I wrote one version of my conversion story while I was going through RCIA, and you can read that edition of it, along with the post-script, which was written three weeks after my Initiation (which is linked at the bottom of the conversion story page), in the link that you’ll see in my signature.
There are certain things that I left out of that story, though, because either I forgot about them, or else I didn’t think they were very important. The hand of God was evident throughout my journey, though.
What got the ball rolling:
August 7, 1983, about 4:55 pm
Age 22, too shy to speak to strangers, for any reason whatsoever. Out walking, got caught up in a group of people who were heading into a Church, waiting for them to get past. While waiting for them to get past, Father Arthur comes out, grabs me by the front of the shirt, pulls me in, and says, “Hurry up! You’re going to be late for Mass!” The only alternative being to explain to him that he has mistaken me for someone else (physically impossible; see above) I go in and experience the Mass for the first time in my life. Completely blown away; ready to convert on the spot.
Mentioned this to my Bible study leader, she talked me out of it - at first. She got so anti-Catholic over the following months that her diatribes began to feel “overdone” if you know what I mean, so that I went back to Mass the following January, and have been attending every Sunday ever since. (Didn’t become Catholic until April 2001, however, mostly out of fear of offending friends and family.)
Learned many things about Catholic teaching, practice and culture over a period of about 17 years, including two years spent in RCIA.
Lost my fear of offending friends and family on October 23, 2000 at about 9:00 am when my grandmother died. (The meaning of the phrase “God is no respecter of persons” became very clear to me at that time.)
November 19-28, 2000: Got into a fierce internet debate with some Catholics over at Steve Ray’s board while posting under the name “Aunt Virginia,” defending liberal Protestantism. Got thoroughly whomped, though not completely convinced. (Blamed my lack of debating skills and the hostile audience for the losses.)
November 30, 2000, about 5:45 pm: In response to a post I had made defending the “invisible Church” (the exact content of which I have since forgotten) someone posting under the name “pax” responded with four simple words: ONE. HOLY. CATHOLIC. APOSTOLIC. At which point, the lights came on, everything I’d learned since that moment when Father Arthur had messed up my shirt back in 1983 all came together, made sense, and I realized that “some day,” I had to become Catholic - no choices, no ifs, no ands, and no buts.
November 30, 2000, about 6:00 pm: received a call from one of my Catholic friends regarding some volunteer work that needed doing, and the voice in my ear said, “Now. You have to become Catholic
now.”
Pondered on this and prayed about it for three days.
December 3, 2000 about 8:00 pm, said to my husband, “I think I have to become Catholic, and I think I have to do it as soon as possible.” He stopped everything he was doing and just looked at the wall.
December 3, 2000 about 8:01 pm, at the end of the longest minute of my whole life, my husband said, “As long as I don’t have to have anything to do with it, you can do whatever you like.”
December 4, 2000, about 10:00 am, contacted Sacred Heart Church and made an appointment to see Father Cramer. Appointment set for December 20 at 7:00 pm.
The rest, you can read about in my link.
