What inspired you to convert?

[TomS333]

This is to those of you who considered converting to Catholicism, what inspired you to think about it then what made you decide “yes, I will”?

I recently found out that my Grandfather was Catholic, but for whatever reason my Dad wasn’t so then I wasn’t. I also ended up meeting someone at school who later turned out to be a distant cousin, she was Catholic. My Dad and I went on a cruise to the Canary Islands and I began to feel more connected and all together happier and I felt as though someone was calling me.

 

[NuclearReceptor]

Born and raised Protestant. There is just so much more spiritual richness of the Catholic faith. God glorified in the lives of saints. Real Presence of Jesus that had always been taught and believed. Lastly I can’t believe God would leave His mystical body in “heresy” until a German “reformer” came along in the 1500s.

 

[nearlycatholic]

1. God’s conviction
2. The Missal
3. The Catechism (awesome literary work)
4. Reverence of the Mass
5. Many prayers by other Catholics
6. PJM and this forum

 

[GladTidings]

 For me, looking back, I believe the Holy Spirit was leading me very slowly to become Catholic.

When I was a kid:

1. My catholic buddy and his parents probably prayed for me when I was eight.
2. My parents sent my older sister to a priest for counseling because they thought she was under an evil influence. This coincided with the movie, “The Exorcist” which also showed me that Catholics know how to fight evil.
3. I sensed something holy and sacred about the Catholic Church. Something the church my parents created did not have.
4. While at a bible study when I was 14, we were reading Matthew 16, 13-20. Someone explained what Catholics say it means and we paused and thought about that for a moment. Then we began searching other scripture to figure out what it really means. After a half hour, I was getting more and more confused because we were going around in circles. I remember thinking, “can we talk more about what the Catholics say it means?”
5. My beautiful, and chaste, Catholic girlfriend when I was 17. She was affectionate, but also had something called boundaries.

As an adult:

1. I didn’t want to go with my future wife and our kids to mass, (without receiving the Eucharist) and then leave and go to the other church I attended by myself.
2. I was led to a Catholic woman who was chaste like my former girlfriend.
3. No one in my family was Catholic, so someone had to be the first!
4. I was pretty sure no one was going to stand up during mass and begin speaking in tongues. It always seemed contrived and made me uncomfortable.
5. Nine words: no traveling charlatans who would pretend to heal you.
6. Mother Teresa did not have a 7 million dollar vacation home in The Hamptons.
7. My parents were receptive to the idea of me converting, and had never taught me Catholicism was evil or pagan. In fact, I learned that dad used to like listening to Fulton Sheen when he was a kid.

So, there you have it.

 

[CelticWarlord]

While I haven’t converted yet, we could say that I have begun what could eventually become a conversion. My journey to Catholicism is not what one might expect, given that it actually began with a fascination with the ruins of Scottish and Irish castles.

To make a long story short, I attended a very controlling and dominating evangelical cult for 22 years. That ended in 1996. I then spent ten years reading and researching books by leading Protestant writers. Ultimately unsatisfied with that and the churches I attended, I spent another 5 years looking into New Age and eastern philosophy. But inherent throughout all of this was a deep interest in my Celtic heritage. Researching and reading about old castles led to a years- long search for information on the monasteries and cathedrals of the UK, especially those that had fallen into disrepair. I began to wonder what life would have been like in one of those places many centuries ago.

Having become a very, very private person after leaving church life, it took a long time for me to work up the courage to attend my first Mass four years ago. In fact, I made several retreats to a monastery not far from where I live before I ever set foot in a Catholic church. Eventually, though, I decided I wanted to attend chapel with the monks. Back at home I started going to Daily Mass just up the street from my place of work. As well as going to Mass I listen to Catholic radio on my computer whenever I’m at my desk. My wife and I own over four thousand books, all crammed into our little house. About 60 of those deal with Catholicism (she is not interested in those ones).

But it all began with the ruins of Urqhart Castle overlooking Loch Ness.

 

[CelticWarlord]

I agree with you, Brittany. After learning about Catholicism from those who were decidedly against it from the beginning, I had many misconceptions about the faith. When I began looking into what the church actually taught, I discovered that all the nasty things I believed about the Big Bad Catholic Church were entirely wrong. All of them.