After playing guitar in front of a crowd of nearly 10,000 people during an Evangelical missions crusade in March of 2019 at the Palacio de los Deportes in the heart of Mexico City, it’s unfathomable that, almost exactly one year later, in March of 2020, a global pandemic and its resulting shutdown orders would act as the catalyst that would eventually lead my family and me to the fullness of the Christian faith in the Catholic Church. You might consider us “COVID converts.” Looking back on all that led to us leaving our deep-rooted Pentecostal heritage for something we knew absolutely nothing about can only be described as a gift— an outpouring of grace during one of the most troubling and isolating years most of us will ever experience. During the pandemic, people were scared and living in hopelessness; yet God was at work within our lives.
Written Story
After bad experiences with Pentecostal “revivals” and living a young adulthood of drugs, violence, and suffering, Lisa Campbell sought refuge in an Assembly of God church. Lisa was introduced to Catholicism after she married a cradle-Catholic.
As a cradle Catholic who followed his wife into the Episcopal Church, Francis Jacobs realized he was “a Roman Catholic who happened to attend an Episcopal church.”
I have to begin my conversion story by relating something of my family life. My father worked for the government as an air traffic controller. They transferred him wherever they wished even though he had a family. So, we moved from state to state when I was a little girl. My youngest brother and I were born in Minnesota, our home state. I was born in 1948 in Minnesota and baptized October 31 that same year in Selma, Alabama, which tells how often we moved. My other brother and sister were each born in a different Southern state. Because of our constant moving, establishing a stable spiritual home was quite difficult for us.
At this very moment in our lives a long-time Evangelical friend and pastor announced to us, “Steve, my wife and I have decided to join the Catholic Church.” Janet and I were stunned. I immediately blurted out, “Al, that is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard; you are way too smart to be a Catholic!”
“Learning about Catholicism, after being schooled by Protestants, I felt like I had only been allowed to view little random pieces of incredible artwork. It is only now that I understand the pieces were a single, beautiful masterpiece.” After a rocky childhood, Alicia joined the US Navy, which brought about stability and order in her life. Life in the Navy prepared her for life in an unexpected place: the Catholic Church.
Tania was raised in a devout Seventh-day Adventist home and persevered in her faith through college. She was certain she “knew” her Christianity until her nominally Catholic husband insisted their kids complete the Sacraments in the Catholic Church. Tania was in for a life-changing surprise!
“My longing for truth was a single prayer.” – St. Edith Stein As a thirteen-year-old Evangelical Protestant, I spent a day in a sporting good store asking people, “If you
Father Ray Ryland, Ph.D., J.D., is a former minister of the Episcopal Church. In 1963 he was received with his wife, Ruth, and their five children into the Catholic Church. Twenty years later, he was ordained to the priesthood of the Catholic Church, with a dispensation from the rule of celibacy. Currently, he serves as chaplain for Catholics United for the Faith and on the boards of both that apostolate and The Coming Home Network. He is also a regular columnist for The Catholic Answer Magazine, and he serves as an assistant at St. Peter’s Church in Steubenville, Ohio.
My story began as a cradle Anglican, which means I have been surrounded by beautiful words of prayer my whole life. As long as I can remember I have come into God’s presence on the Lord’s day praying “Almighty God, unto whom all hearts be open, all desires known and from whom no secrets are hid: cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of thy Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love thee, and worthily magnify thy Holy Name.” Each week we approached Holy Communion praying “Grant us therefore, gracious Lord, so to eat the flesh of thy dear Son Jesus Christ, and to drink his Blood, that our sinful bodies may be made clean by his Body and our souls washed through his most precious Blood, and that we may evermore dwell in him, and he in us” (The Book of Common Prayer).
After a life of fulfilling the cultural obligations of a cradle Catholic, Dan Gonzalez encountered a “living Gospel” during his first year at college. After sensing that something was “missing” from the services at a non-Catholic worship service, Gonzalez began a search that lead him back home.
Growing up in a devout Christian family in Germany, Klemens became dissatisfied with the doctrine of sola Scriptura and varying types of worship in Protestant denominations. After a period of seeking, he stumbled upon a Catholic church close to his home.
While Elizabeth enjoyed the blessings of being brought up in a devout Christian environment, she always had a nagging doubt about being “once saved, always saved.” Her desire for the truth and her husband’s Catholic background led her to investigate the teachings of the Catholic Church.
Help us share the truth and beauty of the Church.
Help us share the truth and beauty of the Church.
