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February 01, 2007
Why did you come back?
There's a lot of discussion and (justifiable) fretting out there about why people leave the Cathoilc Church. It's a discussion we've had here, and will continue to have. But I want this thread to be something different, something I don't think I've seen before.
If you're a "revert" - why?
What brought you back?
I'd imagine for most it will be a combination of things. And it doesn't matter why you "left" - although that will probably come into the discussion, too. What I mean to say is that if you "left" because after your parents had you baptized they never set foot in a Catholic church again, your story is just as interesting as that of the person who consciously left, as an adult.
And, as in our "What did you hear" thread, let's have this be, er...sharing only. (Eeek!) No discussion, if possible - no disputing others' stories, etc. I'll pull some thoughts together over the weekend and we can discuss. Thank you in advance!
Related: There's a new blog dedicated to the stories of converts and reverts. Click on the image below to go there:
Posted by Amy Welborn | Permalink
Comments
In 2002, I was recovering from a suicide attempt, staying with my brother, a deacon, and my sister-in-law, who ministers to separated and divorced Catholics. I saw reflected in them and in their fellow parishioners the love of Christ and thereby had a real experience of Him. This lead me to reconsider the faith and Church I had left 15 years earlier. I embraced them, in a sense, for the first time.
Posted by: Quoheleth at Feb 1, 2007 1:48:51 PM
"Cradle" Catholic whose religious education ended at First Holy Communion. I don't know if I would even be considered a "cradle" Catholic because my mother was not slightly religious, but we went to CCD for whatever reason. I like to think it was Providence. Years later a few things came together out of nowhere and for some unknown reason, and I was interested in the Church. I found a picture of Our Lady of Fatima in a law book I picked up at random from a lady who was throwing away a bunch of books; I had a Billy Graham book lying around that I bought by chance a few years before, and happened to look at it one day and read about "repentance". Apparantly it didn't just mean saying you were sorry; it meant changing your ways (this was a significant moment of education, because I did have a vague sense of God and belief in him, but no idea what it meant to really believe and follow). I also happened to read an article about Pope John Paul II's life as a Priest, and was extremely drawn to the life it described, of service and sacrifice. I actually started looking into how one becomes a Priest, and I wasn't even a practicing Catholic. Eventually I just felt that I had to go to confession, and I did. I called a Priest, went to confession, and that's where my new life as a Catholic began. I wish I could go back to that moment walking out of the rectory, because (except for my baptism) it was probably the most innocent time in my life. I had no idea what just took place, I couldn't tell you what "absolution" was, I couldn't recite an act of contrition, I didn't even know what the Rosary was. But the peace I felt right then I can't explain. It was a supernatural confirmation that I was where I was supposed to be, I was home.
Posted by: Jason at Feb 1, 2007 2:01:10 PM
(1) The biggest thing for me was the Eucharist itself. I had spent 15 years in Baptist churches and the infrequent Lord’s Supper observances were pale shadows of the Eucharist. My hunger for sacramental/liturgical/Eucharistic life (combined with my stubbornness about “I’ll never go back to Rome”) led me to a 5-year stint in Anglicanism. But that led to other issues, which I found were answered best Home in Rome, including…
(2) Human sexuality. For me, Theology of the Body and the Catechism’s teaching on sexuality answered the questions that Anglicans have had about homosexuality and marital sexuality when nothing else did. This also led to…
(3) Authority. The whole Anglican tsuris made me question the nature of the priesthood, the sacraments, and apostolicity in a way I never had before. The more I heard my fellow Anglicans debate catholicity, the more I discovered we didn’t have it. I realized one day that describing myself as a “low-church Anglo-Catholic” was really another way of saying “Novus Ordo Catholic” (somewhat ironic as I am now becoming more traditional in my leanings).
