TBC Notes

Loving Enough to Offend

A friend of mine recently asked a Christian bookstore clerk where he might find a book that would be helpful in witnessing to Catholics. She gave him a rather puzzled look, then seemed to take offense at the implication that a Catholic might not be saved.

During that same time period, another friend of mine went into an evangelical Christian bookstore (a national chain) looking for The Gospel According to Rome by Jim McCarthy. Not finding it in the apologetics section, he asked the manager where the books on Catholicism were. The area he was directed to had only books by Catholics for Catholics—along with rosaries, statues, and infant baptism and First Holy Communion materials. My friend, a former Catholic, returned to the manager and asked him quite pointedly why the store was contributing to, and comforting, Roman Catholics in their lost state. The manager replied that it was company policy that employees could not discuss issues that would offend customers.

Nearly 30 years ago, some evangelicals loved this prideful Catholic enough to “offend” me with the biblical gospel, something I’d never heard throughout my life in the Church of Rome. I can’t thank them enough for truly caring for me. My fervent prayer is that that same love for Catholic souls would ignite in the hearts of evangelicals today.

     T. A. McMahon

    Executive Director