It serves to admit: yes, I wrote that.

Of course, that was history; at the time of my departure, it was a very -- ludicrously -- difficult thing to be an ardent Catholic in the Christian Union, and there was a lot of pent-up hostility to the faith that I and other Catholics encountered on an almost daily basis. Through the machinations of certain users, there was a time at which the CU seemed, to me, to fall far short of its Christian label.

I never stopped trying to rejoin the union, though, but in due course was invited to enter into the officer corps of another union professing to be a place for "believers" (meaning: Bible believers) to come, meet, and discuss. Like me, the members thereof seemed to be disaffected former denizens of the CU. And in them, I found a momentary kinship -- all of us still had a sour taste in our mouths over some chance encounter we had on the CU forums.

I might point out that the reason this union was formed was, in part, because The Christian Union became a very hostile and, frankly, un-Christian place (especially if you were unfortunate enough to be a Catholic).

Those were my words. I won't deny that I said them.

But what I will say is that in the final summation, I was wrong...and then in spades. For while the CU seemed, for a time, to be hostile and far short of its Christian label, it turned out to be a welcoming place again, and then one that was Christian both in composition and spirit. Conversely, the other union to which I briefly fled turned out to be the very thing I thought I was fleeing -- a hostile, unforgiving place, especially since I was Catholic.

I regret my statement above, especially in light of the fact that it applies not to the union I had left, but to the union I had fled to. As bad as things briefly did get in the CU, they pale in comparison to the raw bigotry and hatred poured out by members of the BBU. As as much as I thought that the CU had failed in its mission of witness to Christ, the union I came to afterwards failed much more substantially, and much more comprehensively, than I would have ever though possible.

The BBU was founded, in my opinion, on what was fundamentally a lie -- it was presented, to me at least, as a place which was open to all earnest Christians. It was only after I joined that I learned that the definition of who and what was "Christian" or not was not an open definition at all, but a very strict and unforgiving one indeed. And as much as I had tired of arguing about Catholic particulars on the CU forums, it was only when I entered the BBU that I entered the lion's den.

I'm glad to have come back to the CU -- it is the more Christian forum, and my previous views on the place were informed not by maturity but by frustration. I've been welcomed back in spades, mending old wounds almost immediately and even achieving a promotion to an officer's rank. The people of the CU have shown themselves to be very Christian in their attitude and response to a prodigal son returning to the fold. I'm glad I went back.

I'm equally glad to have shaken the dust of the BBU from my sandals, and while it shames me somewhat that my ill-chosen sentiments are now being used in the capacity in which they are, I do observe that ultimately, they are being used in an effort by members of the BBU to destroy Christian unity. Let that guilt be upon them, then. I denounce my former statement in the strongest terms, and turn its words over to those who would use it to advance their own hostile agenda.