I posted about my reversion (http://andalsowithyou.blogspot.com/2006/05/coming-home.html) and how Anglicanism turned me Catholic (http://andalsowithyou.blogspot.com/2006/08/dr-strangechurch-or-how-i-learned-to.html) previously on my blog. I hope to do a mega-post on the Eucharist soon.
When I have time…
Posted by: franksta at Feb 1, 2007 2:06:44 PM
This is gonna be embarrassing. That's why I'm signing my name as Nemo. Amy will se by my e-mail address tht I'm a frequent lurker and commenter here. But this will be kinda humiliting to write.
I converted to Catholicism in 1975, at the age of 16. I was, in fact, confirmed on my 16th birthday. My family were protestants, not very church going, though my Mom wanted to be (Dad didn't) The family attended a Metholdist church, but my Mom's faith was very calvinist--apparantly we ended up Methodists through a series of mergers between denominations in the 40' and 50's. I couldn't fathom the "tap dancing" though the scriptures, or who, exactly, held authority. That led me to the Public Library.
I began to read, and fell into some good Catholic books. I sensed authority there, (the county wasn't exactly rich, and most of the books were pre VII), and began looking for the imprimatur in books becauseBooks WITH the imprimatur MADE SENCE! This eventually led to me taking instruction, and discovering the sacraments, especially the Eucharist. I had always felt that there was something missing in the communion services in my families church, and I realized what it was--the Real Prescence of Christ, under the appearance of bread and wine.
I knew that the Catachism was just the basics of Catholicism, so I got a job, and paid my way through two years (junior and senior) of Catholic high school. There I began to have a small problem--everything I had learned during instructions was belittled. The Real prescence was reduced to the prescence of the community, we were told not to pray the rosary because it was outmoded, and would divert our energies from social justice.
In college, I went to the Neumann Center, where I was dismayed to find that most of the books we were exposed to by our charismatic chaplain were from protestant sources, and that our liturgies were dominated by feminists who felt they should be priests, and that the role of the priest was essentially that of presiding over the assembly. One mass was "concelebrated" with laymen.
Then I ran out of money and joined the service. The shortage of Catholic chaplains is disproportionate (sp) to the shortage of priests, and so there wasn't a lot of priestly ministry there. The Chaplains we had were excellent, when you saw them. but I had the sence that because I had chosen a military career, I was somehow "les than" than civilian Catholics. Certainly, when local priest said mass for us, that came through in the homilies.
The ongoing deterioration of Catachesis was disenheartening. I taught CCD for a year, and found that we were NOT to teach catholic doctrine--it was all about feelings and subjectivity. (This was in the diocese of Raliegh, befor the establishment of the Military Archdiocese) Mass got to be very like the Methodist services that I had walked away from. I began attending a Maronite Parish in NC to assist at a reverent liturgy. Then I was transfered to Germany. You can imagine.
In 1991 I was medically retired from the Army. That meant our families income went down. As our income went down we became invisible in our parish. The deterioration of teaching and worship continued apace, and I couldn't help but notice that whenever the Pope spoke, the bishops and priests ignored him.
After a while, I decided that the Bishops and priests didn't believe in what I had learned was the faith. Not really thinking that they would fall away, seeming in mass, I decided what I had understood to be the truth was in error. And, I couldn't buy the gospel being synonymous with the Democratic Platform, which was the majority position around me. Nor could I buy it being identical with the Republican platform, which was the seemingly alternate position, (mainly espoused by people I found to be, well not real Christian in there view of others). I knew that protestant christianity wasn't reall consistant, and never hung together well (close to 300 denominations in the US) so, I lost my faith. In some ways, many of which --no most of which--were my fault, it starved to death.
My wife remained Catholic, and we divirced. I fell hard--into the neopagan movement, drugs, promiscuity, the whole devilish nine yards.
