Protestants and Catholics: Striving for Church Unity

Psalm 133:1 states "how good it is when people live in unity!" There are other messages like this all over the bible (1 Corinthians 1:10, Ephesians 4:3, 11-13, 1 Peter 3:8, Romans 12:16...just to name a few). Case and point, God does not desire for there to be over 35,000 different denominations of Christianity. There is only one truth.

I have come to find a large amount of truth in the Catholic faith through a lot of history, conversation, reading the bible, and most importantly through love. Along my journey though, I have come across a number of different faith communities (predominantly Protestant). These communities have greatly impacted my faith by encouraging me to go deeper and build a personal relationship with Jesus. I began to question the Catholic faith at these times. I truly wondered if some of the Catholics that I knew really had a relationship with God and studied His word or if they were just caught up in head knowledge. I would talk to Catholics and question them about their faith. I still do that sometimes, but for different reasons.

After confirming my faith through questioning others, I ran into another road block within Catholic faith communities. At least half the time that I went to any Catholic events, I would hear a negative poke at other denominations of Christianity. In some of the subtlest ways, pride had swooped into the church. I brought a Protestant friend of mine to a group of Catholics and the story ends with him angrily walking out saying "this is why I left the Catholic Church!" I apologized profusely because what he experienced was not love. He was only pushed further away. I later questioned him about basing his beliefs on the actions of others and that is where we left it. I graduated and moved away. We still keep in touch on occasion, but the point is that you never know who is going to show up in your group or at your church. Be respectful and loving and do not get in the habit of bashing someone else's faith even amongst friends and other Catholics. You don't have to bash another faith to build up your own.