Complete Christianity is the Catholic blog of Shane Schaetzel — author, apologist, catechist and Evangelical convert to the Catholic Church through Anglicanism. If you prefer to follow me on social media, you can follow me on Gab, Minds, MeWe, Truth and Twitter.
The first name, Shane, is the Anglicized (English) version of Sean or Shawn. Because people ask all the time, the last name Schaetzel (pronounced shet-zel) is Swiss-German. My father’s side of the family (Swedish & Swiss) came to America between 1840 and 1929. My mother’s side (British and Irish) started out as colonists, and have been on this continent for the last 400 years.
My family is staunchly Protestant — mostly Baptist and Lutheran. However, two members of my extended family began converting to Catholicism as early as the 1960s, following the Second Vatican Council. As for me, I was baptized Lutheran in 1970, but raised as an American Baptist (ABC). My wife was baptized and raised Methodist (UMC). We converted to the Catholic Church in 2000, following a brief stay in Anglicanism (TEC).
I’m a faithful Catholic layman. When I say layman, that means I’m not ordained as a priest or deacon. I’m just a regular Catholic. When I say faithful, that means I actually believe what the Catholic Church teaches in the Catechism of Trent, the Baltimore Catechism and the Catechism of the Catholic Church. In other words, I believe what the Catholic Church has always taught historically. I’m a member of the U.S. Catholic Church, in full communion with the Pope of Rome, and I’m a card-carrying member of the Knights of Columbus, 4th degree.
Here in the pages of this blog, I will explain commonly misunderstood Catholic teachings, as well as comment on politics, news and current events, as they relate to the Catholic Church, Christianity and the world. If you like what you read here, please buy my books. This is the best way you can support my online apostolate (informal ministry). I don’t take donations, and I have no plans to start. I want my readers to have access to information. That’s what this apostolate is all about. Buying my books for yourself, and others, helps this apostolate grow, and it helps the financial side of keeping it going. So please consider buying one of my books. Give it a read, and if you like it, buy another one for a friend. That’s how you can support me and this apostolate. Thanks!
Religion
I’m a Catholic apologist. That means I vigorously defend the Catholic Faith against false claims and religious ignorance. I believe apologetics is a “carrot and stick” kind of art. On the one hand, you want to offer the “carrot,” which is the truth of Jesus Christ, his Catholic Church, and the sacraments. This needs to be offered in the most gentle way possible, to attract those who are sincere and willing to learn. On the other hand, you need to be ready with the “stick” to defend the faith against those who are prideful and only seek to attack the Catholic Church for their personal gain. These are the people who are constantly slandering the Catholic Church and Catholic people (clergy and laity) with falsehoods, half-truths and prejudice. These people demonstrate no willingness to learn, and refuse to listen to reason, or engage in meaningful dialogue. I have zero tolerance for that. No Catholic should ever have to tolerate it. In my opinion, Catholic apologists often take the nice and sweet approach a little too much. I understand their rationale, and I’m not criticizing them for it. I just don’t agree with it.
Religiously, as you can imagine, I’m pretty traditional in my faith. I usually attend traditional Catholic worship (English Patrimony or Latin Patrimony) as a preference. The English Patrimony is how I found my way into the Catholic Church. I was baptized as a Lutheran and raised as a Baptist. In my early adult years, I was an Evangelical and regularly attended Calvary Chapel where I eventually studied to enter the ministry. However, after some time studying the Hebrew roots of the Christian faith, and reading the writings of the Early Church Fathers, I came to the conclusion the Early Church was a lot more “catholic” than I was comfortable with. So my wife and I left Evangelicalism and spent some time as Anglicans before joining the Catholic Church in 2000. It was the English Patrimony, within Anglicanism, that led us to become Catholic, and it is the only liturgical form of Catholicism that I truly feel “at home” with. This is why my family and I are members of the Personal Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter, a diocesan-like structure within the Catholic Church that was built to accommodate Anglican converts like myself. We practice the Catholic Faith according to the liturgical and devotional form of the English Patrimony. If you would like to learn more about the English Patrimony within the Catholic Church, I suggest you get a copy of the St. Gregory’s Prayer Book, which I was privileged to sit on the editorial board to help create.
Politics
Any and all political views I may post on this blog are part of my Catholic religious beliefs. That’s because my Catholic religion does not influence my political views, it defines them. My religious views ARE my political views, and my political views ARE my religious views. There is no distinction between them in my mind. Principally, I am a Catholic Integralist, and as an Integralist, I hold to the Catholic Christian teachings of Solidarity and Subsidiary.
Solidarity means we’re all in this together, so principally, government should be used to help our neighbors, bringing about a more stable and just society.
Subsidiarity, however, means this should be done at the local level, and that it is against nature for higher governments to do the job that lower governments can and should do. That means the primary government involved in people’s lives should be the city, county and state governments. While the federal government should play the most minimal role possible.
To learn more about Integralism, read my essay I am a Catholic Integralist.
Contact
I’m also a columnist and author. My articles have been featured on LifeSiteNews, Church Militant, The Remnant Newspaper, Forward in Christ, and Catholic Online.
If you wish to contact me, I can be reached only through this blog by clicking here. Please note, if you are a member of the press, I am extremely selective of who I talk to. I generally only grant interviews, or make statements, to specific Catholic news outlets, such as EWTN, the National Catholic Register, or any of the news outfits mentioned above. If you are a Catholic blogger or podcaster, please cite some of your recent work before asking me to do an interview. Thank you.
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