The a couple of years ago I woke up one morning (really) knowing what a sinful little jerk I was, and that God loved me. I got out of bed, got dressed and went to Church, in time for Mass. It was an episcopal church, and I didn't realize how different they were from Catholic: the Catholicism I had been surrounded by was essentialy episcopalian, with less reverence in the liturgy. I made a confession and started attending services regularly--even during the week. Then I began to understand there theology wasn't all that hot. So I found a Catholic church, made another confession and started over. I'v been studying every sence, with a a constant anger, feeling cheated by the Clergy, and the Laity of our Church. There is so much here, so much help, so much truth, so much beauty to be had--I was starving in the midst of a feast! And, I have to say, much of my anger is towards myself.
So what brought me back? I believe it was the constant, daily prayers of my (ex)wife, my sisters (who are now pentacostal)and my patrom saints, St. Anthony and St. Michael, along with the intercession of the Mother of God, and the love of Christ, who "wills not the death of a sinner". It was grace, just grace, unmerited by me, and freely given.
Posted by: Nemo at Feb 1, 2007 2:09:45 PM
My Baptist wife started asking me questions.
That's about it.
Posted by: RyanL at Feb 1, 2007 2:13:46 PM
While lapsed, I continued searching. Call it applied comparative religions.
In '94, I was prompted to attend a Mass - something I hadn't done in some time.
During the homily, the priest mentioned this soon-to-be-released Catechism. I purchased one the week it was published.
'nuf said. Since the effects of the vacuum of catecesis after Vatican II had no small impact on my initial lapse, the light of Truth contained in the CCC went a long way to alleviating that darkness.
Of course, my attendance at that particular Mass and my subsequent embrace of the orthodoxy proclaimed by the Church via the Catechism would not be possible without the graceful influence of the Holy Spirit. Thank you!
Posted by: Joseph at Feb 1, 2007 2:17:37 PM
As a child, I refused Confirmation, because I didn't feel I could go through it in good faith (no pun intended). I'd never really had what I would call a spiritual experience, and I felt it would be insincere and hypocritical to profess a faith I didn't truly feel in my heart. So, after my mom stopped forcing me to go to church with her (around 15 or 16, I forget exactly), I just never bothered.
In high school and college, I fooled around with various Pagan religions, but never seriously; they all felt too new and too self-centered to be meaningful to me. Eventually, I settled into a cynical agnosticism of laziness-- if I'd bothered to really get rigorous about my beliefs at the time, I'd likely have declared myself an atheist, but I couldn't be bothered.
Still, a few years ago, I began to feel my life was too selfish and that my cynicism was hurting my ability to stand other people, much less have relationships with them. So I started to think and read some more about Christianity in general, and Catholicism in particular. I figured, I might not know the truth, but this was a pretty darned good place to start looking. This was more than scary to my girlfriend, as she had not been raised with any religion, and was nervous and a little confused about what it might mean to our relationship. But she stuck with me, and as we grew closer together, I came to realize that she was the woman I was meant to marry, for better or worse.
When it came time for me to propose to her (/very/ classy; I gave her the ring (in a puzzle box) at her parent's house for Christmas, thank you ladies, you may now swoon at my sheer romanticness), I decided that I wanted to start our marriage off on the best possible foot I could find, namely, a religious one. So I started going back to church last January, and brought her with me. We were married in the Church last August (no Mass, as her family isn't Catholic), and have not exactly been deliriously happy since then, but definitely very happy.
I definitely still view myself as a "work in progress"; I don't know that I've ever had what I might call a spiritual experience, I've never felt God talking to me, per se (these various nudges I've had in the past could be seen that way, I guess, but it doesn't feel that way from the inside), and I don't feel very comfortable with a lot of the basic doctrines of the Faith. But I feel, still, that there's something true here, and if I can just force myself to stick around long enough, I'll find it. Our parish has a very good "Living the Catholic Faith" class every few weeks that covers various topics in the Church, from explaining the Mass to an overview of Eucharistic Adoration, to Marian devotions, and so on, that is very helpful, and I'm reading tons of books to try and fill in the gaps.
