Podcast Ep. 17 – Jason & Cindy Stewart Recount Their Conversion
Jun 17th, 2012 | By Tim A. Troutman | Category: PodcastIn this episode, Tom Riello, a former PCA pastor, interviews Jason Stewart, a former pastor in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, and his wife Cindy on the topic of their conversion to the Catholic faith in 2011. Jason earned his Master of Divinity from Mid-America Reformed Seminary (Dyer, IN) in 2005, and subsequently served for five and a half years as pastor of Trinity OPC in eastern Pennsylvania. Jason and Cindy currently live in Rockford, IL, and have four children. He is completing a two year course of study with the Diocese of Rockford’s Diaconal Program.
Jason and Cindy Stewart
Listen to the episode here:
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A written account of Jason and Cindy’s story is available in “An OPC Pastor Enters the Catholic Church.”
To All,
You must listen to this podcast, especially if you and/or your spouse is thinking deeply about the Church. You will hear how a married couple approached this journey not only as individuals but as companions. It was my favorite podcast to be a part of.
Great podcast and many thanks to Jason and Cindy for sharing their story together. I also appreciated Jason’s article from earlier this year.
My question for Jason and/or Cindy: As you studied the Catholic position and considered its arguments on its own terms, as well as the best “protests” that your reformed tradition has to offer, what was or were the most difficult objection(s) to Catholicism that you had the hardest time overcoming? How did you overcome them?
Thanks,
Mark
Excellent podcast. My wife and I entered the Church together as well; we helped each other on the way with things that we were reading and discovering. Ecclesiastes 4:12!
MarkS, I’m not Jason or Cindy, but for my wife and me (as probably for many) the Marian dogmas presented significant obstacles because of our Reformed background. In the end, the question for us came down to this: is the Catholic Church what she claims to be—namely, the Church that Christ founded? If so, then it’s not possible for these dogmas to be false, whether I am able to understand their basis or not.
I also realized something else that’s summed up by one of the Pontificator’s Laws: if there’s nothing that the Catholic Church teaches which I believe just because the Church teaches it, then I’m really still playing the Protestant. I’m still making myself the judge of the truth. And so I for one came into the Church not understanding how or why the Marian dogmas were true, nor how transubstantiation “works.” But I was resolved to believe them on faith: to assent to them as divine truth precisely because the Church proclaims them and because the Church cannot err with respect to faith and morals. We make that appeal a lot at CtC, but we do so because it is important: Is the Catholic Church the Church that Christ founded or not? The answer makes all the difference in the world.
Fred
MarkS,
Thanks for commenting. I’ll let Cindy chime in here for herself, but I’ll share that for me the principle of sola scriptura was simultaneously the most difficult and the easiest obstacle to overcome. The concept of the Bible alone as the ultimate standard for faith and life was both central to my understanding of divine authority and at the same time profoundly weak when tested biblically, theologically, philosophically, and historically. Once I recognized that sola scriptura failed on its own terms, I began also to see that only the Catholic Church could rescue the Christian belief in an infallible and therefore authoritative Bible.
Blessings,
- Jason
I transcribed a portion of your story with which I related, but from the side of the congregation, not the session:
When I was a layman in a PCA church, with just casual “Ligonier” style training, I started to get worried about my and my children’s future as far as heresy. What was keeping us on the straight and narrow? What if I swallowed a heresy and went to my session only to disagree with them?
How would I know if they were right or if I was?
I knew full well what would happen and it made my heart sink within me. I would go to another session somewhere where my heresy would be accepted, and my children would be left a rotten legacy.
Now of course anyone can fall for heresy at anytime, Catholics aren’t immune of course, but as you alluded to in this quote, this “agree or leave” system is really part of the Presbyterian system. I was told as much by every Reformed source -whether person or book- I could find. That I could always go where “the gospel was being preached” “faithfully” and “biblically” if I didn’t think it currently was where I was at. As a layman, who was expecting the rod and staff of the Church to guide my family, this situation scared me stiff. It was perfectly and obviously evident to me that there was no final church authority in my religion to tell me when I erred. In fact, they explicitly denied that there could be such a temporal authority. Seeing as my family was a temporal family, I got out of there quick!
Thank you so much for your encouraging story! Us former Reformed pew sitters need more witnesses like yours to encourage us to follow the truth wherever it leads.
Peace,
David Meyer
[...] listened to an interview this evening with a former Orthodox Presbyterian Church pastor and his wife, Jason and Cindy Stewart, who converted in 2011, as did our family. I commend it to you, in large measure because many of [...]
