How to Go from Being a Good Evangelical to a Committed Catholic in Ninety-Five Difficult Steps

by Christian Smith

Evangelicals are not always aware of it, but many expect their churches to be the center not only of their spiritual but also their social lives. They not only want worship and teaching in church. They also want nursery, VBS, Sunday school, reading groups, support groups, play groups, small groups, discipleship groups, Bible studies, food pantries, Christian libraries, middle-school youth group, high-school youth group, retreats, ski trips, men’s breakfasts, choir, missions prayer teams, short-term mission trips, church softball teams, marriage counseling, pastoral counseling, stewardship committees, community outreach committees, diaconal ministries, and on and on. Usually that stuff is taken for granted in evangelicalism. But when you start to contemplate church as a place primarily to worship, celebrate Eucharist, baptize, and send members “forth into the world to love and serve the Lord,” you start to realize how central social life is in evangelical churches. The epitome of this taken-for-granted evangelical