Posted by: Eric the Read at Feb 1, 2007 2:20:19 PM
I have a cradle Catholic friend who though never completely fallen-away, also never really understood it, and didn't really practice it for a long time.
Then he got into a challenging business situation, and began attending mass as a way of getting ideas for how to deal with the situation from a spiritual perspective. But he still didn't really understand it, and rarely went to confession, though he did continue going to mass.
Then he met a women, a convert, really on fire for the faith, the first time he'd met someone on fire for Catholicism. He started attending mass with her and noticed that she went to confession frequently before mass - which got him asking himself why he didn't.
No good reason, so he started going, too. Happens she was going to a really good parish with excellent confessors, and he started getting really good spiritual direction in the confessional.
Now he goes to mass and confession regularly, has a growing library of books about the faith, attends scripture classes, applies what he's learning in the workplace, and says that his life is really changing as a result.
Which I can see for myself. Turns out the woman he met is me, and he's my beau!
Posted by: Theo at Feb 1, 2007 2:28:52 PM
When I was in High School I received absolutely no Catholic instruction, and soon forgot what I had learned earlier. I left due to ignorance and a bit of rebellion.
I was a member of the "Denomination of the Month Club." I checked out the Baptists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Methodists, Conservative and Reformed Judaism, the Moonies, New Age, Church of Christ... I almost joined the Church of Christ but got scared off by their talk that everybody but those in that particular congregation were doomed to Hell. Very nearly joined the Methodists until I read a pamphlet by United Methodist Women stating that abortion on demand was okay (at the time I thought in some cases abortion could be accepted, but never believed in abortion on demand).
After a while I realized that there wasn't anything better out there than Catholicism and wanted a reason to go back. I discovered the Liturgy of the Hours, thought it was cool, and started praying it (or trying to pray it, as I wasn't sure of the format yet). I also read books by Dorothy Day and Thomas Merton - why did these intelligent people CHOOSE to become Catholic? I also read works by John of the Cross and Therese of Lisieux. A spiritual fire was lit under me that hasn't gone out.
So finally after 10-15 years of drifting, I returned to the Church in the late 1980s. I don't see myself leaving ever again.
Posted by: Elizabeth M at Feb 1, 2007 2:33:30 PM
I fell away and then reverted under the influence of my Baptist wife.
We dated for a few years and were Lutherans as a compromise. Then we started to study things seriously again, and she joined an RCIA class. We studied together, far beyond the RCIA materials (which were meager), and both of us came to the same conclusion. She converted, and I reverted.
I guess some people have to go somewhere else to figure out where they were in the first place.
Posted by: Jaques at Feb 1, 2007 2:33:54 PM
I was raising nominally Catholic attending Mass on Christmas and Easter. When I got to college I experienced a profound spiritual emptiness. I got into martial arts and was attracted to much of the philosophy associated with my style (Tomo Sato Ryu). I was repeatedly told by my instructors that the techniques of the style only worked when you actually believed that they would. Self doubt prevents success. In time I learned to have faith in the techniques and style and eventually in myself. It occurred to me that perhaps faith in a higher power was also possible. (In retrospect my style has an almost Salesian perspective live today well, do simple things extraordinarily well, etc.)
I finally decided that I wanted to know the Lord, but I was afraid. My mother introduced me to concept of a novena, so I decided that I would pray a novena to St. Jude because my faith was a lost cause. In June of 2003 I started my novena and the effects were instantaneous. I started going to Mass and after a couple of years met a great group of young adults and got Confirmed. I went to tons of Theology on Taps and got a good basis in Catechesis and apologetics. I am very blessed to have also had the guidance of many priests and the prayers of my family and friends. I spent about a year discerning the priesthood until I felt that I wasn't called to it and about six months after that met my fiancé at Bible Study. We had our first date on Valentines Day 2006 and are getting married in July 2007. Jesus I Trust in You.
