Converts - what was the initial "spark" that got you to consider Catholicism?

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I’m curious about what event, scripture, puzzlement etc. that made you consider the Catholic Church? Was it one specific event or a series of niggling ideas that got you to do the research and prayer that conversion requires? Also, from whatever got you thinking about Truth was it a slow or quick process into the Church?

Thanks for any (name removed by moderator)ut here. As a cradle Catholic, the whole process of conversion fascinates me. I find conversion stories so inspirational and not having one of my own, I’m interested in others.

Kris
 
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kwitz:
I’m curious about what event, scripture, puzzlement etc. that made you consider the Catholic Church? Was it one specific event or a series of niggling ideas that got you to do the research and prayer that conversion requires? Also, from whatever got you thinking about Truth was it a slow or quick process into the Church?

Thanks for any (name removed by moderator)ut here. As a cradle Catholic, the whole process of conversion fascinates me. I find conversion stories so inspirational and not having one of my own, I’m interested in others.

Kris
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Hi,
I had actually gone to a RCC school in elementary school, and my best friend was Catholic… in fact is now a priest. I never really looked at Catholicism seriously as an alternative. I had for the most part quit believing in the doctrine of the Trinity since I could not find it in the Bible, however, still held to most of the other tenets of the SDA Faith. I was reading a book, on the second coming/rapture from the viewpoint of the RCC, and the writer’s explanation of the Trinity is what really caught my attention.

It was the first time that I had seen the doctrine explained in a way that it’s progression towards definition made sense. That was the first time I took the RCC seriously. My wife and I then began studying and after about 2 years wrote a 100 page letter to our family and friends the explained in VERY brief terms the doctrinal reasons for our conversion.

We had contacted the priest I had known as a child through my friend, amazingly, he still remembered me, 20 years later… and well… thats how it all started. 🙂

Brandon
 
Realizing a little over a year ago that there is no way that individual interpretation of the Bible could work.

DaveBj
 
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kwitz:
I’m curious about what event, scripture, puzzlement etc. that made you consider the Catholic Church? Was it one specific event or a series of niggling ideas that got you to do the research and prayer that conversion requires? Also, from whatever got you thinking about Truth was it a slow or quick process into the Church?

Thanks for any (name removed by moderator)ut here. As a cradle Catholic, the whole process of conversion fascinates me. I find conversion stories so inspirational and not having one of my own, I’m interested in others.

Kris
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Kris – my journey into the CC might be a little different than most. I initially went to the RCIA program to ask questions – with the thought in the back of my mind that I would be able to bring my soon-to-be husband OUT of the Church!

The first domino to fall, that eventually led to me falling squarely through the doors of the Church had to do with the Deuterocanonicals. I had been told all my life that Catholics added books to the Bible. When that didn’t square with history, I had to ask the next question, and so on down the line.

Every single thing I had been taught to believe about Catholics was proven to be untrue! Catholics worship Mary? Not a chance. Catholics worship idols? Not hardly! Catholics resacrifice Jesus on the altar at every Mass? No, again. Catholics pray to the dead? A total misunderstanding and misrepresentation of the Communion of Saints. As a result, my Protestant mentors began to lose credibility.

Rhonda in GA
 
Litterally, it was a miracle. 🙂

After a tramatic experience a few years ago, I used to have anxiety attacks so bad I couldnt breathe and landed in the hospital once. I had prayed to God for help and a few seconds after I said amen the phone rang and it was a Catholic friend of mine on the east coast calling me at 3a.m. EST said she heard me somehow.

Not only that, I’ve never had an anxiety attack again.

Was convinced God is real ever since.
 
I have a strong opposition to abortion, artificial birth control even before I’m a Catholic.
my prayers often work which further convinced me the existence of God
 
After vistiting a Coptic church in Kenya, and doing some reading, I realized my church (evangelical non-denominational) wasn’t anything like the historical church.

Plus (as a 20 year old), it was ok to drink beer!
 
Being miserable in the secular life and knowing deep down inside that the secular ideology is not only wrong, but devastatingly wrong; that is what made me ready to finally hear the Truth. That’s what Jesus was waiting for.

Peace.
 
I wasn’t even Christian, even though I believed in God. I was exposed to the Catholic Church while stationed in Sicily. (I was in the Navy.) It was through touring cathedrals, churches, tombs of Saints, seeing/hearing the Gospel messege through sacred art all over the island and eventually picking up a Bible and reading the Gospel of Saint Luke that I was led to the Church. I carefully investigated the various branches of Christianity for three long years - Church history, Bible interpretations, etc. - before acctually starting RCIA because I wanted to make sure I was joining THE Church established by Christ. I think that being so exposed to the very earliest centuries of the Church while in Sicily and seeing the very same beliefs and practices carried on today in the Catholic Church was what cemented my decision. You can’t beat a solid unbroken history!

GOD BLESS!
 
