The first time Norma Freeman strayed from her Catholic faith, it was for love.
The second time, she was seeking new spiritual experiences.
Both times, Freeman came back. Now she’s 80 and volunteers her time to reach out to lapsed Catholics.
She’s one of the laypeople involved with the Catholics Returning Home program at St. Patrick Church in London in Madison County.
I’m not familiar with the Catholics Returning Home program, and would be interested in hearing more about it from anyone with knowledge of it. All the historic oldlinen (former mainline) Protestant churches also struggle with large numbers of lapsed members who’ve switched denominations or just fallen away, but the giant Roman Catholics Church has been the hardest hit. There are probably at least 10-15 million ex-Catholics in this country, some of whom have joined other churches, but many of whom have drifted away from church altogether. “The harvest is plentiful…”
No matter how good this welcome-back program may be, my hunch is that is woefully inadequate as a way of winning back those who’ve strayed. For unlike the parable of the 100th sheep alluded to in this news article, it apparently doesn’t involve actively going out and seeking lapsed Catholics who’ve lost their way and bringing them back, but merely folling out the welcome mat for those who are already motivated to return on their own. Alas, that rather passive approach is how most churches tend to operate.
Very different is the Alpha Course or Cursillo or similar evangelistic forms of outreach. If we are truly to become followers of Christ, we must relearn what it means to follow in the way of him who said he came “to seek and to save the lost” (Luke 19:10). But even modest steps in the right direction are encouraging and to be applauded.
David Handy+
There’s this website link, containing several videos …
http://www.catholicscomehome.org/
#2, Thanks for the link.
David Handy+