Posted by: Christopher at Feb 1, 2007 2:36:43 PM
I left the Church when I got married. My wife and I initially had trouble finding an evangelical church in Madison. We both like older churches. We like older hymns. (I wasn't too well versed in older Catholic hymns, but modern praise music had no appeal to me.) Eventually we settled in a Baptist Church in suburban Madison. In that time, we were admitted. I never really bought the proof that the intention of Christ was to have us eat bread and wine. They only celebrated communion quarterly, so this didn't come up often. What allowed me to plunge in was a tract telling how Baptists could trace their lineage back to Christ. I was quite okay at the time with believing in Protestantism (my family has countless mixed marriages) but I had never heard anyone other than the Catholic Church make the claim that they were the original Church founded by Christ.
On occasion we would go down to my inlaws. They had an old World Book encyclopedia. Out of boredom, I've probably read 100 or so articles out of it. I believe it was the 1965 version. I would have been understanding at that time if the enyclopedia didn't have the claim that the Baptists were traced to Christ but rather a Protestant group. Instead the encylopedia made the claim that the Baptists had been making this claim but that the claim was completely spurious. I was quite surprised. No one outside the Baptist community found the claim to be credible. Even secular academics granted the Catholic Church's claims of origin.
From there, seeds of doubt persisted. I had never read the full New Testament. I had already started reading the Gospel of John. After that, I did the shorter epistles, ones that could be read in a night or less. As I read Galatians and the rest, I was seeing a vision of faith that was distinctly different than what I was receiving in the Baptist Church. The faith and works paradigm seemed completely insufficient for expressing Biblical teaching.
Anyhow, there is more to the story, but that is the start. Hopefully one or two folks find it edifying.
Posted by: M.Z. Forrest at Feb 1, 2007 2:38:32 PM
I entered the Church with my family from a devout Protestant background. But my parents were not completely sold on the whole Catholic thing, they mainly converted because the Church was more stable than Protestant churches.
I was sold, though, after encountering some fabulous women who truly loved the Church and all of Her teachings. After graduating from a solid Catholic university, I decided to be a missionary and volunteer. That is where I lost my faith, working for the Church was such a scandalous experience (a priest who was raping little children, everyone knew about it and would not do anything to stop it!, priests had lovers, etc). I felt the whole Mass was a sham. I stopped going to Church and fell into deep despair.
By the Grace of God, I still had my Lives of the Saints book, and I began to read them. I hung onto the Saints as if they were my lifeline. And they were. Slowly, they inspired me to forgive the terrible, terrible evils I saw and experienced. Coupled this with my now husband's Catholic Charismatic group that he introduced me to and here I am. I am so thankful to God for both, the book and the prayer group for giving me people who DO love Him and DO want to serve Him.
Posted by: Radical Catholic Mom at Feb 1, 2007 2:42:10 PM
There should also be a "tweener" category: between convert/revert and life long Catholics. A category for those who never left the Church (hence, never converted or reverted in that sense), but weren't really conscious of being Catholic in a deliberate way (hence, not exactly the witness of saints). Sort of auto-pilot Catholics, who one day for whatever reason, shut off the auto-pilot and start flying manual.
Posted by: c matt at Feb 1, 2007 2:43:03 PM
A cradle Catholic, I left from around ages 17-23, in the sense that I stopped going to Mass, refused to identify as a Catholic, and bashed the Church any chance I could get. I saw is as hypocritical, anti-intellectual, repressive etc etc.
I came back in 1993, when I was at graduate school at Columbia University. Maybe it was the stress of that first year, but something drew me back. I just wanted to be at Mass, and when I returned (though the Catholic campus ministry), I felt instrinctively at home (Maybe it's like the mafia: "you're never out"!!). Then everything opened up. I realized that the problem is that I didn't know a damn thing about the faith. My catechesis has never progressed beyond the 10-year old level. And the more I read, the more impressed I became. It all fit together. I also had the privilege of becoming friends with a remarkable priest, a top-notch moral theologian-- as well as becoming something of a mentor, he also introduced me to the woman I would marry. So I won big time!
