The Last Thing I Ever Wanted To be...

The last thing I ever wanted to be was Catholic. I grew up in a southern baptist church that while doctrinally does not teach catholicism is evil, the members of my church sure felt that way. I can remember being told that catholics worshipped satan and believing that as I had no reason to question it.

About a year and a half ago my husband and I had been going for 9 months to a nondenominational church. We had tried so hard to get plugged into to the community, he was serving with the youth and I was helping teach a woman's group. We went to bible studies but we still felt as though it wasn't a good fit. We didn't want to be people who just went to what "felt good" so we stayed until God was clear that wasn't our home. Newly married we wanted couples to pour into our lives and help us in this new stage of life. I wanted older women to learn from and Paul wanted men he could grow from and with. We didn't find that where we were and so we left around thanksgiving of 2012. We honestly had no plan of where we were going to go but prayed God would lead us.

We started going to another nondenominational church in Lake Nona, FL. This church had what we wanted: a great marriage ministry and lots of woman who loved God and wanted to know the bible. We got plugged in but still found that some things didn't add up. Doctrinally little things bothered us but nothing had been said that was too far out there. Around this time (January 2013) I was beginning my pediatric neurosurgery rotation.

I can recall just before I started I kept meeting people who were telling me that their bible had more books in it. Growing up baptist I never questioned where the bible came from because if you asked me I would have said "It's the inspired word of God." That's true, but how did it get put together? Did it drop out of a cave ? Did someone find it on an archaeological dig and did it look like my Kids Application Bible or was it more like my grandmothers King James? These questions bothered me but I didn't look much into it as I kind of chalked it up to them being "catholic." No need to look into that.  I rationalized that perhaps they had all the books after hours and hours of research on how the bible was put together and I was certain I was probably missing a few, but I didn't want to be catholic and at least I could say that everything in my bible was inspired but maybe I didn't have the whole bible... so what? Using that logic now I'd tell you that if someone tried to rip out Hebrews or James or Revelation today I'd claim them a heretic (but thats exactly what was done...these three... 4 more for the new testament and 7 from the old. The new testament was fixed but the old testament never was.)

First day of my neurosurgery rotation my preceptor mentions she's Catholic and I should read books by Scott Hahn to learn about the Catholic church. I wrote it down, and forgot about it. I didn't want to read them because I didn't want to be catholic. A few weeks later at her house for lunch she gives me Rome Sweet Home to read. Dr. Hahn is an engaging writer and it took no time to get through the book, and no matter the subject I don't turn down books. I remember thinking some verses he mentioned were puzzling like "the church is the pillar and foundation of truth." Which begs: Which church? I was willing to overlook this information though, until my husband read Rome Sweet Home. We returned the book but couldn't return the ideas. That sunday at church our preacher got up and was speaking on Ephesians 5. He said we were all "predestined in love." He explained this meant that God doesn't love everyone and that He only loves those who are predestined. As we then all stood and sang a song about how God loves us, Paul and I looked at each other knowing we could never go back to this church. It was heretical to say God doesn't love everyone as it destroys the nature of who God is.

Not too long after that Paul and I both felt God putting on our hearts that birth control was not His plan. This culminated in me coming home and sharing what I learned in school that day. As a physician assistant student we discussed all sorts of topics but what we learned about birth control shocked me:

Birth control has 3 functions
1. Ovulation- birth control inhibits ovulation
2. Cervical Mucus- birth control thickens cervical mucus to limit the sperm from getting to the egg should ovulation occur
3. Abortifactant - birth control thins the uterine lining to prevent implantation should the first two mechanisms fail.

I remember not being able to wrap my mind around that third one. "Prevents Implantation." Implantation of what? A baby. Life begins at conception: a baby is made with Gods guidance when egg and sperm meet. It travels down the fallopian tube and ...implants in the uterine lining.  I came home and told Paul I couldn't take it anymore and my heart broke for the babies God might have given that the medication didn't allow to live. This though still breaks my heart and I pray often that one day if that did happen to any that I'll meet them in heaven and be able to honestly apologize because I didn't know. Had I known, I never would have taken that medication. I later learned that birth control starves and suffocates the baby to death even if it does implant. Talk about cruel and no one told me.

