1/14/2010
Former evangelical minister, now a Catholic seminarian
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| Former evangelical minister, now a Catholic seminarian |
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Ed Langlois
A couple decades ago, Gregg Bronsema got an inkling of his spiritual future.
His evangelical credentials sparkled: a graduate of Fuller Theological Seminary, assistant pastor at Portland Foursquare Church, a scholar who could quote scripture at will. Impressed, church friends encouraged him to apply to teach at the local bible college.
But when the application arrived and it included questions formed to test his evangelical loyalty, he found himself balking over several theological points. He knew what to write to get the job, but answered honestly instead. College officials rejected him.
Now, Bronsema is in his first year at Mount Angel Seminary. He feels right at home.
“I didn’t exactly come running to the Catholic Church,” says the slim, bespectacled man. “I had a lot of stereotypes and misconceptions about the church that had to be broken down. But I have found the strength of the sacraments of the church and what a difference it makes in life.”
Bronsema, 52, sees the divine will at work all along his unconventional trek.
He was born into a family descended from Dutch Calvinist immigrants who settled in the Midwest in the 19th century. Growing up near Chicago, he recalls large family gatherings after services when uncles and aunts critiqued the pastor’s sermon and everyone talked about how God was working in their lives.
Bronsema’s first religious shake-up came when his parents left the family church and became Baptist. Soon after, when Gregg was in elementary school, the household packed up and moved west to Ashland. He fondly recalls his mother quizzing him and his two sisters on bible passages before bedtime.
When he was in sixth grade, the family moved to Portland. About a year later, his parents separated and eventually divorced. Gregg finished high school and went on to the University of Oregon, where he earned a degree in architecture. He began work for the Bonneville Power Administration and volunteered at Portland Foursquare, where he was asked to help teach adult Sunday school for more than 100 students. The couple leading the course urged him to study theology, which he did at Fuller, located in Pasadena, Calif.
When he returned, he was offered a post at Portland Foursquare as an assisting minister. He calls those years “a rewarding and rich time.”
Then the bible college professorship application crisis brought on thundering questions. What was true? Where did he belong? He decided to seek out his theological roots and attended Calvin Theological Seminary in Grand Rapids, Mich., but he still felt he did not quite belong.
Then, a decade ago, his grandmother had a stroke. He was called home to Portland to help. Those years as a caregiver not only allowed him to get closer to her, but gave him room to explore his spiritual unease.
He wondered why there are so many different kinds of Christian churches when Jesus emphasized unity. Instead of seeing the Reformation as glorious, he saw it more as “a bad divorce.”
He had landed a job at a Portland Christian bookstore, and began reading about the Catholic Church. He then picked up Crossing the Tiber, written in 1997 by former Baptist evangelical Stephen Ray. A thorough study of scripture and history, the book lays out a case for the Catholic Church as the one founded by Christ. Ray shows no animosity for his evangelical roots, using his biblical skills for the journey. Bronsema saw his own path merging with Ray’s and leading into the community of Catholics.
Bolstered by his reading, Bronsema got up the courage to walk into a Catholic Church. He’d heard about a concert and service planned for St. Joseph the Worker Church in Southeast Portland, not far from his work. During the event, he was impressed with Father John Amsberry’s prayerfulness and enthusiasm. He sought a meeting with the young pastor, who has been a favorite at youth Masses over the years.
At Father Amsberry’s urging, Bronsema began attending Mass. The liturgy and its standing, sitting and kneeling at first dazed him, but he kept coming back. Then Father Amsberry suggested the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults, formation for those who want to become Catholic. Bronsema conceded to try it once, still unsure of the whole plan.
At the RCIA meeting, he met a former agnostic and the two hit it off. And so, the former evangelical and the man who once thought there is probably not a personal God, began attending the family Mass. Bronsema got excited about the liturgy.
He stayed in RCIA through the year and then faced a decision. Should he profess the Catholic faith during the Easter vigil of 2008? During sleepless nights, he worried what his friends and family would say.
Then, in a moment of prayer, it occurred to him that he needed to follow both his intellect and his heart into the Catholic Church, not worrying about what others thought.
“In the end, you must follow what is true,” he says. “That is more important than anything else.”
Bronsema reveled in his profession of faith, his first Communion, his confirmation. He felt he’d swum his way home across a wide channel.
He’d sensed the call to ministry in his old life and assumed that the option would not be open to him as a new convert. He had come to peace with that, ready to be a devoted layman.
So it came as a surprise when, during one of his regular spiritual direction meet ings with Father Amsberry, the pastor asked if he had ever considered priesthood. At the question, Bronsema’s life history flashed before his eyes and he began to weep. It had been only weeks since he’d become Catholic.
“It was a holy moment,” he recalls. “It’s that unusual part of the way God works. I was just open, saying ‘Here I am.’”
Before the meeting was done, Father Amsberry had called the Archdiocese of Portland’s vocations director.
“I love Gregg’s kindness and that he is unassuming,” says Father Amsberry. “[He knows that] all have fallen short and it is all grace. I love Gregg’s relentless search for truth.”
Bronsema began meeting with Father Kelly Vandehey of the vocations office, attending discernment retreats and going through the battery of evaluations for prospective seminarians. He was judged so acceptable that the seminary and the archdiocese waived the usual two-year wait for converts to enter.
“What incredible joy is flowing through me,” Bronsema wrote in a letter to St. Joseph the Worker parishioners as he entered Mount Angel last fall. “Truly this is the ‘Jesus over you’ type of joy.”
Catholic seminary life has agreed with him so far. He rises early to pray with the Benedictine monks who operate the school and then embraces the various chances for prayer all day long.
“Our lives are to be a praise to God,” he says.
As Bronsema reviews the course of his spiritual navigations, he is grateful. He knows it has left him well positioned to show people that evangelicals and Catholics have a lot in common.
“It’s neat to break down these walls that are so unnecessary,” he says.
Last year, he was sponsor in RCIA for a couple who had met at Multnomah Bible College but then decided to become Catholic at St. Joseph the Worker.
“The book group leader loved having Gregg in there,” says Janet Rathbone, youth minister at the parish. “He would go get additional resources. He brought a wealth of knowledge.”
Rathbone calls Bronsema a “gentle, caring person” who jumped into projects right away at the church. “He was always there if you needed something.”
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