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The conversion of Karen E. Koskoff

I am a Jewish convert. Seven years ago, my then 14-year-old son and I were baptized and confirmed in the Roman Catholic Church at the Church of St. Mary, Dominican Friars, New Haven CT, by Fr. Carolton Jones.

When I was a child, each year, I attended the Passover Seder with about 50 relatives at my Aunt Stella’s home in New Haven CT, only a short distance from where my son and I would enter the Church some 30 years later. I prayed while listening to the journey of Moses and the Israelites. I did not know then Moses’ staff prefigured the cross, or that the forty years’ journey in the desert prefigured Jesus’ forty days in the desert wrestling with Satan.

We sang the hallelujah chorus my Uncle Reuven, a liturgical composer, had written, as we celebrated the arrival of the Jews into the promised land. The sacrifice of the lamb and shedding of the blood had saved my people. I did not know then that that the sacrifice of the Lamb of God saves all people, takes away the sins of the world and grants eternal life in the promised land. We drank the four cups of wine at a time in which I did not understand the significance of drinking the fourth cup.

As I grew up, my fragile faith completely gave way to secularism. God was so irrelevant that I did not even think about Him enough to determine whether I was agnostic or atheist. However, in 1990, at the age of 35, while a prestigious lawyer at the family law firm in CT, and a divorced mother with an 8-year-old child, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. I became a victim of illness, multiple surgeries and chemotherapy. I was utterly without God. I had no faith what so ever. I was desperately and frantically alone.

The chemotherapy and pain medication caused my vision to blur. I could not read or watch television. Finally, I found an old book that had large print. It was a dusty mildewed Bible. But I could see the words. I read the entire Hebrew Scriptures, cover to cover, in a week. The book provided diversion from pain and I was grateful. But when I came to the title page for the New Testament, I stared at it for hours. I had become afraid to turn the page. Jews just did not read that book. My rejection was a visceral response to an ingrained taboo. I was convinced that if I turned the page, God, with His fury, would punish me. As I regained my composure and reassured myself that the existence of God was nonsense, I turned the page to read the Book of Matthew, the Book dedicated to the conversion of Jews. I did not know then that St. Ignatius of Antioch had also converted while reading the Bible while recovering.

Father Ray Petrucci, a friend, a Catholic priest, also a black belt in the karate class my son and I were taking, visited me often and we discussed God. I envied his faith. Finally, I asked him “Father, what if I want to believe but just can’t or don’t believe? “.
He replied, “We believe when it becomes easier to believe than disbelieve”. That’s it? So, that was all there was to it? Simple, as I would later discover, like the approach Mother Teresa has towards Catholicism. Clearly, my life, my son’s life, would be easier if I believed. This was one of the defining moments of my conversion.

I began to attend mass and services at many churches of many denominations yet I was continually drawn to Catholic Churches. I did not understand then why upon entering a Catholic Church I felt God’s presence but lacked that sense in Protestant churches. I did not know then that the mass is the celebration of Passover. I did not know then that the Ark of the Covenant is St. Mary, the Mother of God. I did not know then that the Eucharist, the living body of Christ, drew me into Church.

As I gained my strength and recovered, I began to read. After World War II, Chief Rabbi Zolli of Rome converted. Edith Stein, St. Benedicta of the Cross, had as well. Both experienced hostility and anger from their Jewish families and friends. Although I suspected a similar fate, I did not know then that others would judge me so harshly.

I had by now learned that most Catholic customs and liturgy were derived from Judaism. Protestant “reform”, with 36,000 denominations, was an affront to 6,000 years of Jewish history, dogma and liturgy because much of the ritual was destroyed. In contrast, Catholicism was the mirror image of Judaism, the culmination of all that was hoped for and predicted in the Hebrew Scriptures and entirely consistent with Jewish worship.

In 1995 I prayed, at first in a clumsy way but as I become more familiar with Christianity, prayer became nurturing even when I doubted anyone was listening if there was anyone to listen. I prayed for a sign to determine whether I should enter the Church. I had a dream in the fall of 1995 in which 8 symbols in the dream, including an odd script, were found in a church that my friend Dr. Michael Salvana, an emergency room physician, took me to the following Sunday. Was this just a dream, just circumstance or a vision? Mike calculated the odds that these 8 symbols would all have been in this church. The chances were possible but remarkably unlikely. Was this just circumstance? I believe that it was a vision from St. Mary, the mother of God.

In 1995, I began attending mass at the Church of St. Mary, and, with Teddy, joined the RCIA program and we entered the Church together. I became a lector. Fr. Carolton Jones became my spiritual advisor. With his love and insight I have flourished as a Catholic. The miracle is that I remain a devoted Catholic, devoted to Our Lord and His Church. I quit the practice of law, returned to school to obtain my Masters in Psychology and Counseling and hope to provide spiritual counseling in the near future.

I cannot adequately articulate the profound transformation that has occurred in me. I was a very unlikely soul to become religious at all. That fact is perhaps the most compelling evidence that God, through our Lord, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, exists. Amen.