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jimmy:
birth:D
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I, too, was blessed to be born into a devout Catholic family. Even with a wonderful faith based upbringing, I have a sister who is fundamentalist, evangelical (I never can get the distinction between those terms!). She thinks we are all going to hell and I keep praying that someday the right “spark” will remind her of the Truths she has been missing.

Thanks for all the responses. It’s great to read how the Lord works in others’ lives.

Kris
 
The catalyst that started my long journey into the Catholic Church – incredibly enough – was a well-known priest in my city who left the Church and wrote a scathing book denouncing her “errors.” I bought the book for my mother – I knew she would enjoy reading it, since she had left the Catholic Church before I was born and had not been through the door of one for more than 30 years. Well, strange as it may seem, this book by an apostate priest unleashed an avalanche of grace upon my family. I started studying and eventually became a Catholic – then the Spirit fell upon my anti-Catholic Southern Baptist father – and my mother returned home. Next to come home was my sister-in-law, followed by my brother.

That book was a 2 X 4 smacked against my head. This proves that God will use anything to get our attention.😃

I LOVE THIS CHURCH!

Jay Damien
Ex-Southern Baptist, ex-agnostic, ex-atheist, ecstatic to be Catholic!
 
Born into it, and loving it. Glad I’m Catholic. 😃

The only thing that annoys me, are people that say they are Catholic and then go and don’t listen to Church teachings at all…
coughKerrycough
 
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Katholikos:
The catalyst that started my long journey into the Catholic Church – incredibly enough – was a well-known priest in my city who left the Church and wrote a scathing book denouncing her “errors.” I bought the book for my mother – I knew she would enjoy reading it, since she had left the Catholic Church before I was born and had not been through the door of one for more than 30 years. Well, strange as it may seem, this book by an apostate priest unleashed an avalanche of grace upon my family. I started studying and eventually became a Catholic – then the Spirit fell upon my anti-Catholic Southern Baptist father – and my mother returned home. Next to come home was my sister-in-law, followed by my brother.

That book was a 2 X 4 smacked against my head. This proves that God will use anything to get our attention.😃

I LOVE THIS CHURCH!

Jay Damien
Ex-Southern Baptist, ex-agnostic, ex-atheist, ecstatic to be Catholic!
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What a marvelous story! God Bless You!
Annunciata:)
 
What really sealed it for me about 49 years ago was when I found out that Jesus built the Church on Peter, and the keys were handed down from Bishop to Bishop all these years.

Hey, the Catholic Church was the one started by Jesus Himself, and it has persisted all the way until today unchanged!

That is enough dont you think?
 
I always admired the faith of my friends and secretly longed to belong to the Church….

The “spark” that helped me make the decision was ignited after I had been a bridesmaid in my cousin’s wedding…something just clicked…I instinctively knew that this is where I must be! I started asking the questions… and started my Catechism lessons from a very saintly priest who had shown great kindness and acceptance toward me when I was a teen attending a parish dance with a girlfriend, quite unlike another priest who embarrassed me to tears…. :o

When I was about eleven and junior bridesmaid in my brother’s wedding, the priest who was conducting the rehearsal humiliated me by stopping the rehearsal and singling me out in a loud and sharp voice saying, “Junior flower girl, in OUR church we don’t slouch in our pews”…I didn’t realize that I was…I could have died. :crying: I remember shaking like a leaf on the day of the wedding thinking he might do it again… I immediately took a great dislike for the Church and in my wildest dreams never thought that I would ever be a Catholic someday…

Just goes to show what a little kindness and Christian Charity can do! :love: Annunciata
 
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kwitz:
I’m curious about what event, scripture, puzzlement etc. that made you consider the Catholic Church? Was it one specific event or a series of niggling ideas that got you to do the research and prayer that conversion requires? Also, from whatever got you thinking about Truth was it a slow or quick process into the Church?

Thanks for any (name removed by moderator)ut here. As a cradle Catholic, the whole process of conversion fascinates me. I find conversion stories so inspirational and not having one of my own, I’m interested in others.

Kris
Click to expand...
 
The beauty of great Catholic art had something to do with my conversion. The poet Keats said beauty is truth, truth beauty. Anything so beautiful as the sacred paintings, sculptures, music and cathedrals of the Catholic Church has to be true. A colossal lie could not inspire so much colossal art.
 
When I was completely desperate to discover God and the meaning of life, I was lost and my heart was *starving *for truth. Although certain beliefs I was into involved God being loving, the theory I had of God did not make any sense whatsoever. As *something *was pulling me towards Catholicism, the one thing about it that really caught my attention was its teaching that as well as God is all loving, he is also JUST.
 
Realizing the error with sola scripture/sola fide was a huge factor, but the first thing that did it for me was biblical basis for the sacrament of confession.

But long after I understood all Catholic beliefs, the most convincing reason for my conversion was the Church’s teaching against contraception.

So understanding the biblical basis for confession was the initial spark and the church’s position against contraception was the clincher for me 🙂
 
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