OK, Christian readers. Here’s a scenario for you:

You and a young man, perhaps in his early 20’s, step into an elevator at the same time. You’re both going to the tenth floor. He notices something that indicates that you’re a Christian (maybe you're wearing a cross necklace, or he saw a bumper sticker for your church on your car outside, etc.)

“I don’t believe in God or anything like that, but you seem like a reasonable enough person,” he says as the doors close. “I’d be interested to know: why are you a Christian?”

You have about 40 seconds to answer. What do you say?

Trying to catch up on my unread items in my feed reader the other day, I came across the above scenario posted by Julie at Happy Catholic (via Jen at Conversion Diary). With a blog titled ‘Happy Catholic’, you can imagine Julie’s response…

Because now I am happy. Really, truly happy. No matter if circumstances are good or bad, there is an underlying peace and joy. Because I found Jesus Christ.

That’s cool, there’s no point in having a faith that doesn’t make you happy. Her answer freaked me out a little, however, because the first thing I thought when I read the scenario was “I’m a Catholic”. The first thing I’d have to make clear to that guy is that I’m a Catholic, not just a Christian. Even in this age of ecumenism, in my head there’s a clear distinction between ‘us’ and ‘them’ – Catholics and non-Catholic Christians.

I was trying to think about why this is so when I decided it would make a cool feature for Catholic Flux. Provisionally, I’m calling it ‘Catholicism versus Christianity’, it’ll be a series of posts covering the similarities and differences between Catholicism and the rest of Christianity. Although there will be a Catholic bias thanks to my upbringing, I’m going to do my best to make this positive. Ultimately, Christians are divided but the divisions are nothing compared to the things that unify us.

I’m still not sure about the name, ‘Catholicism versus Christianity’ seems to suggest that we Catholics are a bit hostile towards the other branches of Christianity and that we’re not part of Christianity ourselves. On the other hand, it’s pretty catchy and easy-to-remember!

Stay tuned for the first post.

Labels: cvc, ecumenism, feature, resources