I have never left

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Back when I was part of a Small Christian Community we were having a discussion about our personal coming and goings into the Catholic Church. Many of us were converts, but most the cradle Catholics had spent some time away from the Church. We had all about told our stories when our hostess, a tiny Irish Catholic with bright blue eyes proclaimed proudly, “I never left”.

That left a positive impression on me.

So, in light of some of the ‘leaving’ threads, I want to hear from you Catholics who never left the Church. Whom among you has never left?
 
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I haven’t in name. In practice I’ve gone pretty far afield, but I’m back and trying to work out my salvation. 🙂
 
Jimbo said:
I haven’t in name. In practice I’ve gone pretty far afield, but I’m back and trying to work out my salvation. 🙂
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This is me as well. I never stopped being Catholic, I just stopped paying attention to my faith. Then God made His presence known and brought me back ^^.

Thank God for that, because I was definitely Hell-bound.
 
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I have wandered around like wild beast in the wind but have never left…
 
ProdglArchitect said:
This is me as well. I never stopped being Catholic, I just stopped paying attention to my faith.
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Same.

There have been times - and one very recently - where if asked I would identify as Catholic Christian, but de facto in both belief and lifestyle I was a nonreligious agnostic.

God’s honest truth is I haven’t been to Confession since May and haven’t been to Mass since June…

I almost died back in September and received the Sacrament of Anointing, and that experience and Sacramental Grace and my wifes prayers was enough to reignite my faith. I prayed the Office for the first time in a long time yesterday… And I’m planning on going to Confession and Mass and receiving Communion this weekend.
 
ChristMyLife said:
I prayed the Office for the first time in a long time yesterday… And I’m planning on going to Confession and Mass and receiving Communion this weekend.
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All praises be to our Lord Jesus Christ! This is wonderful news!
 
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mrsdizzyd said:
Lord Jesus Christ
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It really is all Jesus.

Jesus of Nazareth was the thread with which I clung to my faith.

The arguments for the existence of a God, my experiences, all that stuff fell flat with me and couldn’t convince me one way or the other…

What really got me was my knowledge of the historicity of Jesus. That Jesus was a real person and many aspects of his life require no faith at all to believe in - they are simple historical facts which even an atheist history professor from Oxford or Harvard will admit is true.

The Virgin Birth and Resurrection of Jesus on the other hand require faith - but that’s where all the supporting arguments and apologetics about those, plus the witness of so many Saints, and my own experiences, and philosophical arguments all come into play to tip the scales in that direction and lead me to go “all in” with Jesus and the Catholic Church.
 
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I never left. There were points in my life where I was very, very lackadaisical, to the point of Christmas/Easter Catholic, but never left.

Some events in my life drove me back with very renewed zeal. Solid now. I strive to make God in control of my life.
 
StephieNorthCo said:
I never left. There were points in my life where I was very, very lackadaisical, to the point of Christmas/Easter Catholic, but never left.
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This was me in my 20’s and even into my early 30’s, but with the birth of my now adult daughter I started attending weekly and became much more committed to my faith. Now some people seem to think I’m “uber” catholic. I regret some of the choices I made during those years with respect to not following church teaching.
 
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tad said:
Whom among you has never left?
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I never left .

I’ve had serious doubts and disillusionment , but “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

In the early 1970s I was going through a rough patch , but the Holy Spirit , through the Catholic Charismatic Renewal , came to my rescue .
 
If I may ask, have you continued to be part of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal? How is it doing in your country and region if I may ask?
 
RCIAGraduate said:
If I may ask, have you continued to be part of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal? How is it doing in your country and region if I may ask?
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I am no longer a member of a prayer group @RCIAGraduate .

The numbers have reduced here .

My spirituality and prayer life is still influenced very much by the spirituality of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal .
 
I never left. I’ve missed a Sunday Mass maybe eight or ten times in my life, including for illnesses. I’m 51 years old. Not to brag at all. It’s mostly because of two things:
  1. Inertia: I don’t know what else I’d do if I didn’t go to Mass on the weekend.
  2. Fear: I’m afraid that if I got lax about it, I might start slipping up too much. It’s the same reason I’ve been exercising several days a week for the past 30+ years.
 
I never left, I just quit going to confession for 18 years because I didn’t want to face all my sins, and I got super lazy about going to Mass, partly related to the former and partly because eh just lazy and tired of “church people” who had nothing in common with me. (They still don’t, but I’ve learned to deal with it better.) During the worst years of that, I was usually a Chreaster, and I still would have told anyone who asked I was Catholic, or perhaps that I was a bad Catholic. I wouldn’t have ever said “fallen away Catholic” or “lapsed Catholic” or “raised Catholic” because that would have implied a faith doubt that I didn’t have.
 
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Raised Catholic. I’ve never left in name but for many years I was basically a very weak “Sunday Catholic” when it came to my faith if you know what I mean by that. I attended Mass but that was it - I knew very little about my faith, did not explain it very well to others, and did not practice many of the things that go into truly being Catholic and practicing my faith. I didn’t appreciate enough what it means to receive the Sacraments including Reconciliation and Eucharist. Being a weak Sunday Catholic I would not have been able to tell you what the Divine Mercy Chaplet was among other things.

Got into the habit of missing Sunday mass for a while for various reasons, my attendance dropped to about once a month. Thankfully I’m back and learned so much more about my faith and to appreciate it (thanks in part to this board!)
 
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By the grace of God, I never left. There was also a period of time in my life where my confessions were few and far between (even though I needed to go), but we’re talking months apart, not years.
 
I never left.

I wasn’t well catechized, but any time I had a question or doubt, Mother Church and the saints had more than ample writings and resources to persuade me she taught the truth.
 
So I too was baptised and confirmed…I didn’t know we could leave - ever 🙂
 
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