How I converted? I was baptized as an infant into the Russian Orthodox Church; I grew up in an environment interested and sympathetic to Christianity (despite the official hostility to it in the USSR). I however, did not practice my faith and did not study it in depth. When I immigrated I discovered a Catholic Church across the park from where I lived, in Portland, Maine -- the Sacred Heart. I loved coming to Mass. I was especially impressed by how people received the Holy Community: they were not overly reverent, surely not externally so, but they came purposefully, and having eaten they looked like their purpose was accomplished. Not thinking much, I went for it myself. That began to speak to me, but I could not understand clearly what it was. After a year I asked to be converted formally, received some catechism and next Easter I became Catholic. The deeper theological knowledge and the ability to defend the Faith came along later. Peace of Christ and the presence of Christ was the first attraction. I never doubted I was in the Church where God was.
My wife, by the way, was at the time not yet my wife, -- and she was practicing Protestant. I was very curious of the Protestant religion because I expected it to be THE America's religion, and visited with her gladly. But the house was empty; the interest faded away as I listened to a variety of sermons and did not see any point being there, rather than to spend time with Ann. Naturally, she converted to Catholicism as well, -- it took her over ten years of frustration in Protestant houses of worship to do so, but I did not want to pressure her. She now wishes I were more forceful.
So yeah, in that sense, it was the experience of faith first for both of us, and that gave me the desire to know Christ's gospel. But there are many stories of conversion from reason as well. Marcus Grodi, himself a former Presbyterian minister, runs an organization helping converts, chiefly from Protestantism, and their stories tend to begin as intellectual conversions, from reason and scripture. I think the latter is to be expected from the Protestant mentality.
Thanks, I appreciate hearing your story. So don’t misunderstand what I’m saying here. I have nothing but the best wishes for you. But I need to make this clear.
Back in post #19, you said “It is not in any way private.”
Now you’re saying, “Any decision at some point becomes internalized and in that sense private.”
So is it private, or not?
You chose to believe, based on your life experiences and knowledge up to that point. That’s what “private judgment” means to a great many Protestants, and not only is it not wrong, it is an inherent necessity of being human. That’s how we work. It’s how God made us.
Which is why, in Scripture, we are not given over to a model of blind submission to human authority. Instead, God invites us to do what?
1 John 4:1 Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.
And of course you remember the Berean model:
Act 17:10 And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea: who coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews.
Act 17:11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
So try the spirits, search the Scripptures. Nothing there about genuflecting to Rome. It seems the “Protestant mentality” has been an ordinary aspect of the believer’s experience from the beginning.
I read your testimony, and i have mine, as one raised devout RC, but who later became manifestly born again thru tearful repentance and faith in Christ to save, and realized the profound difference in heart and life, and btwn what happened to me versus my fellow Catholics.
And yet i remained for 6 years, going weekly and holy days to Mass as a Eucharist-believing RC, and served as a lector and CCD teacher, while also seeking life in RC charismatic meetings (which were better). But who quickly found evangelical radio as feeding my very hungry soul, seeking to know how to please God from the Scriptures.
And finally, and more due to spiritual deadness in the RC church (and i went to more than my own parish sometimes) and desire for evangelical fellowship more than doctrinal differences (though i saw some), i humbly prayed to God if perhaps He would have me go to another church (I knew of none i thought i could trust) then He would make it known. And which He manifestly answered the next day, and which decision He only confirmed in the years since.
Nor do i harbor personal resentment against Rome, but contend against it which i do against other errors, from Swedenborg" to Islam .
And as i can examine Scripture objectively, so i have changed some of my views, if not salvific ones, and likely read more Catholic teaching than most RCs. But this is contrary to the cultic devotion of such RCs i see contending her, and exampled in the incredible things they wrest out of Scripture, which devotion driven extrapolations are actually an argument again being an RC.