Meet Jacob Taylor -- one of our newest hires!

Good day families and friends of Chesterton Academy of the Holy Family!

My name is Mr. Jacob Taylor. I am delighted to introduce myself and my wife Sidney to all the community. We have greatly appreciated your warm welcome into this great fellowship of students, staff, teachers, and families who are all cooperating in this joyful adventure of classical Catholic education. I was asked to write here to tell more about us, especially our conversion story, so you will hear a little about our histories and the path we took converting to Catholicism, moving up to Chicago, and coming to work at CATHF with and for you all now.

Sidney and I met at Harding University in Searcy, Arkansas. We both grew up in the Churches of Christ (sometimes here abbr. as CoC), a part of the American Restorationist movement in our country. Sidney’s home and church families were more on the moderate-conservative side and mine were on the progressive-ecumenical or “nondenominational” leaning wing. We’ll return to how we met and more recent events, but first, I’ll tell some of Sidney’s history. Sidney grew up in the foothills of the Ozark mountains in Russellville, Arkansas. Her father served in the Navy and worked at Arkansas Nuclear One, the major power plant that provides most of the energy for the entire state. Her mother is a very faithful mom of four daughters: Brittney, Tiffany, Whitney, and—the youngest—Sidney. Sidney is very akin to her mother, Joy, who is a homesteader through and through. She is from a small farm town in Tennessee called Portland. They both love cooking, baking, sewing, and hosting friends, family, and strangers (no longer!). Sidney also takes after her mother’s charism of lay spirituality: coffee and prayerful readings of Scripture every bright morning of the year. Her family grew up going to the Westside CoC in Russellville, and the town and church were small and familial. Sidney played basketball and soccer, and she learned to love the idea of doing missions and medicine in her final years of school. After graduating from Russellville HS, Sidney went to Harding and studied Pre-Medicine & Nutritional Health Sciences. Sidney was very faithful to the congregations she participated in and served during high school and college. She was a youth ministry intern for the Downtown Church of Christ in Searcy as well as a missions intern with Predisan Health Care Ministries in Catacamas, Honduras. She is currently studying to be a Physician Assistant at Midwestern University in Downers Grove (one impetus for our move). She will finish the program by Fall 2023.

I am the son of a preacher and a teacher, a double whammy of privilege in certain important places as a youth. But another effect those titles come with is very high expectations in the spheres of church and school, which have in part shaped my young self. My parents were and remain very faithful Christians. They served as missionaries in Jinja, Uganda for 7 years beginning in ’94. I was born there in the capital Kampala in ’99, and then we moved back to the U.S. when I was 2. I have since been back to visit both Uganda and Kenya in 2010 and 2016, as I have great love for the lands and peoples in East Africa. Sidney and I are both open to the call of mission both abroad and domestic (she is an excellent Spanish speaker; Honduras, Peru, and Chile are also dear homes in our hearts). Back to baby Jacob—besides some early years in Nashville, my parents raised my two older sisters Ashley & Anna and myself in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma just outside of Tulsa. There in the eastern part of town for 15 years, my dad preached and pastored the Garnett Road Church of Christ, which eventually moved and renamed as The Journey Church. He recently stepped down to change his work to homebuilding in early 2020. Now he works in Bartlesville and Tulsa with my uncle who leads the Taylor Homes Company that my grandpa Terrell started in the ‘50s. My beloved mother still teaches Calculus and Pre-Calc, leads the AP program and math department, and supports her students at Broken Arrow High School.  

The Journey Church was a good community of believers, but since it turned nondenominational, I was left traditionless. When the joint-venture capsized due to finances in 2020, I was left without a home congregation for my family in Tulsa. Fortunately, though, when I left for Harding four years before, I had begun my search for belonging in the Church—or to discover what the Church really was/is in the first place. My parents always encouraged us, within our home and our church families, to consider ourselves truly brothers and sisters with all Christians around the world. We were taught catholicity without knowing it by the name. And it did smell as sweet. I am thankful to God for my parents and my faith tradition because it made me more ecumenical/ecclesiastically-minded than some of our more sectarian-minded Christian brethren. My grandpa used to say at baptisms in Dewey, OK, as the congregation circled around and held hands, “Son/Daughter, this circle of Christians goes all around the world. No matter where you go, you’ll have the Church of Christ.”