Posted by: Morning's Minion at Feb 1, 2007 3:01:29 PM
In 1995, was halfway through my social sciences undergraduate studies, and started to get a very difuse feeling the "answers" weren't all there.
I came to visit my American host family from 5 years before (I was an exchange student from Brazil), and they had had their reversion around 1991.
They took me to a Steubenville Youth Summer Conference - I read "Crossing the Threshold of Hope" on the way - at the conference, I received the grace of knowing that all the good in my life, my personal qualities, my desire for good, had come from God, even when I was away from Him.
I took me another three years to fully go back, as back in Brazil I did not have any personal truly Catholic references.
In sum, I guess I just came to a mature enough position to realize what was really missing in my life, and God had made all the prior arrangements (such as have me live with a non-practicing Catholic family who turned out to revert a year after I left them) to drive me home.
That finally happened in 1997, during a three-day shut-at-home-due-to-snow stay with my American host family (again), after watching a video on Garabandal and one of a Mary Beth Bonacci talk on chastity...
Posted by: Gustavo Santos at Feb 1, 2007 3:05:04 PM
In being fishers of men, Christ and His Church do not always use nets. Certainly, in my case, it was a line and hook. The line was let out as I was allowed to stray, but I felt the tug of the hook in me pulling me back. He had me, and He wasn't about to let me get away. I can't claim much credit for it.
Posted by: Bender at Feb 1, 2007 3:06:13 PM
What brought me back is easy to describe: First, in the fall of 1979, reading Flannery O'Connor's letters, The Habit of Being, which in a few days time redeemed a dozen years' rubbish that passed for a Catholic religious education. Second, on September 29, 2000 when I was nearly killed in an automobile accident (arranged by St. Nicholas, who left his calling card in the emergency room), which caused me to return to the Sacrament of Pennance for the first time since my early teen years.
Posted by: Romulus at Feb 1, 2007 3:15:18 PM
C MATT: yeah I agree. I'm not a convert, because I am a cradle Catholic, but I never totally made a concious decision to LEAVE...it never mattered at all. Period. Being Catholic was inconsequential to anything else in my life.
My friends and I have a saying: "The pro-life movement is the gateway drug to Catholicism." That's what did it for me. And the fact that my mom is real holy and was praying her butt off. :)
Posted by: Anne at Feb 1, 2007 3:15:29 PM
Oh, and Karol "the Rock" Wojtyla had something to do with it too. He ain't called "the Great" for nothing.
Posted by: Bender at Feb 1, 2007 3:15:56 PM
My mother is an ex-nun and I grew up in a very progressive household in Los Angeles. We went to mass on Christmas and Easter, but our catechesis was very meager. Always an avid reader, I discovered the lives of the saints at the local library when I was about 10. Fascinated, I then read everything I could get my hands on about the Catholic Church and then asked my parents if they would drive me to mass every Sunday. My father, a non-Catholic dropped me off every Sunday and picked me up an hour later.
In college at the University of Virginia, I joined the CAtholic Students Association and went through RCIA, then became a religious studies major concnetrating in Christian history. Although the milieu was (at least in the early 90s) Catholic Lite, there were very strong, orthodox professors and grad students at the university, and many converts to Catholicism. The politically liberal, intellectually challenging environment at UVA drew me in in a way that would not have happened in a more uniformly orthodox Catholic
environment.
Posted by: Mary Russell at Feb 1, 2007 3:22:40 PM
Amy, thanks for this thread.
Since telling friends this story takes an hour, I'll try to keep it to bullet points.
Before I left:
* Grew up going to mass every Sunday.
* Devoutly Catholic father who was left a bit confused by Jesuit teachings that miracles weren't true.
* Devoutly Catholic mother who had converted during College from Lutheran faith. Still very ecumenical and warm hearted toward Lutheran faith -- I grew up knowing protestants weren't damned for being protestants.
