Soon to Be Catholic Convert Looking for Reading Materials & Answers/Encouragement

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andreatapner

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Hello, everyone.

After some research, I have made the decision that I want to become Catholic. I have a non-denominational background, and in a way, I’m still kind of a baby Christian. I started going to church in 2014, was baptized in 2016, but only started to take the faith more seriously recently (I’m 18 by the way). I feel like a bad Christian sometimes for having such profound doubts about the faith, and I’d like to ease them and put them to rest. Perhaps this is some kind of spiritual warfare going on because I’m about to become Catholic. I’m hoping that some of you can recommend reading materials coming from a historical perspective that prove Christianity. I want to know the history, from the very beginning of time. In my heart, I agree with Christianity, & sometimes it is so abundantly clear to me that it is true. I just can’t reconcile the history I’ve been learning about in my English class that took place in the years after the Reformation (such as the burning of people at the stake for heresy). I understand that humans will fall and get it wrong, it’s just that it often seems too corrupt to be true. Like how could the Church He made that Hades was not supposed to prevail against, have so much evil in it? Killing people for heresy seems so against the very doctrines of Christianity. But then again, we can look to common times & the “Christians” today who support abortion and a homosexual lifestyle. I also want to learn more about the Protestant Reformation in depth because I’ve heard some people say it was largely because of priests being corrupt in selling indulgences, and some say that they were never corrupt at all, and it was only a misunderstanding. Also, what about pre-Christian and Jewish times? When I was a Protestant Christian, I think my faith was more based on emotion because I didn’t really know anything about the history of Christianity – if I did I might have become Catholic much sooner! I just want to have a more firm faith based on solid historical and scientific evidence, not just my own anecdotal evidence, and I think that looking into history is the key to solving this conflict for me.

Thank you in advance!
 
Welcome,

It’s good to see that you are searching.

My first recommendation would be for you to start listening to “Called to Communion”. You can get the podcast from EWTN. Dr. Anders is a convert to Catholicism and converted I believe while or just after doing his Doctoral dissertation on Martin Luther. Catholic Answers Live has a podcast as well which would be helpful. If you search their archives you would find shows directed towards the reformation.

As for books I would recommend


This would be a good start to see that the Bible is not just some made up work of fiction.

If you want in depth on the reformation…


If you want information on proving Christianity

andreatapner said:
Like how could the Church He made that Hades was not supposed to prevail against, have so much evil in it?
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I honestly would not let this bother you. The Church isn’t a museum of saints it is a hospital for sinners. There will always be evil present in our lives. When someone presents this question to me I always respond…

How can any institution survive for 2000 years, with corrupt evil people infiltrating her walls, unless she was being guided by the Holy Spirit.

If you really think it through Catholics believe the Pope is Jesus Christ’s chief steward here on earth. We believe the Pope was given the power by Christ to bind and loose. If he says, from the chair, thus saith God, then we are bound. In 2000 years we have had some real doozies in the Chair of Peter. We are talking some of the worst of the worst. Yet not once did a single one of those men bind the faithful and pronounce the evil they themselves were performing was OK. I’m sure the Holy Spirit was working overtime guiding those Popes. To me the promise that the gates would not prevail is proven to be true because of the historical evil that couldn’t destroy Christ’s Church.

I like the way Tim Staples (who use to be Baptist) says it. If you walk into a church and everyone is on fire, turn around and walk right back out, because it isn’t true. That’s not the way humanity works. We are all at different levels at different times of our lives. If every person in the church is on fire at the exact same moment then they are just putting on the show for everyone around them.

Hope this helps, there are many many more books out there that will open your eyes to the truth.

God Bless
 
Well, there are soooo many great books out there that have a wealth of information to help you, but I’m going to tell you the first two books I read when I was inquiring about becoming Catholic:

Surprised By Truth (ed. Patrick Madrid; there are 3 I think but the first one, the purple one, was the one I read when I was searching). Each chapter in this book is written by a different person telling of their conversion and their many reasons for converting.

Why Do Catholics Do That (Kevin Orlin Johnson; older editions are called Expressions of the Catholic Faith - I think- but I believe the content is the same)

I think it’s wonderful that you are really wanting to dig in to the history of the faith, doing that has been a major part of many conversions.

You speak of thinking there may be some spiritual warfare going on with in you as you close in on the truth, and I think you are absolutely right. Satan is a sore loser and when he thinks he is about to lose a soul to Christ he fights back. Arm yourself with prayer every morning, throughout the day, and before going to sleep at night.
 
Welcome!

It’s great that you are seeking answers and wresting with these questions. And it’s okay to have questions! You are really just at the beginning of an awesome adventure. It would be weird if you didn’t have questions. There is a lot of stuff in our culture that casts doubts on Christianity, and it makes us want to know the answers.

