A Good Reason to Become Catholic

Joseph de Maistre

So I’ve been thinking a lot about political issues lately.  After all, I’m a big fan of Joseph de Maistre.  In the last couple of years we’ve had people on the alt-right say that the West needs to be saved from Islam and other non-white populations coming here.  What do I think about the West?  What would be considered saving the West?  It has nothing to do with skin colour but returning it to Christendom.  Anything else would ultimately be detrimental to the West.

I think that this is a legitimate reason to become Catholic.  The Catholic Church is the only religion that can save the West.  It has the institutions in place to do so if only enough people would join the fight and become observant Catholics.

I’m aware that this is an argument based on pragmatism and not a truth claim.  The truth should certainly be how we determine our faith choice.  All I’m saying is that if you live in the West and are on the fence between Catholicism and another religion, this reason could be the potential tie breaker.

Allow me to explain.  I think the mainline Protestant denominations are finished.  Probably every reader of this blog would agree with me.  They go along with everything that secular culture agrees with and don’t exist for the purpose they were founded.  Most Evangelicals think they’re an abomination and are they ever correct.  It’ll be a good day when Anglicanism folds into oblivion.

What about Evangelicalism?  Most American Evangelicals belong to churches that are one or two hundred years old.  They are also too divided to form any organized resistance to the evils in the West.

The Eastern Orthodox Church is certainly a powerful Church but it doesn’t have much presence in the West.  One could easily make the case that they could end up saving Russia or the Ukraine from Western evils but as for saving Canada, America, England or France?  They simply don’t have the numbers.

This leaves us the Catholic Church.  America and English speaking Canada are about 20 – 25% Catholic.  That’s not a lot but it’s certainly not nothing.  If the Church could mobilize all of its members to live out a Christian and Gospel-centered life it could help the culture improve in so many ways.

I know what a lot of opponents of mine are thinking.  This won’t work.  The odds are completely against the Catholic Church saving the West.  What about the American and German bishops?  These are certainly valid points.  The odds are very much against the Church defeating the forces of evil in the West.  However, I didn’t say that it will save the West; I said that it’s the only Church that has a chance.

As I mentioned earlier, though I believe that the Catholic Church is the true Church, I concede that this argument is not one based on truth or evidence.  It is based on pragmatism.  So if you live in the West and are torn between Catholicism or another religion, let this reason tip the scale.

With a wider Catholic influence, we can get the writings of Joseph de Maistre to a larger audience.  Western society looked pretty good after World War II.  It had defeated fascism and was on its way to defeating communism.  It doesn’t look so good anymore.  We need to show the world that the enlightenment is the emperor that has no clothes.  Catholic philosophers like Louis de Bonald, Rene de Chateaubriand, and Joseph de Maistre can provide the world with the antidote to the disease of the enlightenment.