Chicago, IL.
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The following report comes to us from virtual school student Roberta in Chicago, IL:
Living in a nursing home restricts my ability to evangelize, but I try to do the best I can where I’m at and online. Recently I gave it another shot with a Protestant friend of mine. Remembering the four stages of evangelization that I learned in my SPSE virtual class— listen, befriend, preach, and invite—I invited all of my Facebook friends to Dr. Ralph Martin’s recent talk on Zoom. He was the guest speaker for our class and his talk was open to the public. In addition, I personally wrote an email inviting my Protestant friend to join in and listen. I enjoyed Dr. Martin’s talk and he mentioned a quote by St. Augustine that I loved so much that I instantly shared it with all of my Facebook friends. The quote was, “If you believe what you like in the Gospel, and reject what you don’t like, it is not the Gospel you believe, but yourself.”
My Protestant friend didn’t come to the talk, but he did write a very long comment criticizing me for posting that St. Augustine quote. My friend said that I and/or St. Augustine was, “preaching something false and damaging people’s faith.” Thankfully, Dr. Ralph Martin ended his talk with a prayer to the Holy Spirit to come down upon all of us, so I was totally on fire with the Holy Spirit when I read my friend’s negative comment. I was filled with the Holy Spirit and what happened afterwards was nothing short of AMAZING. The Holy Spirit spoke through me and responded to my friend with the most incredible explanation complete with scripture that left my sola-scriptura-Protestant friend utterly speechless and astounded. He had no response. Only after a few days did my friend email me privately to admit that my response to him was a wise one. The Catholic faith really is the one, true faith and no one can debunk it because it is the truth.
Praised be Jesus Christ!