Tim Staples gives a caller advice on how to handle an anti-Catholic family member.
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Transcript:
Host: Danny, in Jackson, New Jersey, listening on EWTN, you are on with Tim Staples.
Caller: Hi guys. Thanks for taking my call. I have a brother-in-law, he, you know, he was raised Catholic also, and stuff like that. And he–over the years, he was reading a lot of Protestant books and a lot of things like that. And I noticed he started thinking a lot like them, you know? And I told him, I said, “If you keep on doing that, you know, you’re gonna…you’re gonna start thinking what they believe, and believing what they believe. So anyway, it came to fruition now, he’s very anti-Catholic. In the last few years he’s just been posting these things on Facebook, you know, and all the family members are getting very upset. He posts these videos from, like, YouTube, like the history of the evil Catholic Church, and these things are like so ridiculous. If you know your faith at all, you know that they’re lies and stuff like that.
But when I try to talk to him, I even send them stuff from Catholic Answers to, like, you know, to refute these claims. Yeah. He–he’s just got like a wall up. He doesn’t… He just, “I thought the Catholic Church is this,” you know, the typical stuff. We worship statues, worship Mary, the Pope is the Antichrist. So, you know, my sister-in-law today was telling my wife that, you know, she was upset some of the stuff that was put on Facebook. What–I know have to pray for them and I do. What would be the best way to… to, like…you know, talk to him–
Tim: Danny, you know what–yeah, let me jump in because you already took part of my fire. You know my friend, the most important thing of all is that you pray for him. Offer the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass for him. My friend, pray your daily rosary, offer up a decade, two, a rosary a day. I will tell you, Danny, that was the secret to Matt Doula that you mentioned before. I would find out later, after I left the Marine Corps, he was offering his mass every day for me, and he was praying a rosary for me everyday. I didn’t–and that was for a whole year–and I didn’t know it at the time, Cy, but I was a goner because of it. Now, it took a couple years for that to, you know, to come to fruition, but Danny, of course that’s the most important thing.
I would suggest something else as well. Here is what I do, and I’ve done it many times over the last…hard to believe, 29 years that that I’ve been Catholic. My goodness, 29 years, Cy! It seems like yesterday. But anyway, Danny, ask your brother-in-law: “What is the single most absolutely crazy thing that you could never believe about the Catholic faith?” One thing, not ten things, not a hundred things. I tell you, Danny, most people make the mistake of trying–you know what I’m doing now? I got myself two thousand emails behind as of Christmas time–actually by about early February–and I told everybody, everybody who emails me: “If you email me 45 questions, I’m gonna answer one.” All right, now, I tell everybody now: you send me one. What is your biggest bugaboo about the Catholic faith? And I’ll answer that. And then we can go from there. Let me tell you, I’ve got my emails down from 2000 to about a hundred and seventy now and counting. And I am determined, I’m gonna get them all done.
But Danny, it’s the same thing with you. One thing. If it’s worshiping statues, okay. Let’s deal with that. Let’s knock this thing every which way but loose. Let’s turn it upside down, and if you–let me tell you, Danny, what happened to me was, Matt Doula got me on one thing, and it was “calling no priest ‘Father.’ Don’t call your priest ‘Father.'” He answered that thing every which way but loose, and even though, Danny, I never even admitted to him–you know my story–I never even admitted to him he was right. He was right, and it bugged me to no end. Now we went on to thing after thing after thing. And he answered, he answered, he answered. But you gotta start somewhere. Start with one thing. That’s number one.
Number two: It may be, Danny, that it’s just not time to talk to him. And that’s a hard one for you and I to be able to to come to and say, “You know what, I’m just not ready.” I’ll give you an example; My father and my brother Mike. My father, who just died about a year and a half ago, and a good Catholic; and my brother Mike, who is now a Catholic as well. But both of those guys, when I was evangelizing my mother, my brother Terry, my brother Ted, those two didn’t want anything. My dad got mad. He’s like, “I don’t want that stuff in my house.” My brother Mike would just get up and walk away. You know what I found, Danny? It does no good to speak to the back of somebody’s head. It doesn’t work. All right? So sometimes it’s just not time. It took 14 years with my brother Mike before he became Catholic. Took five years with my dad. My brother Terry was wide open. Took six months and now he’s a Catholic priest. Everybody’s different.
But here, final thing I will say to you Danny; Take James, chapter 1, verse 5, and this is a prayer that you can pray that you know will be answered, and it will be answered in the affirmative. Isn’t that cool? Here is a guarantee from God. You ask for this, you get a “Yes.” And it’s this: “If any man lacks wisdom–” and that’s what we’re talking about, wisdom. Should I talk to this guy, or should I not? “If any man lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who upbraideth not–” in other words, he’s not going to say no, right? He will respond yes. “He gives liberally wisdom to all who ask.” That’s what the scripture says in James chapter 1 verse 5. Now, wisdom comes with age most often, and with experience. It’s going to take time and hard knocks, but you pray for wisdom, and God will give you wisdom concerning this situation.
Host: Thank you very much Danny.