www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Parish Life & Evangelization "Convert Mentality"

Dear Vie,

When my children, as teenagers returned from a Greek Orthodox Archdiocese religious camp in Greece, all the American Greek Orthodox priests there gave the kids chotkis, taught them to pray the Jesus Prayer, and the kids all returned wearing them on their wrists. The black knotted ones with one bead looked kind of 'cool' besides!

My husband carries his in a pocket of his coat, and has it handy to pray on inconspicuously, in the car, walking, or wherever he feels he needs a quick spiritual lift.

In the Greek Orthodox church, the monastics are very big on chotkis. I was given my first one by the elder of the monastery the first time I visited and spoke to him. Generally, in my church, when I see someone wear one, I know that they have probably had some contact with a monastery either in Greece or in this country. Personally, I am not offended by seeing them... infact, I rejoice...as I do when someone is wearing a cross or crucifix on their neck.

Fondly, in Christ our Lord,
Alice

Alex,

Perhaps I can help you understand a bit of the convert attitude and you can help me understand your perspective.

To convert, a person most often must:

1. Admit that something they were raised with and learned to love is largely wrong.

2. They have to find what it is that they beleive is right.

3. They have to study a great deal more than many of the "insiders" were required.

4. They have to explain, and most often defend, their decision to those closest to them.

5. Some have to be willing to leave very close relationships including that of parents, siblings, close friends, and even spouses.

6. Then they have to settle in to a compromised reality.

For someone to admit they are wrong or that their family was wrong may take courage. The learning and seeking process takes even more time and dedication. The individual often argues against the faith which they finally adopt. They generally learn through polemics. Primarily because that is what polemics are designed to do: argue the case for a particular faith.

The next step requires them to go to a church where they feel like foreigners even though they know why they are going. They ask probing, sometimes argumentative questions. Not because they are rude, but because they are giving up important aspects of their initial view of existence itself. They have to study and learn traditions that aren't theirs and are asked to show these traditions great respect, which they do.

Then they have to confront their families who often times disown them. They lose friends and some, and I know personally of one, lose their spouse.

All of this is done and asked for by cheerful folks with smiles on their faces, who don't seem to understand the gravity of what they ask. Then, when the convert goes to settle in to the parish, they find that the people don't revere the traditions for which the convert may have just sacrificed his/her family. Do they get angry and tell the parishioner, "Hey, why aren't you following the tradition you cheerfully asked me to give up my family for?" Yes. The response is usually, "Be flexible."

Sometimes that is what is needed, but great pastoral care must be shown, not only by the priest, but by the parishioners. For one prominent parishioner to come up to someone who may have suffered things the parishioner has no vague idea of or has no resolve to endure and say, "You are too rigid and have 'convert mentality' and we don't want your kind here," this can be devastating. So they leave and go somewhere where they will be taken seriously.

Yes, some need to be reigned in, but it needs to be done with pastoral care and not vague epithets. Patience and care, not arrogance and abrogation.

Well put, Cizinec; the misunderstanding between those who have always been a part of something and those for whom it is new and fresh is constant and recurring...
There is something to be said for each side: converts can be a pain in the ass, and lifers can be semi-conscious.

Dear Cizinec,

Actually, what you wrote describes my situation perfectly - even though I'm a so-called "lifer."

Since university, I've drawn closer to my true Eastern heritage and this has unnerved most of my family and friends.

They think I've gone "Orthodox" and are always asking me if I still believe in the Pope . . .

I've also helped friends in their experiences in becoming Eastern Catholics and Eastern Orthodox.

One friend, a former Anglican, is now an OCA priest and he has "calmed down" with respect to a lot of things that he used to do in public.

As a matter of fact, he now counsels new converts to Orthodoxy to NOT be as he was!

My old parish has an anchorite whose family actually disowned her after she became Catholic and a nun.

Her RC Order told her she must STOP attending Byzantine Divine Liturgies - and she then left to become an EC. She is now with us as an anchorite.

A "convert" in the East especially does not need to be someone who moves from one faith or Church to another.

A "convert" can be someone who has simply found the path to a deepened practice of his or her Christian faith.

And someone who is a "catechumen" is not necessarily someone who hasn't received baptism yet.

It could be me who needs to deepen my faith and its practice and when the priest issues the call for the Catechumens to leave at the Liturgy - this is a call for that part of me that needs deeper conversion to leave the Temple of my body while only that which is converted remains for the Holy Eucharist.

Extreme converts who are forever making a show of their faith need greater guidance by their spiritual Fathers.

A tell-tale sign that one is an "extreme convert" is when they refuse to come under the rule of a spiritual Father and prefer their own will. Another is to be found in their spiritual history - they will almost always have been members of several faiths before coming to ours.

That is not healthy spiritually - neither for the convert nor for his or her ecclesial community.

That is what I mean by "convert mentality" and nothing more.

I agree with what you said.

Alex

I think we have all seen that. In my mind, though, it's not because they are an extreme convert, but because they haven't converted enough. They like the smells and bells and the polemics, but not the humility. They don't give up the universal priesthood of the believer. They see themselves as the ultimate boss, not the priest. That's the pinnacle of the Protestant (esp. Evangelical Protestant) ethos.

I think one of the first items covered in education programs should be the proper relationship of the parishioner to the priest.

Concerning what is and isn't a "convert," I have a close friend from Central America whose family decided to abandon the Faith while she was a teenager. She refused and was subject to ridicule by her entire family. I think that converts sometimes only see their own sacrifices. It's nice to let them know that the lifers have sacrificed too.

Dear Cizinec,

Well, Glory Hallelujah Brother!