Thanks for posting this excellent interview. As an evangelical who is seriously, sincerely exploring Catholicism, these posts are really helpful. In fact, I thank God for this whole blog. What a great source for information, and a place for me to find answers to my questions. I know that if I have questions about Catholicism, I can count on the people here to give me solid, well-thought-out, educated answers. Keep up all the excellent work!
Welcome Home from a former two decades ordained Protestant minister (Pentecostal) in 2006 along with my whole family. God bless you.
Thank you for this testimony. I had been in the reformed faith for 40 years before converting to the Catholic faith this year. I agree with your recommendation to study Catholicism from Catholics . I had always studied it from Protestant sources, including the book you mentioned by Loraine Boettner. I had no idea how so much of what he wrote about Catholicism was false until I read Karl Keating’s book on Catholicism and Fundamentalism. Keating actually points out many of the incorrect statements of Boettner’s. Reading the Church Father’s also was shocking to my Protestant eyes.
Mark asked about obstacles and Fred responded. I agree that the Mary doctrine has been the tough one for myself. Called to Communion has helped in this respect along with some of the audio links they gave on this subject. Dave Armstrong’s book on Mary which is available in kindle format has also helped. Study of the early church on this has helped. The book by Dr. Mark Miravalle called Introduction to Mary has also been a huge help. [This link here gives the beginning of his book free online: http://www.christendom-awake.org/pages/marian/intromary1.htm . I agree with Fred…..I came to the conclusion that the Catholic Church was the true church Christ established and have submitted in those areas of doctrine where I still need growth in my understanding. Thanks so much to Called to Communion for helping us in growth of the understanding of Catholic doctrine.
PS. I just wanted to add that what Cindy said on the audio about praying was so true in my conversion too. I kept everything in prayer and God constantly was surprising me with answers ….. Sometimes He gave the answers to questions I had even before I had a chance to put them into verbal prayer. He , knowing what is on our hearts, knowing our seeking for truth, will surprise us; I am constantly amazed at His intimacy. One example of this was a statement I read by a Protestant against a certain Catholic saint. I had no idea who this saint was. I do not believe I had ever heard of him before this time. I looked him up and thought about how strange it all was. Here then, came the God wink, the very next day my son [not knowing anything about what was transpiring with me] sent me a link to a documentary type movie on this particular saint which he in turn had heard about through a friend whose parents had known the saint. It just made me laugh out loud. God is intimate and knows our hearts.
MarkS,
Certainly my pride was a stumbling block! :) No joke. It took me swallowing a big pill of humility to even begin to study Catholicism on its own terms.
The first major obstacle was belief in Scripture Alone. I began to question if I really held to that position anyway since as a Presbyterian we subscribed to the Westminster Confession and Catechisms. Are these not affirmed right alongside Scripture? Why do these Standards exist if Scripture alone is enough? There was a need for an outside interpreter or authority even in Presbyterian and Reformed circles, and such interpretive documents don’t merely serve the purpose of separating the Reformed from other Christian traditions. They define doctrine.
The next was Mary, what do I do with Mary…? The Mother of our Lord was shoved into a theological corner being completely ignored and neglected. Why are Protestants so scared of her? Why was it acceptable only at Christmas to speak of her? I confess that when I first began to read of Marian devotion in Catholicism there seemed to be too much focus on her. But then I understood that it was my perspective which was off. That the mission the Father had for Mary was to give us His Only Begotten Son, and her missionary work did not end at delivery. I quickly began to see that Mary continually brings us Jesus…even today. I decided to just pray about it, to ask Jesus what his Mother was to mean to me. All I can say is that one day the trepidation of calling her Mother melted away. My study and prayer brought me to a clear understanding that I was not committing idolatry by calling her Mother, I was loving the Woman who so faithfully brought us Jesus! Where would any of us be without Jesus?! She was no longer just a “holy pipeline”, but a real person that must be honored and loved.
Blessings,
Cindy
MarkS,
I’ll add that the Marian dogmas were problematic for me too, initially. What helped me greatly – in conjunction with what Fred and my wife Cindy have already mentioned – was discovering the Church Father’s uncontroverisal description of Mary as the New Eve. The CCC 494 states:
Blessings,
- Jason
I’m trying to figure out why you CTC guys continually emphasize “He went to BIG TIME REFORMED SEMINARY and later converted to Catholicism.”
What is the connection you perceive between going to a Reformed seminary and converting to Catholicism?
Hello Tim,
I think I can speak for the others in saying that we don’t think there is any intrinsic connection between attending a Reformed seminary and then becoming Catholic. Obviously the vast majority of persons who attend and graduate from Reformed seminaries remain Reformed. Having attended a Reformed seminary and then become Catholic is merely something a number of us here have in common. But none of us, so far as I know, has made any claim about the prestige or quality of the seminary we attended.