When I graduated from high school, I went on a study abroad trip to Greece and Rome with Harding classmates. This trip, a pilgrimage rightly considered now, opened up my eyes to the world of historic Christendom: Orthodoxy and Catholicism, what Pope St. John Paul II calls “the two lungs” of Christianity (Ut Unum Sint, par. 54.) Admittedly, I was more attracted to the soaring monasteries of Meteora which the Orthodox monks crafted atop the crags of Thessaly as they fled to the skies from the oncoming Ottoman invaders, than I was of opulent, magnificent, splendorous Roma, which did little to abate my angsty criticisms of hierarchy, wealth, and power. Granted, we did spend more time in Greece than Rome, so we did not see as much of the beauties Catholic Rome and her surroundings had to offer. I was bewildered by St. Peter’s, so drawn yet offput by the beauty. I was appalled at the pilgrims rubbing his statue’s foot. I was righteously (I thought) indignant at the sales of rosaries, holy water, and anything ornamented by Pope Francis’s face. I thought, “surely Jesus would have flipped these tables of 2017 like he did in 33?” Nevertheless, Rome still captivated me and caused me to wonder. The Beauty of the Other is startling and, sometimes strangely, repugnant to us (remember cooties, anyone?) before we are able to cede our claims, give ourselves over, and be enraptured in the joy of love and belovedness. This sort of freedom is not something that can be taught, but can only be experienced through an encounter with the living God who formed our very being. Mary was praying for us, even then.

When I arrived at Harding, I decided that rather than stay faithful to the CoC tradition in which I saw insurmountable intellectual flaws and cultural failures, I would strike out on my own two feet to see the rest of the world of Christendom…in small town America! I was sufficiently steeped in the CoC at Harding already, so I would take my tour of all the other denominations of Searcy, Arkansas. I made it about halfway through the thirty (with a brief voyage to St. James, the only Catholic parish of the town) before settling at Trinity Episcopal Church of Searcy. There I made my stand, and there in the Anglican Communion, I learned much of the Tradition of the faith & morals, but especially architecture, organ music, altar rails, and the parts of the Church liturgy that I didn’t know growing up such as the Creed. For the first time I also encountered vestments, the church calendar, the communion and intercession of the saints, and antiphonal prayers. I found much joyful reprieve from the Christian tradition of my past, but there was not enough moral truth (or the clamor for grace, reconciliation, and fidelity to the adoration of Christ, for that matter) to pledge myself in confirmation therein. So, I kept one foot in the CoC and another in unconfirmed Episcopalianism, while also exploring our golden heritage of Scripture and Tradition in philosophy and theology courses at Harding. Here, I majored in Honors Interdisciplinary Studies (like Sidney) with the title of study: Bioscience and Philosophy.

 More briefly, I’ll name some of my influences in college that drew me to the faith. If I boast, I boast in the Lord who gave such glorious gifts of love to me and Sidney through many different avenues. I also pray that these stories and sources give aid to one who is trying to persuade their brethren who have fallen away back into the fold. Know that nothing but the Lord, truly present, sacrificed, and resurrected for them and all of us, will make this act possible. No amount of pontificating, lecturing on ethics, or bewailing the impending apocalypse will justify the faithful or bring the apostate back. Only Christ’s most efficacious grace will do that, his total outpouring from the Father through the Holy Spirit and his Spouse, our Blessed Mother. Regarding these things, here are some influences, many of whom you have already heard of or know. Pray for these blessed souls, whether they are alive, in purgation, or invoke them from heaven above: Alasdair MacIntyre, through his philosophical journey to Catholicism, the English literary converts of the 19th and 20th centuries such as Tolkien, Lewis, Merton, and E.F. Schumacher. But the most important witnesses were the saints. When I was up in the near heavens of the Greek monasteries, I first encountered an ikon of St. Justin Martyr, patron of apologists and Christian philosopher-theologians. He transformed my life and brought me to the virtuous pagans before him and many other saints. The most influential were St. Augustine and St. John Henry Newman, and that is why they are my wife’s and my patron saints. The person that most clearly, and possibly unwittingly, caused Sidney and I to become Catholic was a Theology professor at Harding by the name of Dr. Mac Sandlin (most of college he was A.B.D. and just ‘Mac’ to us). Mac was and is still not a Catholic per se but he is a very faithful Christian in the CoC tradition and a dear friend and brother of ours. He and his wife were faculty for the Greece/Rome trip for me, and then during college he held a small group study at his house consistently for us and friends.  He is one who introduced me to the Aristotelian and Thomistic Tradition of ethics, politics, and philosophy in general. He also taught us Old and New Testaments and Pneumatology. The most important class, though, was a Seminar on St. Augustine and his writings. Sidney was the catalyst who made this class happen. After reading On Genesis by St. Augustine for Old Testament, Sidney requested that Mac teach her more St. Augustine. So, he created a whole seminar course just on St. ‘Gustine for us and about ten other brave friendly souls.

I first read Chesterton in his Orthodoxy (minus his fantastic essay “On Cheese” which we digested in the small group) in my junior year of college. Chesterton had a profound impact on the faith, hope, and charity of Sidney and me. For example, in discussions about our household oikonomia we often quote and apply his principle: “economy is far more romantic than extravagance.” When I read Chesterton, I was thoroughly convinced that I needed to become Catholic (or at least Anglican!). St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Augustine, and St. John Henry Newman continued to pray for and work on me, but Chesterton capped it off. Philosophically I was there, wanting to be in the Church and believing her truths; but my body and spirit were not yet in sync with my mind.

