It happened just last week, and it was so amazing I had to share it with you.
Young Dino had been showing up at our table once in a while, staying a few minutes, listening and smiling – but quietly drawing away before we could speak with him. We wondered who he was and why he was stopping at the table.
Last week he approached Solomon and asked, “Could we go out for a cup of coffee? I’d like to speak with you guys.” Of course we were happy to join him.
“I’ve been a Catholic all my life. Served as an altar buy. Was confirmed at the age of twelve. Go to Mass and confession. Saw Pope Francis when he visited New York. Not that any of this makes me an angel, but at least I try to live the way the church tells me to.”
“So . . . what I don’t understand is . . . as Christians, why can’t you guys accept my church? What’s so bad about being Catholic? Why can’t a good Catholic be a good Christian? I mean, what’s the difference? I’m troubled by this, and I’ve been thinking about it a lot.
We were struck by Dino’s sincerity, and his question deserved an equally sincere answer. Carefully, respectfully, and backing up our every point with scriptural authority . . . we made the case for doctrinal error concerning transubstantiation of bread and wine into flesh and blood, the Papacy as a permanent divine office on earth, and praying to Mary as a form of necromancy (praying to the dead).
This last idea, that praying to Mary was forbidden, shook our young friend to his roots. Solomon turned to I Timothy 2:5. “For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Jesus Christ.”
Dino asked to see the verse. Solomon handed it to him. He read it over and over and over. Then he did the unthinkable: he stood up, took the rosary beads out of his pocket, dropped them to the floor and crushed them beneath his heel.
For this former altar boy, doing that must have seemed like spitting in the faces of all the priests and nuns who taught him a lifetime of Catholic beliefs. But he was honest enough and brave enough to see God’s light on the road to Damascus, and we were privileged enough to witness it, praise the Lord!
The Holy Spirit is still guiding men and women into all truth, friends. And during this Thanksgiving season, we are grateful above all for your love and support. It enables and encourages us to help shine that “great light round about us.”
Brenda & Solomon Milliner NY, NY bmilliner10@gmail.com November 2018
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