Boise, ID
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The following is a continuation of yesterday’s story and comes to us from team leader Lucy with our team in Boise, ID:
Continuing with our story about our encounter with Dan and his family, our visitor wanted to know if you “could be saved if you never confessed Christ as your Savior?” The evangelist responded, “That’s for God to decide, not us.” But our visitor seemed to think that, for this reason, one could not be saved. So, Nancy said, “Maybe a person isn’t in a place to hear about Jesus. Maybe bad Christians made a person turn against Jesus. Maybe they were mentally ill. Anyway, it would never be for us to decide. God is Mercy and we leave that to God.”
At this point, Dan had been yelling at Chuck for close to an hour, which wears on one. So, Nancy switched from answering questions to asking them. In reply, our visitor told the evangelist that she was baptized in the name of the Trinity. So, Nancy assured her that when she became Catholic, she wouldn’t have to be baptized again. Our visitor just laughed, because she didn’t know that being baptized in Jesus’ name only was a problem. She then said baptism was “an outward sign of inward grace”. The evangelist told her that that’s exactly what we believed about our Sacraments.
Our visitor then got detailed about distinctions in justification vs sanctification. But we’re not versed in detailed knowledge of their theology, so Nancy kept with, “We are saved by Grace”, that Jesus does it all, but we do not believe in once saved, always saved.” Nancy asked her, “Why do Protestants think that Catholics believe they are saved by works?” She replied that that’s what they’re taught. She then agreed we need evidence that we’re Christians, that we can’t show up at our Final Judgement with empty hands or bury our talent and expect Jesus to be happy with us. The evangelist explained that we can never save ourselves, but it’s both/and, we are saved by grace AND we should help the widows and orphans, in other words, we should serve God.
Then Nancy went over the Rosary brochure with her, that it is focused on stories from the Gospel about Jesus. She was familiar with how stained glass windows told the Bible stories for people back in the days when so many couldn’t read. So, the evangelist noted that the Rosary correlates to that same concept. She then asked our visitor if she wanted to take the brochure with her, but she glanced at her husband and said, “no.” Nancy then assured her that it’s all online.
Our visitor then wanted to know if we believed in the rapture. Nancy told her it sounded like Jesus was coming three times and we don’t believe that. Our visitor tried to explain it, but we’re not sure it made sense to her either.
Toward the end, our visitor started telling a story about three red heifers and how when they are sacrificed, the Jewish temple will be rebuilt and seven years of tribulation will start. She was really invested in this. Nancy told her that was not part of anything she’s heard of, that Jesus didn’t know the end of the world and we don’t either. So, we don’t focus on that, we focus on the Passion of Christ and what that means for us. But by then our intrepid evangelist was weary and mostly just listened to the crazy-sounding story.
Throughout the encounter, Nancy tried hard to find commonality and encourage her questioning. She told our visitor what a lovely family she had, she congratulated her on raising them in the church, that it’s not easy to get four kids to church, and so on. She was a very nice lady but the interaction was exhausting and quite disjointed.
Praised be Jesus Christ!