I went to Mass on Saturday evening.
And I went to an evangelical service on Sunday morning.

Scandal, I know—not literal, but literary.
A devout Catholic, at an evangelical church.
Scandal two: I loved it.

But let me be clear from the start: nothing surpasses the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Nothing equals receiving the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus Christ—heaven entering our mortal flesh (John 6:53–55). That is the summit of human intimacy with God. Everything else flows from it—and back toward it.

And that’s precisely why, on the morning after that Eucharistic encounter, my experience at Redemption Church in Monclova pierced me so deeply. It wasn’t a substitute. It was an overflow.

Overflow, Not Replacement

Three services. Streams of cars. People smiling, embracing, praying. Joy so tangible you could feel it before you even stepped inside. They weren’t playing church; they were being church—souls hungry for Jesus Christ, convinced He is alive and at work among them.

As I stood there, I thought: This is what Eucharistic life is meant to look like when it leaves the church doors.

Of course, innumerable Catholics are already living this way—parishes alive in the Holy Spirit, families gathered in home prayer, movements forming missionary disciples.

In our own home, along with the Rosary, Novenas and the Divine Office, we’ve long gathered friends and family for evenings of praise and prayer—guitar, Scripture, spontaneous song. This has overflowed for us into leading events large and small, in places sacred and secular. For us, this has never been “non-Catholic.” It is Catholic overflow—a continuation of the Psalms first sung by David and prayed daily by priests and religious around the world.

Our son, Seph Schlueter, a #1 Billboard Christian artist (Counting My Blessings, Running Back to You) and leader of Damascus Worship, embodies this reality: expressive praise, intimate encounter, and missionary zeal are not Protestant imports; they are the fruit of Eucharistic life rightly lived. If you happen to attend a closing Mass on a Friday at Catholic Summer Youth Camp (CYSC) in central Ohio, you may likely be surprised, no, blown away, to see lines of young people giving witness to many miracles of encounter.  

In its simplest form, for anyone who truly receives Jesus and knows it—how can we keep from singing?

The Scandal of Practical Atheism

And yet—too often, for too many—the flame has cooled.

Pope Benedict XVI called it “the silent apostasy of practical atheism,” in which believers live as though God did not exist.

We can receive the Bread of Heaven and leave unchanged.
We can profess the Creed and then drift through life unmoved and unconvincing.

It’s not that every Catholic parish is lifeless—far from it. But where faith becomes mere calisthenics, a performance of sacred gestures without encounter, the world looks on and asks, rightly, like the little old lady in that first Wendy’s commercial:

“Where’s the beef?”

Where’s the substance? Where’s the conviction that this is real?

Meanwhile, at Redemption, I saw a community animated by purpose—joyful, expectant, hungry for truth, eager to serve. That vitality doesn’t threaten our Catholic identity; it reveals what our Catholic identity is meant to produce.

THIS IS CATHOLIC.
This fire.
This mission.
This living communion that flows from Communion.

Until we begin living what we profess—until the transforming power of the Eucharist spills into our relationships, our workplaces, our communities—why should anyone want anything else?

Small “c” and Big “C”

We need to reclaim both meanings of church.

The small “c” church includes gatherings of believers wherever two or three are assembled in Christ’s name—worship nights, concerts, Bible studies, home prayer groups. Grace moves there. As the Catechism reminds us, “many elements of sanctification and truth are found outside the visible confines of the Catholic Church” (CCC 819).

But the big “C” Church is more: the visible, sacramental Body founded by Christ, “the universal help toward salvation” (CCC 849), through which He continues His redemptive work. The C is not competition—it is completion.

When Catholics rediscover the power of both—the liturgical and the lived, the sacramental and the spontaneous—we become fully ourselves. It is not this or that. It is this and that.

Word and Sacrament. Adoration and action. Liturgy and life.

The Liturgy: Heaven’s Order on Earth

It’s important to be clear: when Catholics speak of “going to church,” we are talking about something utterly distinct from any other form of gathering or worship.

Evangelical “church” rightly refers to the ekklesia—the people called together in Christ, worshipping, learning, and living mission. From a Catholic standpoint, all of that is good and true. But the Mass is in a completely different category.

At Mass, we are not primarily doing something; we are being drawn into what Christ Himself is doing. It is not our initiative but our response to His.

As Dietrich von Hildebrand observed, “The essence of the liturgy is our response to the Supreme Value that is God—to imitate and glorify Him for His own sake.”

That’s why we don’t choose the readings, invent the prayers, or tailor the form to our tastes. The Liturgy is not our creation—it is His invitation. The same words and gestures that rise from our parish today echo from every altar on earth, and from the beginning of the Church’s life—one heartbeat of worship in time and eternity. This worship doesn’t ask, “What strikes you?” It invites us to bow and receive Who He revealed Himself to be—to discover Whose we are.