You is right!

You are more right on than a nail in a hitchin' post!

Bless y'a, Big Guy!

Alex

I wonder if this [theoniondome.com] might be a good example of someone with "extreme convert mentality".

Dear Dolly,

Yes, I would definitely say so!

But I can't (and wouldn't dare) speak for Cizinec on this matter!

(That's hilarious! )

Alex (the Man of God, March 17)

Hi everyone

My, my, my, this is an INTERESTING thread...

To me and my experience, the EC is one who comes in screaming HERETIC at something he/she doesn't like. It could be the stained glass windows that our grandparents sacrificed and saved to donate; or the 1920's style ikons on the ikonostas that once again our parents and grandparents saved and sacrificed for or even, GOD-FORBID, the pews in our churches.

Another example of an EC, IMHO, is person who stands in front of an entire congregation and tells them NOT to eat a certain dish that was prepared for a joint parish event because the dish has a teaspoon of "margerine" in it and it's not allowed. This person then proceeds to cover the dish with a brown paper bag and labels it as NOT A FASTING DISH.

Oh, the last example did in fact happen to me and I can give you the name of the Panni who did it; she's Antiochean and in some circles is called "She Who MUST Be Obeyed".

In my parish, we have many converts, men and women who married members of our community. They have been accepted and many of them keep our traditions and customs better than some of "cradle" members.

We have one young man who converted to the Roman Catholic church from the Lutheran church only to fall in love with our Eastern Divine Liturgy. He's there every Sunday, pitches in at all the Festivals and helps with every men's club project. He has yet to utter word one against the ikons, stained glass windows or the pews.

Gee, maybe he's not a REAL convert...

I CERTAINLY HOPE HE IS!!!!

JMHO...

so many eggs, so little time...

mark

Dear Marko,

Now don't get people here started on those pews!

Grrrr . . .

Alex

Yea...about those pews....I will let you know how I feel about them, right after I get done sitting in one while resting my back...

PEWS!!!!! PEWS!!! :rolleyes:

But at least I've never complained about anything else...and if anyone wants to sit in those we have I never say anything against them.

I'd never complain about something we eat at a parish dinner. I would just figure that if anything was wrong with what was set before us Father would have already given us a dispensation for it.

I love our Church.

Dan Lauffer

Dear Dan,

Convert or not, there's still Methodism to your madness!

We were invited to attend a United Methodist church supper for the poor in Florida - and we went.

Very nice people, your former people . . .

Alex

I'm a wannabe easterner, but in reality a Roman Catholic. And speaking in confidence to the Orthodox among us, since I would not be able to say this out loud in front of any of my latin rite family at this point, I am wondering about how one "converts" to Orthodoxy from being a RC. Not the paperwork process, but the inner process. I believe I read on another post today that Archimandite Gregory was formerly a Franciscan. I know other priests, religious, and laypeople have probably made the switch to Orthodoxy. But something bothers me: and the only way I know how to describe it is that good old-fashioned Catholic GUILT. As much as I am enamored with Eastern theologians, icons, liturgies, and other things, I come back to that "I will give to you the keys to the kingdom of heaven" that St. Peter was blessed to hear from Our Lord, and I think, "Oh, no, to leave Catholicism would be to turn from the "True Church." Even though I have a great many misgivings, (I will not go so far as to say doubts, not yet) re: certain dogmatic pronouncements of modern history.

Plus, I see how the Orthodox seem to have more or less kept the faith constant in most churches. That is, no pro-abortion, contraceptive-pushing, women-priest promoting, relativism touting, Christ forgetting nonsense going on among about 50% of most congregations, as is the case in Roman Catholicism, at least here in America.

And the spiritual side of things, well, you can't begin to even think about comparing the riches in East to the guitar Masses here in the USA.

After my ramblings, what I am getting at is this: How does a RC begin to find their way past the RC guilt, to even be able to freely appreciate and learn about Eastern rites without that nagging voice saying (true church, keys to heaven, vicar of christ, etc.)?

It must be a very long process, but one I would love to see the story of in print by one who is theologically trained and metamorphed into an Orthodox from Catholicism. I mean this in all sincerity, and hope I have not offended anyone on either side. But, plainly, I have a divided heart right now, not to speak of my LUNGs. (Smiley face!) Do many converts come to Orthodoxy through the auspices of Byz Catholicism, since it still owes allegiance to the papacy? Is it always a long road? Does the little voice ever go away that says, "you left the true church?"

Tammy

Strangely enough, I was thinking about this discussion last night during pre-sanctified and came to a few conclusions about myself...

I thought perhaps that I had the 'ec' mentality, but I realised that I was the same when I was RC, meaning, I watched and sniffed at how people were doing things, decided that they weren't doing them right...but then I realized that I did the same thing when I was Latin(holding hands during the Lord's Prayer...yechhhh)so I can't pawn my attitude off as 'ec'...when I was a kid I left the Church because I thought people were being hypocrits...when I returned to the Church, I returned realizing that everytime I pointed at a 'hypocrit' three more fingers were pointing back at me, making me three times the hypocrit.

I also remembered something I used to tell my students when I taught the RCIA...I remember explaining that when they sat in the pews they would see a whole range of worship attitudes(for want of a better expression), some who seemed deeply in love with the Lord, some who seemed to take the Church and Her Sacraments for granted, some who seemed to be old-fashioned, others who seemed to follow every change and fad like the wind...I told them that since we could never judge what was in the person's heart, we couldn't ever judge what we could see as far as the externals...shamefully, I never seemed to take my own advice...

Humbly asking for forgiveness for my own faults, and prayers that I might overcome them,

Vie,