The impetus for moving to Chicago came purely from the Holy Spirit. We were considering where to move last Summer in 2020, and in prayer at church, Sidney heard that we must go to Chicago, three times, from the voice that unmistakably belongs to no other. Previous to this, very comically so, we had no plans of moving anywhere that was a big city, far from family, cold, or Northern which were all opposites of Sidney’s love (and to an extent mine) for small towns, the people we love, and the sublimely subtropical South. But alas, the Spirit called, and, as we live and profess, we must answer to our Lord and Giver of Life.

We were already coming to Chicago then, but what was next is that the Holy Spirit and Our Lady, His Spouse, would enact a full conversion of our hearts, bringing us into full Communion in mind, spirit, and body with the Holy Catholic Church. So, during this time, I was following Catholic news, I carried (often wearing) a rosary with me from Peru, and I continued to read Catholic saints. I worked on my senior thesis on the Catholic doctrines of hylomorphism and theosis in C.S. Lewis’s Till We Have Faces, and I found myself telling Sidney that I wanted us to go to a Catholic church once we came to Chicago. But those hopes were expedited by the Holy Spirit and Our Blessed Mother when the diocese of the Episcopal Church closed again. Around this time, I was reading a Catholic Answers text from 1909 or so in the Harding library. It was by a priest who was defending the faith. I scanned through a few sections, and even argued by pen with a previous amateur theologian and annotator (book defacers, all of them!) who vehemently denounced the Catholic doctrines in the pages and gave poor defences of why. I was having my fun until I came across the article on Veneration (hyperdulia) for the Blessed Virgin Mary. The priest went through the reasons why Mary is blessed, full of grace, Mother of our Lord, and deserving of all praise and entrustment as to Jesus through her. I was thoroughly convinced, but what is more is that he went on to argue that devotion to Mary in no way distracts, but rather magnifies the glorious praises of her Son. He discussed the beauty of daily Mass and Adoration, both of which I had, for obvious reasons, never partaken in yet, but for which I was imbued with an insatiable desire that could only be sated by God himself. I was hooked in, entirely. St. Peter is the best fisherman with Christ at the helm.

That day, I came home imploring Sidney for us to become Catholic, or at least visit a Mass. Like the good wife she is, she listened, questioned, contemplated, and finally agreed. That Sunday we went to St. James parish in Searcy, AR for the first time together. That was our first time of hearing the Mass in English. Afterwards, we also went to the RCIA class taught by our wonderful catechist, Janet. She guided us for the coming months, meeting with our class weekly and with us personally through Zoom. In that first RCIA session Sidney heard for the first time what the Church says about the sacraments, but especially the Blessed Sacrament of the altar, the sacrifice of the Mass, the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist, and the joyful prospect of living in the fullness of the Chrsitian Tradition by becoming Catholic. When we went home, we watched Scott and Kimberly Hahn tell their story of conversion and started listening to Catholic Answers and Pints with Aquinas. From there till Easter Vigil, we had questions, and we heard a lot of answers, but most of all we were satisfied by the authority and beauty of the universal Roman Church, and we were inspired to witness to our friends and family, none of whom are Catholic, that we were crossing the Tiber. Not all were pleased with the news. Our parents were more supportive, and mine and Sidney’s mother came to our confirmation under the names St. Augustine for Sidney and St. John Henry Newman for Jacob.

Around that time that we were entering the Church, we were also looking forward to the future in Chicago, wondering what I would do for work. I looked for classical Catholic schools (having then no idea about the Chesterton Schools Network. Good GoogleMaps brought me to Chesterton Academy of The Holy Family. From there, I went to the website, and then to the YouTube page to see all the fun events of the past 6 years. I was amazed and excited about the curriculum and how much it matched what I had studied and desired to teach and do. I was also thrilled by the aspect of daily Mass and a deep reverence for the Catholic Tradition in the Oath of Fidelity to the Magisterium. I was very excited, but thought it as impossible as my marriage to Sidney that something could be this good, true, and beautiful. I never thought Sidney would want to date me. Neither did I think that CATHF would want to take me. But, here we are, blessed by the Lord four months later. I am floored that I get to teach maths and sciences (and hopefully philosophy and theology in the future!) at Chesterton. I am humbled to be entrusted with the education of your sons and daughters, and I look forward with joy to the days of struggle and of triumph over the culture of materialism and despair that pervades our modern West. Let us sally forth in mirth!

So, that brings us to the present, to where we are, here today. We are excited to begin the schoolyear (Sidney’s has already begun!). It is entirely the gift of God that we are as persons, as Christians, in Chicago, members of the Catholic Church, in the Chesterton Network, and here to serve CATHF. I cannot communicate well enough how faithful Sidney is to me and to the Lord. Her listening and following the will of the Holy Spirit has been crucial for our walk of faith. Sidney is faithful, abiding, and my dear friend, and we wouldn’t be here in Chicago, as Catholics or Chestertonians without her gifts from God and her fidelity to Him.

Pax Christi,

Mr. Jacob Taylor