Every other gathering, however powerful, draws life from this reality. Every song of praise, every word of testimony, every mission of love is meant to flow from and return to the altar—the living center of the universe where Heaven touches earth.

What If We Dared to Bridge the Divide?

What if our bishops and pastors saw communities like Redemption not as competition but as collaboration—partners in awakening souls to the living Christ?

What if, instead of guarding boundaries out of fear, we invited their vitality into the fullness of Eucharistic faith—recognizing in their praise the longing for what we already possess in the tabernacle?

That would require humility. And courage. Because souls today are starving for more than religious exercise. They crave encounter—truth that is lived, not recited.

As St. John Paul II wrote in Redemptoris Missio, “The Church proposes; she imposes nothing. She respects people and cultures, and she honors the sanctuary of conscience… she invites people to freely enter into the joy of truth.” (§39)

To evangelize, then, is to invite—not argue. To propose truth with joy, trusting that grace, not pressure, converts hearts.

A Gentle Invitation to Truth-Seekers

So to my evangelical brothers and sisters who may stumble upon these words: this is not a debate—it’s an invitation.

You already know the Word of God. You cherish it. You proclaim it boldly. So follow that Word where it leads.

As the pastor of Redemption is boldly and clearly preaching a series regarding Christianity versus Islam, socialism, and all the rest, on the subject of “what is true?”—don’t draw a line in the sand!

If truth matters more than comfort, if Scripture truly is our compass, then we must follow it wherever it leads.

In John 6, Jesus declares:
“Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you.”

And many left Him—“from that time many of His disciples turned back and no longer followed Him” (John 6:66).

Jesus did not call them back to clarify symbolism. He let them go. Because He meant what He said. More, He honored Peter and others who exhibited this faith, based not on what they understood, or was comfortable, or desirable, declaring, “Where else are we to go?”

That same faith would later be sealed in Peter’s new name—Kepha, “Rock”—the Aramaic word Jesus used in Matthew 16. In Scripture, a new name always marks a divine mission (Abram to Abraham, Jacob to Israel, Simon to Kepha). Here Jesus wasn’t using a metaphor; He was establishing the foundation of His visible Church through a man commissioned to guard the truth and keep the family together.

From that moment forward, the Church has recognized in Peter’s office a living line of succession—unbroken and numbered from Peter to the present Bishop of Rome. That continuity is not an accident of history; it is the fulfillment of Christ’s promise that “the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Mt 16:18).

If we believe in the authority of the Word, we must believe in the authority of the context that gave us the Word—“the Church, the pillar and foundation of truth” (1 Tim 3:15).

For 1,500 years, the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist was unquestioned by any Christian community. God did not change His mind. He is not double-minded.

I invite you—search the writings of the early Church Fathers. Read Ignatius of Antioch, Justin Martyr, Cyril of Jerusalem. You will discover that the Eucharist was always understood as what Jesus said it is: His actual Body and Blood, offered for the life of the world.

This is not a barrier to intimacy with God. It is its fulfillment.
For what could be more intimate than partaking of His very life?

This mystery of Real Presence isn’t an isolated doctrine; it flows naturally into something else equally concrete—the Church herself.

Truth Anchored in the Church

Authentic encounter presupposes authentic truth.

The Word of God is not self-interpreting; it is born from and safeguarded by the Church—the living community through which the Holy Spirit still speaks.

As Dei Verbum teaches (§10): “It is clear that Sacred Tradition, Sacred Scripture, and the teaching authority of the Church are so linked and joined together that one cannot stand without the others.”

Every serious truth-seeker who follows that thread—asking hard questions about Mary, the saints, purgatory, authority—finds not superstition but coherence; not rigidity but radiant unity.

The Church is not afraid of your questions. She is the only place where all the answers finally hold together.

Time to Turn

As Advent approaches, or at any time you may happen upon this, maybe we all need to repent—not only of sin, but of smallness.

To turn again toward the full dynamism of the Body of Christ:
toward worship that is reverent yet alive,
toward leadership that exhibits what it preaches,
toward parishes that flow from, follow, and lead to Holy Mass, look and feel like upper rooms—places where the Spirit still descends in fire.

What if Catholics embraced the zeal of evangelical praise as our rightful inheritance, and evangelicals discovered that the fullness of that zeal finds its home in the Eucharist?

This isn’t compromise. It’s completion. It’s the prayer of Jesus in John 17: “That they may all be one… so that the world may believe.”

Holy Communion, Holy Community

Every Mass ends with a mission: “Go in peace, glorifying the Lord by your life.”

That isn’t dismissal. It’s deployment.

Holy Communion must lead to Holy Community—to lives that reveal Christ beyond the walls.

When Catholics rediscover their evangelical wings and evangelicals rediscover their Catholic roots, the world will see the Church radiant and whole—one Bride, aflame with love, lifting this weary planet toward heaven.

Let it be, Lord.