* I knew enough Bible to know salvation history, and key figures of OT and NT. Knew no chapter and verse, and very little theology. Slight inklings of what creeds meant, but mostly as guesswork. Knew almost nothing of saints, liturgy of hours, chaplet, novenas, never said a complete rosary during entire childhood. Was an altar boy and truly tried to do a good job at it and be reverential.
* Knew just the basic prayers but did pray them: Our Father, Hail Mary, Act of Contrition, Glory Be.
* Was born in 1967; never have been to or seen a Latin Mass.
* Childhood masses alterated between a Guitar mass and a piano mass.
* Had been taught I was in the One True Church, but nobody I knew who wasn't Catholic ever said that.
* Friends in High School all Protestants, and very faithful ones. Their families' dedication to scripture and daily holiness put mine to shame and was quite a witness to me. I also dated a girl who came from a strongly faithful conservative lutheran family.
In college:
* My mass attendance lapsed; I went to the campus chapel about twice a month for mass.
* Many catholics in my dorm, but none of them went to mass regularly except the meanest, most vicious guy of the bunch in an all-male hall. He made a big deal of being Catholic, but he was one smart, mean-spirited bastard who openly broke most of the 10 Commandments on a regular basis. But he was so mean-hearted and said such mean things that he was a particularly strong anti-witness to the faith, for sure.
* I knew a few protestants who were faithful to their denominations, and they were good witnesses to a life of grace.
* The campus chapel routinely invoked God in the feminine. I Knew that wasn't right.
* Mass was boring. Nobody sang. Most people left after communion like a surge.
* I decided this couldn't possibly be Christ's church. It couldn't be. I decided to look elsewhere.
Left Church in 1988.
* Found a little lutheran church on campus. Lots of fellowship, Bible studies. Seemed very reverent. Went there about a year, most Sundays.
* Met a strongly faithful conservative Lutheran woman, dated, got engaged. Graduated college, moved to a "grown up" city. Continued attending a High Church Lutheran congregation with great music, lots of singing, great reverence, great sermons, Bible study.
* Have moved at attended variety of faithful lutheran churches, most recently a more Evangical style, with contemporary praise band, big telescreen, etc.
* Kids in conservative Lutheran School. Wife a chidren's minister. Very active with a home Bible study.
OK, this still long. 3 years ago approx. these various factors happened to put me on the road back to Rome.
* Became concerned that Lutheran congrgation and church in general had lost touch with Lutheran tradition. But, question arises, what is so important about lutheran tradition? If Tradition is important -- and i was increasingly thinking it was -- why arbitrarily stop at 1519? Why not 1200? Why not 650? Why not 100 AD? Why not 32 AD?
* Three different people asked me why I left the church (all family). They all I think assumed I'd had some bad run-in with a priest or something. But, really, the best answer I could give is that it was boring and just didn't seem like the kind of church Jesus would attend. But it got me thinking maybe I'd been rash.
* Experiences at work showed me I was changing to be much less a radical thinker and more attuned to the need for structure and authority in my work life, and same for home life with kids.
* I watched some EWTN and found myself drawn toward the Masses.
* My work shift temporarily changed to very early morning, and the only station i could tune in was the local catholic station, WDEO, which had the Stations of the Cross on during my drive time. I also heard ads for a program by a wonderful priest called "Christ is the Answer" which taught the Church from a very Christ-centered position (ie. not the other elements, like mary, saints, doctrines or whatever). I listened and was drawn in.
* WDEO also opened my ears to other Catholic programming, such as Al kresta's talk show, which is wide ranging and shows the range of Catholic thought engaging the world ... and how much broader it is than Lutheran faith or Protestantism in general.
* Scott Hahn/Curtis Mitch's Ignatius Bible Study. I saw that the Catholic faith WAS Biblical, and made the comment to some friends that the Bible reads differently from a Catholic perspective. It really does. Wow.
