Testimonies

Personal stories can make unfamiliar questions easier to approach. These books introduce men and women who loved their Catholic families and communities, wrestled honestly with Scripture, and describe how they came to rest their hope more fully in Christ and His gospel.

Ray Galea, Nothing in My Hand I Bring: Understanding the Differences Between Roman Catholic and Protestant Beliefs (Matthias Media, 2007)

Galea was raised Roman Catholic and recounts his own investigation after coming to Christ. He talked with Catholic priests and Protestant ministers and tested their claims by the teaching of Jesus and the apostles. It is only about 120–130 pages, personal rather than academic, warm, and steadily brings the reader back to Scripture, grace, and the finished work of Christ.

Richard Bennett, ed., Far from Rome, Near to God: Testimonies of Fifty Converted Catholic Priests (Banner of Truth, 2009)

This is a book where real people share their stories—people who had a strong emotional attachment to Catholic identity, clergy, or tradition. Their testimonies repeatedly center on discovering the sufficiency of Christ, the authority of Scripture, and salvation by grace. It is not narrowly polemical, but rather emphasizes the love and concern these former priests retained for the people they had left behind.

Mark Gilbert, ed., Stepping Out in Faith: Former Catholics Tell Their Stories (Matthias Media, 2012)

Gilbert gathers the personal testimonies of eleven men and women from different backgrounds who came to find peace with God through the gospel of Jesus Christ. Rather than presenting a dense theological argument, the book invites Catholic readers to listen to others who once shared many of their beliefs, loyalties, questions, and struggles, but who were gradually brought by Scripture to reconsider where their confidence before God truly rested. The stories are candid, compassionate, and deeply personal, encouraging the reader to open the Bible, examine the claims of Christ for themselves, and discover the freedom and assurance of salvation found in Christ alone.

Chris Castaldo, Holy Ground: Walking with Jesus as a Former Catholic (Zondervan, 2009)

Castaldo warmly invites Catholic readers to consider the sufficiency of Christ and the biblical gospel through the perspective of one who knows Roman Catholicism from the inside. With both respect and clarity, Castaldo points readers beyond religious tradition to the freedom, assurance, and new life found in trusting Christ alone.

Deeper Study

For readers ready to examine the questions more closely, these studies compare Protestant and Roman Catholic teaching with care and documentation. They vary in length and difficulty, but each aims to represent Catholic claims fairly before evaluating them from Scripture and the historic Reformation perspective.

Michael Reeves and Tim Chester, Why the Reformation Still Matters (Crossway, 2016)

Positive rather than negative in framing, each chapter takes a doctrine and shows what the Reformation recovered and why it is still worth having. This work winsomely dismantles the assumption that the Reformation is a five-hundred-year-old family quarrel that modern people have outgrown. Reeves writes with unusual warmth and wit for the subject.

R. C. Sproul, Are We Together? A Protestant Analyzes Roman Catholicism (Reformation Trust, 2012)

Sproul is clear without being shrill, and the brevity is a feature. The book grew out of his long concern that evangelicals had become careless about what the Reformation actually settled.

R. C. Sproul, Faith Alone: The Evangelical Doctrine of Justification (Baker, 1995)

Written in the wake of the Evangelicals and Catholics Together statement, and considerably weightier than Are We Together?, Sproul’s treatment of imputation and of the difference between infused and imputed righteousness is the clearest short account available. This volume definitively corrects the claim that the dispute of the Reformation was a misunderstanding of terms.

Gregg R. Allison, Roman Catholic Theology and Practice: An Evangelical Assessment (Crossway, 2014)

Allison works systematically through the Catechism of the Catholic Church, summarizing each section accurately before assessing it, and argues that two underlying axioms govern the whole system: the nature-grace interdependence and the Christ-Church interconnection. The value of the book is that it engages Rome as a coherent system rather than as a list of errors. Catholic readers have acknowledged its fairness.

Gregg R. Allison, 40 Questions About Roman Catholicism (Kregel, 2021)

Substantially the same material in a question-and-answer format, this is easier to dip into and better suited for anyone who has one or two specific questions rather than an appetite for a full systematic treatment.

Gregg R. Allison and Chris Castaldo, The Unfinished Reformation: What Unites and Divides Catholics and Protestants After 500 Years (Zondervan, 2016)

Short and structured around exactly the right question, the book deliberately distinguishes what is genuinely held in common from what genuinely divides. This prevents both the false irenicism that says the differences no longer matter and the overstatement that denies the shared creedal ground. It answers the question, “Aren’t we all basically the same now?”

James G. McCarthy, The Gospel According to Rome (Harvest House, 1995)

This is a strong choice for the analytically minded reader who wants documentation rather than merely testimony. McCarthy systematically places official Roman Catholic teaching alongside Scripture, using the Catechism of the Catholic Church. It examines grace, works, justification, the Mass, sacraments, church authority, and salvation. Its great strength is that the reader does not merely hear a Protestant say, “Catholics believe X”; the reader can compare Rome’s own authoritative statements with biblical texts.

William Webster, The Church of Rome at the Bar of History (Banner of Truth, 1995)

A former Catholic, Webster assembles the patristic and historical evidence against Rome’s claims about the papacy, tradition, and apostolic succession. The documentation is extensive, and the historical argument is where its strength lies. This one is a heavier read.

Assurance

Questions about forgiveness and one’s standing before God are not merely academic; they touch the conscience and the heart. These works explain how Christian assurance rests in God’s promises and Christ’s completed righteousness while also addressing doubt, self-examination, and growth in grace with pastoral tenderness.