(May I request that for future comments you please avoid using all caps. Thanks.)
In the peace of Christ,
- Bryan
Hi Tim,
My alma mater is actually quite modest. Mid-America Reformed Seminary is a small institution dedicated to equipping men for pastoral ministry in the Reformed tradition. In my written account of how I came to be Catholic, I noted that my seminary education was confessionally in tune to the point of nearly perfect pitch. In doing so I was merely emphasizing that I learned Reformed theology from a group of some of the most godly, genuine, theologically and historically informed Reformed men one might find. I thank God for each one of them.
And I do agree with Bryan that there is no necessary connection between attending a Reformed seminary and becoming Catholic.
Blessings,
- Jason
Question for Jason Stewart: You were asked by Mark “…what was or were the most difficult objection(s) to Catholicism that you had the hardest time overcoming?”
You then replied …”the principle of sola scriptura was simultaneously the most difficult and the easiest obstacle to overcome. The concept of the Bible alone as the ultimate standard for faith and life was both central to my understanding of divine authority and at the same time profoundly weak when tested biblically, theologically, philosophically, and historically. Once I recognized that sola scriptura failed on its own terms, I began also to see that only the Catholic Church could rescue the Christian belief in an infallible and therefore authoritative Bible.”
My question is how do you personally see Sola Scriptura (The Bible alone which is the same as saying the Word of God is suffice) fall apart when tested biblically? I have read a few testimonies of those professed to be protestants and are now Catholics say the same thing and every time I read these testimonies I am shocked to see that they did not see what I saw immediately as a Born Again Christian. The Scriptures testifies that Jesus Christ who is the center of our faith is the Word of God so I don’t see how anyone can overlook this simple truth since we do not live off bread alone but by every Word of God.
In other words: Who gave us the Word of God? God did! It’s His Word! He spoke it and it shall accomplish all His desires never returning void! Compare Isaiah 55 and Jesus as the Word saving us from our sins.
Who assures us that the Word of God is indeed the Word of God? The Holy Ghost testifies that the Word is true. Just as it did with Jesus and his ministry.
Who is the Word of God? Jesus Christ! No other religious founder or so called prophet will ever have this exclusive title?
Who do we glorified by standing on the Word of God as the final authority? Jesus Christ! Otherwise, we are entertaining what man has to say over Jesus. If Jesus were to be physically on earth today who will not hunger to hear what He has to say since HE speaks truth and only truth which gives us life?
How do we treat teachings that are not in the Word of God? As if God never said it. It is heresy a lie from the pit of hell. God did not utter it! Jesus being the Word didn’t reveal it.
Why is the Church the pillar of all truth? The Church which are living stones glorifies the Word of God and only the Word of God! Christ centered and Bible centered and these must be one!
What Church is the true Church? The Church that holds the Word of God above all! Granted, denominations are rampant but Galatians 5:20 KJV states that those who commit heresy or self-willed opinions will not inherit the kingdom of God. It also makes sense that since we are fighting a spiritual battle the truth is going to get attacked and many are going to fall away or live after the flesh and not the spirit. Since the flesh cannot submit to God we have factions but this is why we are to carry our cross daily and love our brethren as Christ loved us
What makes up the Church of God? The believers the Body of Christ who hold unto the Word of God above all!
How does one know the truth of God? Faith, in agreement with the written Word and Living Word of God. Again Christ centered and Bible centered
How does one acquire? Faith comes by hearing and hearing the Word of God!
How come the Word of God is always emphasized over and over and over? Hence the Word OF GOD, again Jesus Christ is the WORD OF GOD.
Now how can someone still conclude that Sola Scriptura is false when that means that we are to only abide in the Word of God because Jesus Christ is the Word of God? I find it extremely difficult for a spirit-filled believer to commit such heresy which is a work of the flesh. The reason people create factions is not a matter of Sola Scriptura being wrong its a matter of their flesh getting the best of them. Sure people disagree at times but there’s a difference in opinions and self-willed opinions that have desires to gratify self attached which are the heresies I am referring to and the natural man wants to promote his false or misleading understanding which is not of the spirit but of the flesh. He can’t grasp the deep spiritual truth because he refuses to die to his natural understanding.
