The Church is like Grandmother's Attic - Terry Fenwick

The Church is like Grandmother's Attic - Terry Fenwick

Father Robert Barrons said,  "The Catholic Church is like Grandmother's Attic."  He suggested It is crammed full of all these things from the past.   Being a Grandmother, and having had two sets of Grandmothers who saved things and, being a Grandmother now, myself, who saves many things, I related to this thought.  

You do, if you are a convert to the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church, bring in a lot of wonderful things from your life as a Protestant.  If, when you came in, you were 70 as in "'3' score and '10'" as I was, you really bring a lot, albeit some changes - some small changes and a few major changes - but you bring in your wonderful past, the wonderful friends from your early days as a believer, the hymns, all of your Bible lessons, all of your marked up Bibles, and a lot of great teaching - albeit some changes - some small changes and a few major changes.  You do not want to leave anything or anyone behind!  

Then you come into Grandmother's attic and add all you brought to all that is stored in this attic. You find boxes of history, files about martyrs, the blood you stand in that the martyrs shed to preserve the history and the faith and the Bible, the Angels, the Saints and more history.  

It is like Christmas morning, almost every morning - for years - as you make new discoveries, read more about St. Augustine, St. John Cassian, the endless Early Church Fathers, and the Doctors of the Church that you had NEVER heard of before.  You fall in love with the Saints and the 1500 years of Church history you seem to have missed - wonderful history - TRUTH and some truth about really bad things, too. You discover in Grandmother's attic, a Church filled with great men and some not so great, too.  Truth is like that. There were Good Popes and Bad Popes but the Church still stands and always will. You discover that the Doctrine never changes.

You discover that this is truly the Church Jesus started in Matthew 16, when He said, "I will build MY Church . . ."  and went on to say that the gates of hell would never triumph over it and, in the end, She will still be standing.  You discover how the Church was born over 300 years before the Bible.   That is a big surprise! You may have thought it fell from the sky, like I did, but it is all there in Grandmother's attic. You also discover in Matthew 18:17 that the Church was given Authority to solve disputes about who is right or wrong. Jesus did not leave HIS Church behind without specific instructions about how to deal with the problems that would come as His Church grew. 

I am just beginning to think about this - I will be writing and changing this but, for some reason, this morning I wanted to share this thought with all of you.  

Let us all be blessed this Sunday October morning, in the Year of our Lord 2010.

(next day:  This morning I suddenly remembered the lace, the cloths, the candleholders, the candles, the long robes - all those beautiful things that all have meaning!  They were in Grandmother's Attic, too.  Not just pretty things but things that mean something! Everything means something beautiful but all lead to and celebrate CHRIST.  His Birth, His Death and His Resurrection! CHRIST HAS DIED, CHRIST IS RISEN, CHRIST WILL COME AGAIN!)  

I need to clean out that attic for sure and add another chapter!  I love being Catholic! 

(next day:  there will be so many things to add to this - I might, as one of you said, have a book here.  Never thought.  You have all added some great thoughts and I thank you for that.  I just made a Bishop Sheen comment because he was even in our Grandmother's Attics.  I chuckle when I see him as I used to live in Peoria - where he was an Archbishop or just Bishop.  Way before colored TV. But I bumped into him in this attic today!) 


Here is the Cardinal Sheen comment:  "There are not more than 100 people in the world who truly hate the Catholic Church, but there are millions who hate what they perceive to be the Catholic Church.  ....As a matter of fact, if we Catholics believed all of the untruths and lies which were said against the Church, we probably would hate the Church a thousand times more than they do."