 |
| STILL
PREACHING — Former Pentecostal
minister Alex Jones didn't leave preaching behind
when he joined
the Catholic Church in 2000. Employed in the evangelization
office of the Archdiocese of Detroit, he is also
studying to be a deacon. Jones was in Milwaukee
last weekend to speak at the 2005 Revival Fire
Transforms Us at All Saints Parish. |
MILWAUKEE — Alex Jones spent much of his life not
wanting to be Catholic. In fact, he was born and raised
in the Church of God in Christ and eventually became
a Pentecostal minister who pastored his own church for
25 years.
“
Why would I want to be Catholic? Nobody wants to be Catholic,
not even Catholics,” Jones joked with his audience
at All Saints Parish last Friday evening at the 2005
Revival Fire Transform Us.
The former minister not only entered the Catholic Church
in 2000, but he brought along 54 members of his former
Detroit congregation, Maranatha Christian Church. Currently
he works for the Archdiocese of Detroit as associate
director of an inner-city evangelization project and
is in the diaconate formation program. He tours the country
speaking about his road to Catholicism.
“
My son asked me, ‘Dad, why do you want to become
Catholic? You’ll lose your ministry, you’ll
lose your church, you’ll lose your income and will
never preach again,’” he chuckled. “I
preach now more than I have ever preached in my life.”
Jones, the featured speaker at the two-day retreat/conference
sponsored by the Catholic Charismatic Renewal, admitted
his journey to Catholicism was lonely and unexpected.
Happy with his life as a Pentecostal preacher, Jones
said he wasn’t searching for anything different.
As a way to learn more about Christianity, he and his
congregation began studying the origins of the faith
by reading works by the fathers of the church such as
St. Ignatius of Antioch and St. Clement of Rome, the
third successor of St. Peter.
The more he learned, the more he realized the Catholic
Church was the closest to the teachings of Jesus. As
he studied, he made subtle changes in his own congregation.
For example, on Easter Sunday, he divided the worship
into Liturgy of the Word and Liturgy of the Eucharist.
He took the Bible off the communion table which was becoming
an altar and he purchased red, white and green chasubles,
the outer vestments a priest wears while celebrating
Mass.
His readings from Ignatius of Antioch, a friend of the
apostle John, stressed the flesh and blood of Jesus.
“
That’s transubstantiation. He’s talking of
the Eucharist,” Jones said. He also kept reading
about bishops, priests and deacons, but said he realized
in his church he was the pastor, the bishop, even the
pope.
“
But at that moment, I saw I was all alone. I prided myself
on being an apostolic teacher, but I had no apostolic
succession,” he explained. “I had created
a church that did great things, but it was not tied into
apostolic ministry. I had no assurance of orthodoxy.”
Through his research, he learned about the Catholic Church’s
emphasis on liturgy, hierarchy and the Eucharist.
“
That blew my theology out of the water,” he admitted.
After much deliberation and a two-year faith journey,
Jones, his wife, three sons and members of his congregation
entered the church during the Easter vigil in 2000 at
St. Suzanne Church in Detroit.
Jones, however, does not consider himself a convert.
Rather, he says he “grew into the Catholic Church.
I did not come to the Catholic Church to find God. We
were led by the Holy Spirit into full understanding of
Christian faithful.”
For the first month after he became Catholic, Jones said
he carried a huge burden. “I had discovered a wonderful,
well-kept secret. God’s church was one holy, catholic
and apostolic and you cannot understand the impact that
had on me.”
Every morning, Jones said, he awakened early and attended
the liturgy of the hours and Mass at a nearby Dominican
cloistered monastery. After the other 20-30 worshippers
left the chapel, Jones said he felt so strengthened to
be in the presence of the blessed Eucharist. He would
ask God why so late in his life, at age 59, did he introduce
him to Catholicism.
“
I was glad to be here, but why did it take so long?” questioned
Jones, also wondering why he was chosen when he saw others
whom he perceived as holier or better preachers.
“
Do you know what he told me,” Jones asked his audience?
After a dramatic pause, Jones said God told him “nothing,
absolutely nothing.”
He believes, however, that God is showing him, rather
than telling him why he led him to Catholicism “to
show him what a jewel you have here in the church.”
Jones said he also discovered God is more loving, more
forgiving, than he had thought. “He’s constantly
telling us to ‘Be not afraid,’” he
said.
In the Catholic Church, Jones said he believes he’s
found a treasure.
“
I’ll never see all the treasures in this church.
It is so deep, the spirituality in this church is so
deep. It’s not like the superficial spirituality
you see in TV programs, it is a profound spirituality
that causes one to give up everything,” he said,
pointing to people like Francis of Assisi.
“
I often tell Catholics, ‘Why would you want to
give up your faith and get something that’s not
as valuable?’,” he said, saying with Pentecostal
churches you “sing kum-ba-ya Lord, but here you
get the Eucharist.”