The cross does not give us a minor shift or two with regard to a few of our ethical and moral and religious values. The cross radically disrupts the very center and citadel of your life from self to Christ. And if the cross has not done that, you’re not a Christian! … YOU ARE NOT A CHRISTIAN until the cross has RADICALLY DISRUPTED THE VERY CENTER AND CITADEL OF YOUR LIFE. And brought you from a life of commitment to serve self, whether it’s Religious Self, Moral Self, Proud Self, Covetous Self, Lustful Self, Prideful Self, Unforgiving Self, Lazy Self, IT DOESN’T MATTER WHAT ARE THE FOCAL POINTS OF THE REIGN OF YOUR SELF!
If you’ve gone to the cross in union with Christ it’s been SHATTERED.
-Albert martin-
re 16
I would note great zeal in #16. I would also note that the author claims to be born again and will take that claim at face value. My own impression is that the author is an evangelical type rather than a reformed type. I base this on the idea that it is scripture that is being appealed to rather than a creed or theology. Hopefully I am reading this correctly.
The limitation is that while scripture is cited, in part or in whole, the writer fails to recognize when he or she avoids scripture for the intention of maintaining a position.
My problem as an evangelical born again Christian was that I avoided or denied those parts of scripture which did not support my evangelical born again Christian position. So in John 20:23 where Jesus tells the apostles, “Whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven them,” we decided that Jesus not withstanding, we could go directly to God for forgiveness, and we would assume that He would do exactly that, no matter what He said in scripture. We were beyond that authority given to the apostles in what appeared to be a function given to the Church.
But then we did not need the Church, especially of the kind described in Matthew 16 where a man with a perfectly good name, Simon, is renamed by Jesus Himself and given a charge consistent with the charge given the chamberlain of the King of Israel. We did not need that, and we did not need Peter, so we denied it and him.
We had no idea of what the Church was in scripture in part because we were busy denying those parts of scripture where it is described, because we did not want that to be true. We did not want Jesus’ Kingship to include a Kingdom with a chamberlain. We did not want Jesus to be a sacrificial Lamb Who must eaten per the proscription in Exodus, John 6, the Synoptics and Paul’s writing in 1st Corinthians. (Actually I learned that was a Catholic idea and then knew why we did not want to believe it.)
Scripture was full of items like Peter, and Mary, the Eucharist as Passover, and a Council in Jerusalem making decision binding on the entire Church, and we did not need those things, so we denied them. Scripture not withstanding.
We justified our position by blaming others for their failures. Scripture says that there is one Lawgiver and Judge Who is Judge of all, and He told us that the judgment we give is the judgment we’ll get. We were told to request the forgiveness of our debts (sins) as we forgive those in debt (sin) to us. However we were the lawgiver and judge and we were not subject to the words in the Lord’s prayer or in Hebrews. We did not need to concern ourselves with judgment, or with running the race to the end, because we were saved. Being saved, we could ignore Jesus’ words (or Peter’s or Paul’s or John’s or James’ words) whenever they came in conflict with our position. We were past all of the conditions that Jesus had associated with salvation or obedience to Him through the Church.
That is what I was seeing as a born again evangelical Christian. I was proclaiming the absolute authority of God’s written word while denying what it said. I was also in conflict with other born again Christians, not all evangelical, who read the same words, sentences, and passages and came to a different conclusion than me. Different conclusions from the same scripture appears to make God the Author of confusion. That couldn’t be right, so where was the problem?
Scripture was not actually the problem. The problem was Luther’s dictum that any man inhabited by the Holy Ghost was capable of apprehending and expounding the Word of God (written). Luther discovered people doing exactly that who were in conflict with Luther’s positions. We inhaled Luther’s dictum, without inhaling Luther’s position.
It occurred to me that Scripture came from somewhere. One might look at the source. The scripture we inherited came from the Church which made a binding decision on what is and what is not scripture. That exactly matched a statement from Nicolai Grundtvig, a Lutheran theologian, who wrote, “I have discovered a truth; we do not discover the church in scripture, we discover the scripture in the church.”
What Grundtvig discovered was the Lutheran position in scripture. What I had discovered was the born again evangelical Christian position in scripture. However as noted above, I made the discovery by ignoring any passage of scripture which conflicted with the positions I held.
When one reaches the point where one is in general disagreement with where one is at, one knows one is leaving, but may not have any idea of where one is going. That was what happened to me. I was leaving but I did not have a destination. I did have an idea. I knew it would have to be a place where scripture is honored in belief and practice, and not in the breech. I did manage to find that place, thanks be to God.
How is that, God is my judge?
Cordially,
dt
Thanks DT , I have felt those same things.
