Why I am closer to “Mainline Protestantism” than to American Catholicism today

Anglican Church

… Mainline Protestantism is making a comeback, close to Catholic social teachings

More than five centuries ago, a priest and intelligent scholar named Martin Luther pinned his “95 Theses” to the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany. That movement signified the start of the Protestant Reformation, and it was a definitive break with the Catholic Church.

What was contained in these theses? Quite a bit, but the essence of his condemnation of the Catholic Church focused on its corruption,

In his theses, Luther condemned the excesses and corruption of the Roman Catholic Church, especially the papal practice of asking payment—called “indulgences”—for the forgiveness of sins.

History.com

Since I was brought up in the Catholic Church was indoctrinated into its teachings, Martin Luther was condemned for his behavior in turning his back on that denomination. 

The unfortunate part of this is that today, a person raised in that church like me can realize that Luther was right about many aspects of his criticism. 

And the very sad part of it for Catholics is that the church today in the wake of the wake of the worst scandal in its history, one in which tens — and likely hundreds — of thousands of clergy have sexually abused boys and girls under their care over the past century. 

And worse, the highest levels of Catholic leaders were complicit in the coverup of this scandal, and the pope who presided over the worst of that coverup has been declared a saint. 

Today, for me, the mainline Protestants are much more attractive than the Catholic Church, the one in which I was raised and which was so important to my family. 

Why is this?

I have been exploring that on a personal level. 

Belief in the New Testament

The problem that I have with the Catholic Church — beyond the horrific abuse and the millions of dollars that the church is spending in the coverup — is that it is closer to evangelical protestants than to Catholic social teaching that I believe in so strongly. 

I believe in the New Testament, the words of Jesus Christ as reported by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Most Catholic leaders in the U.S. disciples of the disgraced two previous popes, are more concerned about political issues than in the love expressed by Jesus. 

That brings me to a piece that I had read recently by a man who has been a life-long “mainline” Protestant and says that his brand of Christians have been devastated by the abuse of the Christian brand of Protestantism in the past 20 years. 

Mainline Protestants

As a piece in The New Yorker that was written by a Mainline Protestant indicated, the decline of the mainline numbers has been precipitous for decades. However, those numbers are now rebounding, and that is gratifying to those from the mainline churches.

Back in the 1950s. Mainliners were predominant in America,

Take 1958 as a high-water mark: that year, as Dwight Eisenhower laid the cornerstone for the Interchurch Center on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, the religion researchers Mark Silk and James Hudnut-Beumler report that fifty-two per cent of Americans, many of whom were moving to the new suburbs, were affiliated with one of the mainline denominations that are members of the National Council of the Churches of Christ, which was headquartered in that building. 

Without this “firm foundation, national morality could not be maintained,” the President intoned. (Ike himself, raised in the Mennonite tradition, was baptized a Presbyterian less than two weeks after taking office.)

Bill McKibben, “The Unlikely Rebound of Mainline Protestantism,” The New Yorker, July 16, 2021

Who are these Protestants?

Which denominations are included in this affiliation? Lutherans, Methodists, Presbyterians, Disciples of Christ, and the United Church of Christ. In addition, some smaller denominations in places like Pennsylvania like the Mennonites and Moravians are also included in this, like the former president.

However, as one Pennsylvania Mainline Protestant lamented, they have been relegated to the sidelines over the past 30 years by those pastors who are more interested in money than in morality,

What makes an American church “mainline”? Well, we’ve got deep roots in American history.  We are really, really white, though we lament that about ourselves. We’re ecumenical, stressing fellowship over dogmatic difference. We hold the Bible to be sacred, but not unerringly factual. We have some sort of national structure. We tend to have set liturgies, which are quiet, even austere compared to Black, evangelical or Pentecostal churches. We are big on social justice, systematic charity, gender equality and radical welcome to all people. Our ministers never, never, never go on television to strut on stages, angling for money.

And to most secular progressives, and the subset of them who cover national politics for big media, we don’t exist.