R. C. Sproul, Can I Be Sure I’m Saved? (Reformation Trust, 2010)

Sproul explains true assurance, how it is obtained, and the danger of false assurance. This is a short, helpful resource that offers a clear introduction to the Bible’s teaching on the security of true salvation. Ligonier currently also offers the ePub free of charge.

Joel R. Beeke, Knowing and Growing in Assurance of Faith (Christian Focus Publications, 2017)

Beeke treats assurance biblically, experientially, and pastorally. Particularly helpful is his threefold treatment of assurance arising from God’s promises, evidences of grace, and the Spirit’s witnessing testimony, along with chapters on cultivating assurance and recovering it when lost.

Thomas Brooks, Heaven on Earth: Assurance in the Christian Life (Banner of Truth, 2022)

This is perhaps the finest Puritan treatment. Brooks demonstrates that believers may attain well-grounded assurance, distinguishes genuine from false assurance, and shows how assurance strengthens worship, prayer, holiness, courage, and joy. It is characteristically searching without turning the believer inward away from Christ.

J. C. Ryle, Are You Forgiven?

With characteristic plainness and pastoral urgency, Ryle begins with the Apostles’ Creed and asks what it means to know the forgiveness of sins personally. He explains our need of pardon, the only way of pardon through Christ, the marks of a forgiven life, and the welcome held out to every sinner who comes to Him. This brief work is searching but never cold: it aims to lead an unsettled conscience away from self-reliance and into the freeness and completeness of Christ’s mercy. Read the free PDF.

Horatius Bonar, God’s Way of Peace (1862) and The Everlasting Righteousness (1873)

These companion works press the freeness of justification and the settled peace it brings with a tenderness that disarms. God’s Way of Peace speaks especially to the anxious reader who wonders whether faith, repentance, or feeling is adequate, directing the heart to Christ as the present and complete Savior. The Everlasting Righteousness unfolds the sufficiency of Christ’s righteousness for the ungodly and shows how the same grace that quiets the conscience also gives rise to a holy life. Both are available as free PDFs: God’s Way of Peace and The Everlasting Righteousness.

Classic Reformation and Puritan Works

These primary and classic works allow the Reformers and Puritans to speak in their own words. Some are more demanding than modern introductions, but they reward patient reading with a vivid sense of the pastoral concerns, biblical convictions, and hope in Christ that animated the Reformation.

John Calvin, Reply to Sadoleto (1539)

Perhaps the finest model in the Reformation literature of exactly the task at hand. Cardinal Sadoleto had written an eloquent and affectionate letter urging the people of Geneva to return to Rome; Calvin answered him with equal courtesy and devastating clarity, framing the whole matter around the glory of God and the peace of the conscience. Short enough to read in an evening and worth reading before any serious conversation.

William Tyndale, A Pathway into the Holy Scripture (1530)

Tyndale’s own primer on how to read the Bible, distinguishing law and gospel so that a first-time reader is not crushed by the one or presumptuous about the other. Given the occasion of this year’s celebration, there is a fitness in handing a friend the very tract the translator wrote to help ordinary English readers understand what they were about to read.

Martin Luther, The Freedom of a Christian (1520)

Brief, warm, and startlingly clear on the relation of faith to works: good works do not make a good person, but a good person does good works. Notably, Luther sent it to Leo X with a conciliatory covering letter, so it is polemically restrained by his standards.

John Owen, The Doctrine of Justification by Faith (1677)

The definitive Puritan treatment, and heavy going. Not a book to lend, but the one to read yourself if you want to be able to answer the objection that imputed righteousness is a legal fiction.

Robert Traill, Justification Vindicated (1692)

Far shorter than Owen and remarkably pointed, particularly on the pastoral consequences of confusing justification with sanctification. A good bridge between the accessible and the technical.

Richard Sibbes, The Bruised Reed (1630)

For anyone with a conscience burdened by guilt or fear, this is the most winsome and pastoral of the Puritan works. If the real problem is a frightened conscience rather than an intellectual objection, Sibbes on the gentleness of Christ toward the weak will serve better than an argument.

J. C. Ryle, Light from Old Times (1890)

Ryle’s accounts of the English Reformers and martyrs, including Tyndale, Latimer, Ridley, Hooper, and Cranmer, with sustained attention to why they were willing to die rather than concede. A natural companion to this year’s celebration and a reminder that the questions at issue were once thought worth a life.

Free and Online Resources

If you would prefer to begin online, these free resources provide accessible starting points as well as libraries for longer exploration. Each site has its own purpose and perspective, so read thoughtfully, compare what you find with Scripture, and follow the questions that are most pressing upon you.

• Protestant and Catholic: What’s the Difference? by Kevin DeYoung (2017) — A concise, respectful survey of the principal doctrines that continue to distinguish historic Protestant and Roman Catholic belief.
• Justified by Faith Alone (Teaching Series) by R. C. Sproul — Ten accessible lessons explaining why justification by faith alone remains central to the gospel and to a settled conscience before God.
• Ligonier Ministries — A rich library of free articles, sermons, teaching series, devotionals, and study guides centered on the holiness of God and the grace of Christ.
• Chapel Library — Free downloadable books, tracts, and themed issues that place trusted Reformation and Puritan teaching within easy reach.
• Monergism — A searchable Reformed library of free ebooks, sermons, articles, confessions, and resources organized by author, topic, and Scripture.
• Christian Classics Ethereal Library — Hundreds of classic Christian books in readable and downloadable formats for devotional reading, historical study, and careful comparison.
• Grace Gems — A welcoming treasury of brief, Christ-centered devotional writings from the Puritans and later authors, many gently modernized for today’s reader.
• The Reformanda Initiative and Vatican Files — Careful, current evangelical analysis of Roman Catholic theology, Vatican statements, and practice, with articles and an accompanying podcast.