Congratulations to our essay contest winners

Feb 6th, 2010 | By | Category: Blog Posts

In early January we announced an essay contest for the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. Our purpose was to raise awareness of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, and to increase ecumenical dialogue between Catholics and Protestants. We asked that the essays seek to answer the following question: “What is it, most fundamentally, that still divides Catholics and Protestants?” Their answer needed to pinpoint the fundamental disagreement that underlies the other Catholic-Protestant disagreements, show why it is fundamental, and show how Protestants and Catholics can make progress in reaching agreement about this fundamental point of disagreement.

Crucified RabbiWe would like to congratulate the authors of the winning essays: Jeremy Tate and Dave Wade. Jeremy is finishing a graduate degree at Reformed Theological Seminary in D.C. this Spring. He is being received into the Catholic Church tomorrow (February 7, 2010). His winning essay is titled “The Authority of Divine Love.” Dave is a catechist on the RCIA-ACI team at St. Cecelia Catholic Church in Clearwater, Florida. He is preparing to enter the Masters Degree program at the Institute for Pastoral Theology at Ave Maria University. Dave’s winning essay is titled “The Catholic-Protestant Divide: A Path to Unity.”

For their winning essays, Jeremy and Dave each received a copy of Taylor Marshall’s recently published book, The Crucified Rabbi. Many thanks to Taylor for donating the books for our essay contest. Thanks also to those who sent in essays that were not selected. And thanks to Andrew Preslar and Jonathan Deane, for doing blind reviews of the essays we received.

Both Jeremy’s and Dave’s essays stimulated a good deal of substantive dialogue in the comment threads. It is well worth carefully reading through the two essays and the comments that followed them.

Jeremy Tate’s “The Authority of Divine Love“

Dave Wade’s “The Catholic-Protestant Divide: A Path to Unity“

Congratulations, Jeremy and Dave!

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  1. Jeremy TateNo Gravatar February 10th, 2010 10:34 pm :

    Thanks Bryan and C2C folk. I was received into the Church this past Sunday! We only had about 30 people at Mass because of the blizzard, but it was great. The work of C2C certainly helped to speed things up for me. Thank you all for the great work. Here’s a link to The Catholic Review which mentions my confirmation. I can’t even begin to tell you how loving the community at St. Andrew’s has been to our family during this transition.

    https://www.catholicreview.org/subpages/selectedstory.aspx?action=7645

    Thank you all. Thanks for the book Marshall! Peace in Christ, Jeremy

  2. Tom BrownNo Gravatar February 11th, 2010 12:01 am :

    Jeremy,

    I would welcome you to the Catholic Church, but you beat me there somehow. Now go and put those special graces received from Confirmation to work!

    Peace in Christ,
    Tom

  3. Andrew PreslarNo Gravatar February 11th, 2010 5:19 am :

    Jeremy,

    Thank you for the fine essay, and Welcome Home!

  4. Bryan CrossNo Gravatar February 13th, 2010 11:46 am :

    Jeremy,

    Welcome to the Catholic Church! It may have seemed that there were only 30 there, but there were many more heavenly witnesses, the whole host of heaven and all the departed saints throughout the ages, all greatly rejoicing. May the light of Christ who is Love and Truth shine through you even more brightly, through the charism of the Spirit you received in the sacrament of confirmation. And may you find the peace and rest of being in full communion with holy Mother Church, and the true communion of all the saints.

    In the peace of Christ,

    – Bryan

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