who had made it their mission to save me from the path of damnation the Catholic Church was supposedly leading me down, then shown Scripture verses that seemed to ‌contradict those teachings, I quickly found my faith shaken.

I never left Catholicism, though I came very close.

After I graduated high school, I became ‌lukewarm in the practice of my religion for a few years. That changed with my discovery of Dr. Jordan B. Peterson’s Biblical lectures sometime around 2018 or 2019 (the fact that the work of a religiously unaffiliated clinical psychologist was the catalyst for my return to religion is very curious to me and probably worth an essay in its own right). I started taking my faith more seriously again. More importantly, I learned more about it. I soon found many high school arguments against Catholicism to be, at best, caricatures and, at worst, straw men. That was unsettling enough. Worse, I failed to recognize such inaccurate depictions of my faith. When I was told things like “Catholics believe you earn your salvation by works” I did not know enough to say “No‌, we do not”.

That brings me to the purpose of this series. In the essays to come, I hope to dispel some misunderstandings of Catholic doctrine. I will address commonly misunderstood doctrines, such as papal infallibility, and doctrines the Church does not teach, such as salvation being earned through good works. My sources will include Church doctrinal documents such as the Catechism, writings of great saints, and Scripture. I will show why these misrepresentations are inaccurate and why the true Catholic teachings are far more profound, rich, and beautiful than often presented.

I am not writing as a theologian. Indeed, I have no formal training in theology at all. I am neither a pastor nor a priest. I am not an expert. I write as someone who knows what it is like to misunderstand what Catholicism is. I write from the perspective of someone who understands how misunderstandings can disappear, unveiling the hidden magnificent masterpiece that was always present but not previously visible to me. I write as someone who has seen the truth of the quote I opened this essay with firsthand, as someone who has seen Protestants go from hating the Catholic Church to respecting and even appreciating it because they learned that the teachings of that Church were often not the grotesque anti-Scriptural things they thought they were.

Neither do I write with hostile intent. Rather, I write with conciliatory intent. If you are a non-Catholic Christian reading this, know that I am not, strictly speaking, trying to convert you to Catholicism. I am simply hoping to show that we may not be as far apart doctrinally as you might think.

Finally, to my Catholic brothers and sisters reading this, I hope you will come away from this series with a greater understanding of what we do not, in fact, believe and will, therefore, grow in your understanding and appreciation of the truly beautiful and profoundly deep teachings of the Catholic Church.

Best wishes to you all and may God bless you.