DT,
I have understood according to the Scripture that God wants us to cry out for understanding. Proverb 2 and Daniel 10:12. The Word of God and the truths it contains are of the spirit and as much as we battle with our flesh (pride, idleness, etc. ) we must constantly crucify our understanding that is dead because our flesh is dead. Our Adamic reasoning always wants to resurface and prove to be right even when the Word is trying to correct us. John 6 and Matthew 16 are both perfect examples of how God’s Word being spirit and life yet foolishly many take it to be literal. The man after the spirit can now see what God means under the text but this revelation is not easily attained unless one is found crying out for understanding hence why many were offended and decided not to follow Jesus anymore. It happened then and sadly it continues to happen now as many are refusing to love the truth and be saved they become reprobates because in order to receive life they must first die to the only life they know and that life they know is their corrupt understanding with self sitting on the throne reigning wanting no more but self-gratification. It’s funny you mentioned John 20:23 because I hope you’re not saying that you assume the Holy Spirit meant that we are to confess our sins to a priest saying a few Hail Marys and Our Fathers and voila we are forgiven because that would be complete nonsense. Compare John 20:23 with 2 corinthians 2:10 and the book of Philemon in regards to the remittance of sins. In regards to retaining the sins of others compare John 20:23 with 2 Timothy 4:14-15.
When we forgive someone of their sins they have transgressed against us or God it is expected that everyone in the Body of Christ forgive that person as well and if we have the Spirit of God we will. (2 corinthians 2:10 and the book of Philemon) When someone is doing harm and continues to do harm despite the warnings given we are to wipe our feet and shake the dust off them and warn others believers of these people and if we have the Spirit of God which loves the truth we will warn others. (2 Timothy 4:14-15)
If anyone leaves the Body of Christ which seeks to glorify the Word of God above all to enter a religion its only because the reign of self has resurfaced or perhaps never even died in the first place thus it seeks to be fed and it gets fed quite well when one practices self-piety and religion. This is an invitation to seek the Face of God in the spirit and not His hands in the flesh otherwise you will find yourself dead but deceived in thinking your religious observance means you’re alive to God when in reality your lips speak but your heart is no where near God’s presence.
In the love of Christ and the love for the Spirit Romans 15:30
God is my judge,
Though I am not Roman Catholic, I have to say that much of what you have espoused sounds – to me, at least – dangerously close to a gnostic understanding of Christian spirituality. Perhaps that is not your true position, but it strikes me thus. It is true that in St. Paul’s writings especially there is the notion of the flesh warring against the spirit, but when taken in the context of all of Paul’s writings, and all of Scripture, it would seem that he is referring to the “old man,” i.e., the sinful nature, as opposed to the regenerated “new man” sanctified by the Holy Spirit of God. By virtue of the incarnation and Christ’s final victory in death over the powers of evil we can no longer think of flesh as evil in and of itself. Thus, to read Scripture strictly in a “spiritual” sense (or to pick and choose what to take “literally” and what to take “figuratively” or “spiritually”) is to undermine much of what God has taught us about this life and His good creation through it.
So I suppose, getting back to the point, who is to determine how to interpret Scripture? Is it not the “fleshly” pride you spoke of that rises up within me that says, “I am determined to interpret Scripture for myself.” Or maybe, “I will follow this denomination’s doctrine, because I know this is a correct understanding of Scripture.” Either way, is it not pride? The doctrine of “Sola Scriptura” combined with “The Priesthood of All Believers,” at my vantage point, are the culprits for the 35,000 denominations we have in Protestantism, many of them having lost their way to the spirit of the age. “Sola Scriptura” seems to have morphed into “sola schismata.” Now we vote on truth, and truth becomes whatever the majority believes the scriptures say or do not say. Surely God did not mean this to be so. Surely Jesus’ prayer in John 17 remains unfulfilled.
Again, I am not Roman Catholic and at one time would have said the exact same things you said above. I no longer do, but I’m not sure what that means for me or where God is leading.
Tim
Cindy,
I was wondering if I could get your email address and email you a few questions about Catholicism? I’m currently researching and will attend RCIA soon. Still have a lot of lingering questions and would love to dialogue about them with you if you have time.
Sincerely,
Christie
Hi, Christie!
Absolutely! I have sent you a private email. I look forward to hearing from you!
Blessings,
Cindy
Cindy,
Thank you! I actually haven’t received an email, did you get the right address from C2C? I have re-typed it, in case it was the wrong one.
Sincerely,
Christie
Christie,
I resent the email this afternoon with the address from your last comment. :)
Blessings,
Cindy
Dear Jason and Cindy. God richly bless you as you found treasure on earth for heaven. your experience and testimony will shine like the sun that brighten our heart to see and seek the truth. we as Catholic for most of the time taking it for granted. your faith journey give us energy to dig deeply in to the deep of our faith.
God bless you and your family
Rina