(Father Dwight Longenecker/National Catholic Register) — As pastor of a parish in South Carolina, I am witnessing a remarkable trend: Almost every week I receive a call, email or visit from at least one young man interested in learning more about the Catholic religion. They are older teenagers and both single and married men in their 20s and early 30s.
So many of them have joined our OCIA class that our parish’s director of faith formation has had to run an extra course in the summer. Here in the Bible Belt, many of the inquirers are exploring historic Christianity from a background of contemporary evangelicalism.
Most of them are biblically literate and theologically thoughtful. The old anti-Catholicism in the South, if not dead, is at least dormant. My inquirers express an interest in liturgical worship and are curious about the Catholic religion. Reading the Apostolic Fathers has led them to explore the historic churches, and after dipping their toe into Anglicanism and Lutheranism and finding those denominations either progressive or schismatic, they continue their journey to Catholicism.
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