I think you’ve already received some great resource recommendations. If you like the concrete, you might try a book like “The Case for Christ” by Lee Strobel. He’s not Catholic, but he does a great job of illustrating the reality of why Christianity is historical and believable rather than just some pie-in-the-sky “nice idea”. Brant Pitre has a Catholic version with “The Case for Jesus”. I haven’t read that one yet, but I like Pitre’s other books, so I imagine it is good.

When I was around your age and wrestling with questions, a book that had a profound influence on me was Peter Kreeft’s “Yes or No?: Straight Answers to Tough Questions on Christianity”. Kreeft pretty much read my mind and responded understandably and convincingly to every doubt I was wrestling with at the time. It was a game changer for me.

Mostly, though, I would encourage you to keep seeking the truth. Jesus said that all who seek will find. If you encounter something that doesn’t make sense, or that causes you to question, that’s okay. It would not be okay to let those questions lead you to call off the search. But if you instead look at them as opportunities to learn more about God, human beings, and the world around you, then you will be greatly enriched through your journey.

And if you have any specific questions that arise, you can always return here and ask away. Just ignore the posters who are belligerent. 😆

God bless!
 
It’s great that you want to learn more about the Catholic faith! May God guide you on your journey. 🙂

The Church is holy because Christ, its founder and leader, is holy. The Church offers many graces to its members to achieve holiness, but since God gave us humans free will, some will cooperate with these graces while others will abuse that free will by rejecting these graces and sinning. It’s always been like this with both the Old Covenant and New Covenant. The Church will always have great saints and sinners. We must pray for all the sinners to repent and change. Despite the failures of individual members, the Church will always remain holy and Jesus promised the gates of Hades would not prevail against it. It will never teach errors in faith and morals, nor will it ever cease to exist.

There were indeed corrupt clergy who abused the practice of granting indulgences (indulgences themselves can actually never be sold), but be careful where you get your sources of information about indulgences and other aspects of the Protestant Reformation. There is a lot of misinformation out there. I actually have taken some classes where I discovered through my own personal research that the contents taught by textbooks and/or instructors were false. In addition to the good recommendations the posters above have given you, I will list some of my own.

An excellent book is Why We’re Catholic by Trent Horn. You can order a copy at whywearecatholic.com

The remaining materials can all be found at shop.catholic.com.

The Protestant’s Dilemma by Devin Rose
The Case for Catholicism: Answers to Classic and Contemporary Protestant Objections
Evidence for God by Trent Horn
Why You Can Trust the Gospels by Jimmy Akin
The Reason Series: What Science Says About God
The Real Story of the Inquisition by Steve Weidenkopf
Understanding the Inquisition by Christopher Check
The Catholic Faith of the Early Christians by James L. Papandrea
The Fathers Know Best: Your Essential Guide to the Teachings of the Early Church by Jimmy Akin
Catholic Controversies: Understanding Church Teachings And Events In History by Stephen Gabriel

There are also lots of good Catholic websites out there, such as catholic.com, catholicscomehome.org, and aboutcatholics.com, where you can find excellent free articles about various Catholic topics, including the ones you mentioned.

If you have any more questions or would like more resources, you can PM me any time. God bless you! 😀
 
andreatapner said:
I want to know the history, from the very beginning of time.
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Hoo, Boy! You got some reading to do!
andreatapner said:
I just can’t reconcile the history I’ve been learning about in my English class that took place in the years after the Reformation (such as the burning of people at the stake for heresy). I understand that humans will fall and get it wrong, it’s just that it often seems too corrupt to be true. Like how could the Church He made that Hades was not supposed to prevail against, have so much evil in it?
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I’m not being flippant here, I truly mean it from the bottom of my heart. If someone ever, ever, wants to make some kind of sense regarding the atrocious and inexplicable behavior of people, Christian or not, you must remember one thing - and this is the truest thing you’ll ever know. This one true thing explains everything - Here it is: PEOPLE ARE JERKS. They’ve always been jerks. They will continue to be jerks until Our Lord returns. Once you realize this, all things will fall into place.
andreatapner said:
I think that looking into history is the key to solving this conflict for me.
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It will indeed. To know history is to cease being a Protestant, as a famous person once said. Don’t hold ordinary mortals to the same standards as Jesus. After all, He is God. The rest of us are just a bunch of imperfect jerks trying to get through this life as best we can. God bless you in your endeavor. If I can think of some good reading material, I’ll post it later.
 
One Important thing you should know,
(and it is in the Bible) The devil is pitted
against THE WOMAN (Gen. 3:15; Rev.
12:13) and her off-spring THE CHURCH
(Gen. 3:15; Rev. 12:17), by “Church” I
mean all of REDEEMED HUMANITY,
both Protestant and Catholic and even
among Seventh Day Adventists and other
Bible believing sects.
 
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