Of course no birth control for a newly married couple ...and we started asking people what we should do? At the time I thought babies were made like cakes even though my medical training told me otherwise. Put in the ingredients and wait.  They told us "pray about it." No advice. No answers. I began to research these functions of birth control to learn that the Catholic church knew these functions and thus encouraged natural family planning through a variety of methods (note: the rhythm method is not natural family planning.) I came to a place where I believed what the church said about birth control but I didn't want to be catholic.

We did around this time meet with a Protestant pastor from my baptist church who I respected. I figured he would tell my husband the catholic church is wrong and that would be the end of it. Instead he recommended Sex Love and Marriage by Christopher West and told us the Catholic church has it right on these subjects and we should follow them but ignore the last page on Mary. I couldn't believe my ears and couldn't appreciate that book more...even the last page.

By this time we were attending mass but it wasn't a happy experience. I hated it, Paul felt bad for going but we were certain we didn't want to be separated and when I asked my husband where we should go to church he said : the Catholic church. I'm thankful now that he had an answer because I truthfully didn't. I could tell you why we shouldn't go to many of the other churches in the area but my reasons for not wanting to go to mass were that it was boring as if church was ever for our entertainment rather than for worshipping God. By this time I had figured out they didn't worship satan as they said "Do you renounce Satan and all his works? - I do." It was tough for me to want to stand and kneel and bow to what I wasn't sure. I used it as time to pray that God would either show me the truth of the Catholic church or He would change my husbands heart and take us away from the Catholic church. I found myself defending Catholic doctrine as to dispel misconceptions as I talked to people being clear that I wasn't Catholic but that Catholics do NOT worship Mary, they do NOT worship satan, they DO believe Jesus is truly present in the Eucharist, they do believe marriage is a sacrament... I was clarifying but not sharing, I was reading a lot but much of it I found confusing to what I knew.

It took a lot of prayer, and time for God to open my heart to the Catholic church. I didn't blindly follow Paul and I didn't make it easy as I was questioning everything down to that I wouldn't cross myself without good reason and I wouldn't bow just because everyone else did. I wanted to know why and how and when it started and then decide if I felt we should do it. I won't go into all these things here but what I will tell you is the tipping point was not all of these things, it was the Eucharist.

I read many books during my journey but maybe the two most important were "The Jewish Roots of the Eucharist" by Brandt Pitre and "The Sign of the Cross" by St. Francis De Sales. In the book by Dr. Pitre a trail between the manna of the old testament and the Eucharist of the new testament was carved out showing me truth that I had never encountered and an explanation of scriptures that have baffled people for centuries.  God led me many other places during the reading of that book and I went on a quest to prove that in some way the Eucharist was either true or false as there could be nothing in between. I read books, I scoured scripture, I prayed and through grace God showed me that when Jesus said "My body is true food and my blood is true drink" it wasn't a metaphor or a symbol. It was true. Learning that helped me during mass quite a bit as the mass is all about the Eucharist: it's all about Christ. To claim its Jesus either has to be true or the church is the biggest heretical place out there because they bow to a cracker. Either they are right, or they really are wrong and NOTHING in scripture could show me that it wasn't Jesus and rather all of scripture screamed that it IS Christ.

I'm still learning and growing and I truly could make a whole book out of this story as it was such a journey but my take home message would be to look into it. Look into what they teach and why they teach it and know why you don't believe it. All I was doing was looking for a way out and God slowly brought me in. I'll be confirmed on May 17th in the Roman Catholic Church and it seems like it can't come soon enough.

To say this is the last thing I ever wanted to be would be an understatement, so if you think I'm crazy I completely understand. My husband can attest that this was the hardest decision I have ever made not only in the amount of time it took to come to this conclusion, but also in what it has cost me. It has cost me the ability to practice medicine at a lot of offices as I am a pro-life provider.  It has cost me friends, who have asked me not to be their friend if I'm catholic, or not to talk about it if I am going to be catholic. I've had friends, family and strangers, bosses and potential employers challenge and question my decision to be catholic. It definitely has not been the convenient option. I can tell you it was the right option, because it is following the truth and God's leading.  It's truly a miracle that God has brought me here, where I least wanted to be but I know that He has a plan for me and my faith.

I'd be happy to answer any questions you have please e-mail me at beautifulgoodtrue@gmail.com
I'll tell you it's a journey to the church just as it's a journey to faith in God.