When they say Christians, they have solely in mind the type of religious people of whom they most strenuously disapprove. In other words, either right-wing Catholics (not, by far, the only kind) or those evangelical Christians who attend mega-churches, vote conservative, doubt evolution, fret about abortion, gay marriage, and critical race-theory, and tend to follow the lead of well-known, well-coiffed, highly political superstar preachers. And who, lately, seem to worship Donald Trump as passionately as they do their Lord and Savior.

Chris Satullo, “Not all Christians are right-wing evangelicals. Mainline Protestants preach and practice social justice,” Dick Polman’s National Interest, March 12, 2022

The convergence with Catholic Social Teaching

Why do I believe that Mainline Protestants are closer to my brand of Catholicism than the current American hierarchy brand? This member expressed it well, 

And let me be clear, emphatically, at the outset, about something: I know that I, personally, am the least of my brothers and sisters; so many in my church, and in others like it, do so much more than I.

What do they do? They (laity and clergy alike) feed the hungry. They welcome and shelter the refugee. They visit the ailing and the prisoner, and comfort the troubled. They preach justice and seek it. They probe the deep wounds of racism, hungry for healing. They welcome all, no matter who they are and where they are on life’s journey, to their table fellowship. They march against violence and for school equity. They welcome women and gays and all races to be part of their ministry, even to don the collar.   

They read, they listen, they think, they discuss, and they vote their values. 

And they get no credit for it. They politely bow their heads and stay silent when their secular friends spout ignorant, biased opinions about the horrors of religion and the pathetic superstitiousness, intolerance, and hypocrisy of all who believe “that nonsense.”

Chris Satullo, National Interest, March 12, 2022

This paragraph illustrates the convergence of the Catholic social teaching and Mainline Protestantism, and it is the reason that I am closer to them than to the religion in which I was raised, as it is practiced in America in the 21st Century,

feed the hungry. They welcome and shelter the refugee. They visit the ailing and the prisoner, and comfort the troubled. They preach justice and seek it. They probe the deep wounds of racism, hungry for healing. They welcome all, no matter who they are and where they are on life’s journey, to their table fellowship. They march against violence and for school equity. They welcome women and gays and all races to be part of their ministry, even to don the collar.   

Christ Satullo

My beliefs

I believe strongly in Catholic social teaching, and I love fact that we can find places like the St. Vincent de Paul Society that feeds the hungry in downtown Johnstown. That we can find places like the Dorothy Day Center on the campus of St. Francis University in Loretto. 

I believe strongly in the words of Jesus Christ when he said that the second greatest commandment is “love thy neighbor as thyself.”

I believe strongly in the Sermon on the Mount and The Beatitudes, like Mainline Protestants do. 

In short, I am closer to the Lutheran and Methodist churches in my hometown than in the disgraced Diocese of Altoona-Johnstown that was condemned in the grand jury report of 2016.

And I agree with this Protestant version of penance than in the right-wing Catholic form that allows former criminal pedophiles to believe that they can enter the kingdom of heaven by saying five Our Fathers and five Hail Marys.

We are now in the season of Lent, the period of reflection and penitence leading up to the centering joy of Easter. As always, my church congregation began the season by reciting a litany of penance. I want to share some of the litany with you, to help you grasp the values that the majority of Protestants in this country – both mainline and evangelical – still hold and seek to live out in an often-hostile secular world:

“Have mercy on us, Lord.

“We confess to you, Lord, our past unfaithfulness: the pride, hypocrisy, and impatience of our lives. We confess to you, Lord, our self-indulgent appetites and ways and our exploitation of others. We confess to you, Lord, our anger, and our envy of those more fortunate than ourselves. We confess to you, Lord, our intemperate love of worldly goods and comforts and our dishonesty in daily life and work. ….

“Accept our repentance, Lord, for the wrongs we have done, for our blindness to human need and suffering, our indifference to injustice and cruelty. Accept our repentance, Lord, for uncharitable thoughts toward our neighbors and our prejudice and contempt toward those who differ from us. Accept our repentance, Lord, for our waste and pollution of your creation and our lack of concern for those who come after us.”

Chris Satullo

Some food for thought.