Someone Else On Dual Heritage

I feel like I am in a very precarious position, one which I may very well be in for the rest of my life. I was raised in one church, very much formed in that church, and then left it for another of my own free will. What does that make me?


-Heroic, because I followed the call of God and my conscience upon my life, however painful and difficult it has been?

-An ingrate, because I left those to whom I owe so much?

-A traitor, because I soon stand to defend what I once might have denounced?

-Just a human trying my best at life, so leave me alone?


I'm certainly no longer solely a Pentecostal. On the other hand, were I to identify myself to someone as "Catholic," they would certainly and immediately conjure up a series of assumptions and stereotypes relating to my character and spirituality, almost none of which would apply to me. I've settled for the time being on Pentecostal-Catholic, but I don't even like that (If I'm not even sure what that's supposed to mean, how is someone else supposed to get it?). And how does one in this position relate to their former church, or discuss matters concerning it, and their reasons for leaving it? Certainly, I've avoided that altogether, lest I become (or even remotely sound like) certain writers and individuals I once despised, who made my decision not easier, as they thought they set out to do, but vastly more painful and difficult.

Searching through Franciscan University's library today, I came across a book called The Price of Unity, written by Basil W. Maturin. The title caught my eye, especially considering that it was shelved in what appears to be the library's ecumenism/conversion section (or so it seems to me). I'm currently reading G.K. Chesterton on the subject, but perhaps I will try this book as well. At any rate, I certainly appreciated the foreword.

B.W. Maturin, born in 1847, was an Irish-born Anglican priest and writer, who later became a Roman Catholic. He apparently died on board the RMS Lusitania in 1915 (how interesting is that??). He had some fascinating thoughts on this subject, which I took great comfort in.

If a man is vanquished by the dialectical skill of his opponent, or by the stronger array of facts and arguments which he is able to bring forward on his side, he is not generally in a very receptive state of mind, but is probably rather looking about for other arguments and weapons of attack and defence, than laying his mind open to the force of the arguments by which he has been silenced.

And this is especially the case when the writer has once belonged to the party he attacks. It is difficult for anyone, however well intentioned, to avoid a tone that, under the circumstances, sounds offensive, and not to seem to be betraying the confidences of those with whom he has lived on terms of intimacy, and with whom he has often talked over the question. He knows exactly how these difficulties were regarded, how some of them were answered, and others were looked upon as trials that must be borne, and others again as anomalies that were not of their making, but which it was their part and their privilege to help to mend.

And it is almost impossible to avoid, at any rate, the appearance of bad taste in dragging out to the light the weaknesses and inconsistencies of a religious system that for many years claimed one's reverence and respect. The memories of religious experience do not easily pass away, and these memories are sacred, and lend some of their hallowing effect to the circumstances and surroundings in which they were felt. I have never been able to understand the attitude of mind of those who speak with bitterness, still less with ridicule, of that which once had been their religious home.

Thank you, B.W. Maturin. May your words bring comfort to many others who have tread this difficult path.

You died in a fascinating and history-altering event, by the way.