* Amy's blog. Seeing the huge wealth of Catholic world exprssed here was eye-opening. The idea of Catholic Literature was incomprehensible to me. There's no such thing as Lutheran Literature.
* Plunging into history, with Augustine, Early Church Fathers and so on. Wow. It's all Catholic.
So, there goes. I'm sure I missed something. But i went from not even thinking in the slightest about reverting to being cautiously curious about whether Catohlicism made any sense, to being in full-blown soak-up-everything-i-can mode in just a few months.
Thanks again, Amy!
MarkAA
Posted by: MarkAA at Feb 1, 2007 3:36:19 PM
I grew up in an orthodox post-V2 parish outside of Pittsburgh. I actually wanted to be a priest for the longest time, and was the best darned altar boy my parish ever had and ever will have ;). My parents were very involved at the church. My father ran the weekly bingo and my mother was one of the backbones of the Christian Mothers group. We went to church every Sunday, attended Stations of the Cross every Friday during Lent and basically lived the life of devout Catholics, at least when it came to church. No one really prayed at home and we didn't do any of the "fun" Catholic things during holidays, like writing the initials of the Three Kings above the door around Christmas like some of my friends did. Of course, their families were more ethnic than ours. Most of my ancestors were here during the first wave of German immigrants in the 18th century.
By the time I went to college, I still considered myself Catholic and attended Mass on campus (and off), but I found myself falling away ever so slightly until, for the first time in my life, I did not attend Easter Mass in 1999. I had missed Mass most Sundays from 1997-1999, but I always did my Easter duty.
In 2000, my fiancee decided she had enough of Maryland and left for Florida, leaving me behind. Needless to say, I was pretty devestated. I remember one night staring at the wall and just asking God to help me. No deals, no "Bring her back, please!". I just wanted help.
The very next day I met a girl who was intensely interested in Catholicism and I did my best over the next few months to explain things to her. It's pretty amazing how you just don't forget what was drilled into you as a child. If I didn't know the answer, I'd find it and tell her. I found religion again. I went to confession for the first time in 5 years.
Our friendship turned into something much more and we started to attend Mass together. We found the Tridentine indult Mass in Baltimore at St. Alphonsus and spent alot of our Sundays there. She's a medievalist and, even though she didn't share the faith, she could really appreciate the grandeur of the old Mass. I felt at home there, but it was around this time I also started to attend the local Byzantine Catholic church. It was there that I found my true home and I've been there ever since. I flirted with the idea of becoming a monk (the medievalist had since moved away and got married herself...strike two for me!) but decided to just wait things out and, a couple years later, I'm married to a wonderful Catholic girl who loves being Catholic as much as I do.
Posted by: Schultz at Feb 1, 2007 3:37:05 PM
Mary,
Glad to hear that UVA and St Thomas Aquinas University Parish played a role in the deepening of your faith! I think your description of the place in the '90s is fairly accurate -- "Catholic Lite." My hope and prayer is that we're not that anymore! Come back and visit some time!
Fr Brian Mulcahy, O.P.
Pastor
Posted by: Fr Brian Mulcahy, OP at Feb 1, 2007 3:45:28 PM
Knew I forgot at least one biggie...
* Death of Pope John Paul II. I remember the irony of being in a newsroom surrounded by former Catholic now Atheist Catholic bashers, me laying out the A1 presentation of the Pope's death (special stuff) and feeling like as a Lutheran whose church still officially lists the office of the Pope as the AntiChrist I was the one left to present the funeral of this very holy man respectfully in our metropolitan newspaper. That affected me, as did the whole event, with all the various denominations going to the funeral from around the world, and how it seemed a loss for the whole world.
Followed by...
* The election of Benedict, whose writings I devoured and found that he was a huge, deep thinker who loved Protestants and Orthodox as well as Catholics.
Big, key elements in the path for me too.
Posted by: MarkAA at Feb 1, 2007 3:47:21 PM
