On a shelf in my office is a pre-publication copy of Eric Svendsen’s Evangelical Answers: A Critique of Current Roman Catholic Apologetics. It has been on the shelf, unread, for years. Much of the book consists of criticisms of my writings in defense of the faith. One might think that would be enough to induce me to read it—after all, most people are curious to know what others think about them—but I never have worked up enough interest to do so. The best I have done is to read the short introduction and the shorter conclusion, and they have been counter-inducements.
The book’s final paragraph says that “We have not found even one argument of these Catholic apologists that stands on its own.” Not even one? All these labors, all these apologists, all this education and reading and thinking behind their writings, and the result is not even one good argument in defense of what even Svendsen must acknowledge to be the oldest Christian body? How discouraging—not so much about the Catholics who are criticized but about the critic. His comment suggests an illiberality of mind—as though he were saying, “These papists are hopeless”—at which point I lose (and lost) interest.
Then there is the first paragraph of the book:
“There is a growing number of conservative Catholics who have taken it upon themselves to defend the Catholic tradition. Vigorous in their defense and confrontational in their approach, they actively pursue debate with non-Catholics in an attempt to answer sixteenth-century Protestant objections and to lead their opponents back to Rome. Many of them are very cleaver debaters and can articulate their position in an extremely compelling way.”
What a wonderful typo: “very cleaver debaters.” Webster’s gives contrary definitions of “cleave”: “to adhere firmly and closely or loyally and unwaveringly” (which brings to mind Genesis 2:24) and “to separate into distinct parts and especially into groups having divergent views.”
A very cleaver Catholic debater will accomplish both things. He will move his listeners toward a firm, close, loyal, and even unwavering adherence to the truths of the Catholic faith, and he will do so by setting this against that, by showing the distinctions between the Catholic understanding of issues and, say, the Fundamentalist understanding. He will bring about unity through division, as paradoxical as that may sound. First he will deconstruct, and then he will reconstruct, as a child takes apart an unremarkable Erector Set building and refashions the many small parts into a marvelous Ferris wheel.
It has been some years since I last engaged in a public debate. I never thought of myself as a clever debater; I hope I was at least a competent debater. But I wish I had been a “very cleaver debater,” one able to take apart misconceptions about the faith and able to build from their ruins a solid understanding of the one Church that Jesus Christ established. That has been the goal of every Catholic apologist I know.