Hear the stories of Catholic converts from Eastern Religions or New Age backgrounds and learn what lead them to embrace Christianity and the Catholic Church.
“I knew every sickness, every problem in your life was because of your actions…. I read most of the books in my Hindu religion and there was nothing mentioned about forgiving, renewal, regenerating a soul or a person’s life…”
– Mohini Christina, Actress
A FEW GREAT VIDEOS
Hall Miller 6:33
As a young adult, Hall Miller left the Catholic faith of his youth in favor of Eastern spiritualities. But when his life began to fall apart, he found their proposed solutions to his problems unsatisfying. Through the witness of his mother, and in studying the Scriptures, Hall eventually found the peace and purpose he’d been longing for through a fresh understanding of the loving Fatherhood of God.
Fr. Richard Ho Lung, M.O.P. 54:35
Father Ho Lung’s family came to Jamaica, from China, in the 1930s where they struggled to survive operating a small shop. Richard was taught by the Franciscans and was the first Ho Lung to see that Christ was the truth for which he was searching. He was baptized and was eventually ordained a Catholic priest. In 1980, Father Ho Lung founded the Missionaries of the Poor to serve the poor and downtrodden in his island home through service and song.
Kim St. Maurice 53:54
Kim was born in Vietnam to practicing Buddhist parents. As a child, she attended French Catholic schools. Later, she attended university in Montreal, Canada and lived in a Catholic student residence. She later met and married her husband, who was a Catholic, and although she agreed to baptize and raise their children as Catholic, she didn’t think she would ever become a Catholic. Her heart was turned to Christ and his Church by attending Mass with her husband and meeting Bishop Alvaro Del Portillo, the late Prelate of Opus Dei.
A FEW GREAT WRITTEN STORIES
A Child Who Led Me — from Liberal Feminism to Life
Cynthia Scodova
I left the Brethrens for good at 17 years of age and began propelling myself into nature mysticism and Eastern philosophy. In high school the Tao Te Ch’ing became my bible of sorts. Upon entering college at Ohio State University in 1978, I ran full into all secular philosophy, embracing my newly found “spirituality” in the liberal movements of the 70s and 80s. I fully immersed myself in the new Women’s Studies program, Marxist ideologies, communist, and socialistic philosophies, literature of the empire, and New Age writings.
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From Pain to Peace
Leonard L. Adams
I was born in the ghettoes of Chicago’s South Side in 1961. My first memories are of dilapidated apartments, window frames without windows, trash strewn on the streets, urine-soaked alleys, and a neglected-deprived independence. As a three-, four-, and five-year-old, I remember many times coming and going from the apartment my mother, siblings and I shared while my mother, an active alcoholic at that time, had friends over from morning till night — days filled with card games, cigarette smoke and all the beer and vodka they could want.
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Highway to Heaven
Dr. Jean M. Lee
My fall from the Church began at the age of eighteen and lasted for thirty-two years. I had lived a worldly life of sin for a dozen years before experiencing an interior conversion at the age of thirty that led me to the practice of evangelical Pentecostalism for two more decades. Eventually, by the grace of God, I returned to the Catholic Faith of my youth as an older and wiser Christian. This testimony is a story of how the Lord led me back to the Catholic Church gracefully and in His wonderful timing.
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More Inspiration for the Journey
Explore the full archive of conversion stories from eastern religious backgrounds
Explore Full Archive
RECOMMENDED BOOKS & OTHER RESOURCES FOR CONVERTS FROM EASTERN RELIGIONS
The Smile of a Ragpicker: The Life of Satoko Kitahara Convert and Servant of the Slums of Tokyo
by Fr. Paul Glynn
The Smile of a Ragpicker brings us the heroic story of Satoko Kitahara, a young, beautiful woman of wealth who gave up her riches and comfort to be among the ragpickers in the Tokyo slums. Motivated by her newfound faith in Christ, she plunged into the life of the poor, regardless of the consequences.
Silence: A Novel
by Shusaku Endo
This novel, set in Japan circa 1630, is the basis for the recent Martin a deeply moving story of two Franciscan missionaries sent to locate a third who, it is rumored, has apostatized from the faith under extreme torture. It is extremely powerful David Mitchell, author of Cloud Atlas and The Bone Clocks describes Silence as “One of the best historical novels by anyone, ever.”
Catholics and the New Age
by Fr. Mitch Pacwa
Fr. Mitch Pacwa, SJ, is a popular host on the EWTN Catholic television network and founder and president of Ignatius Productions, a Catholic media production apostolate. A respected biblical scholar and speaker, he serves as senior fellow at the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology.In Catholics and the New Age, Father Pacwa probes the reasons why many Catholics are dabbling in the New Age Movement.
