God Heals the Sick and Brings Hope to the Hopeless
By: Micah Wright

“Micah, we know something is going on in your life. You are hiding something. Whatever it is, you can tell us, we will still love you, no matter what it is.”
This is a hard statement to hear from your mother and father, especially when you know they are right. I was hiding something. Something that I was terrified to share with my parents, because I did not know what their reaction was going to be. Would they be angry, and try to talk me out of the lifestyle I had chosen? Would I lose my family forever? Would they reject me, or laugh and ridicule me?
I know what you are thinking. I don’t have a drug problem, or a mistress. Neither was I hiding a secret super hero identity. I hadn’t even joined a cult. No, I had become something even more questionable. I had become……. a catechumen.
“How did this happen” you ask? How does a good Evangelical Quaker preacher’s kid who was from the Mid-West end up becoming a Roman Catholic? Well, the only answer I can come up with is by the grace of God, the intercession of the Blessed Mother and the all the saints of heaven.
Let me say first, I am quite proud of Protestant heritage. I was taught by many Godly people, my parents, Sunday School and Children’s Church teachers, school teachers, friends and Youth Pastors. I learned so much of the stories and verses of the Bible from these people. It is the one area that I would hope to influence the Catholic Church. We need, as the Catholic laity (and some clergy), to learn and teach each other God’s Holy Word in Scripture.
The branch of the Wright family that I am a part of has an interesting history. We are the descendants of Orville and Wilber Wright, the famous aviators. If you look at a profile of them, and a profile of my grandfather, father, uncle and brothers, you see the family resemblance in the nose and chin. I have the chin, but thank the heavens, I missed that nose! My Dad says it also shows that a crazy streak must run in the family, because who can go from manufacturing and selling bicycles, to trying to make them fly! Most people don’t know this, but their father, Milton Wright, was a great preacher and bishop in the United Brethren Church, traveling throughout Indiana and Ohio. The church has been the family business for a long time.
My grandfather, Gene Wright, was truly a man of God. He talked out loud to the Lord everyday. And the Lord talked back. Jesus was my grandfather’s best friend. However, between Bishop Wright and my grandfather, it is a string of men who were drunks, bar room brawlers, womanizers, and when in a drunken fight, could be killers. There is a Wright trait of a quick, hot temper. I am glad to say I don’t have this trait, but I have seen it in other members of my family. But thanks be to God! The chain of sin that was tied to my family was broken by my great-grandfather, 5 times removed, who surrendered his life to the Lord. He was the town drunk, kind of like Otis on the Andy Griffith show. He made his living as a barroom musician and doing odd jobs around town. That one decision for righteousness affected my family in a major way! (Papaw) Gene Wright, who went to be with Jesus in August of 1994, was a pastor and evangelist in the Free Methodist and Evangelical Friends churches throughout Indiana, North Carolina, Virginia, Idaho, Michigan and Illinois. His wife, my grandmother Barbara, was a real prayer warrior. She died in January of 1990 after a difficult battle with breast cancer. Both their parents were active in their small-town Indiana United Methodist churches, teaching Sunday school, eldering, and raising children who loved the Lord. My grandfather has 2 brothers. One is a retired District Superintendent for the United Methodist Church, and the other is a retired song evangelist for Church of the Nazarene
He has 6 sisters as well, one is a retired pastor, one a missionary on an Indian reservation in Arizona, and the other 4 are active in their home churches. As I have said, the church has been the family business for a quite a while. This is quite a legacy to carry, and I am proud and humbled to be a part of it.
My parents, Gary and Carol Wright, were high school sweethearts. They met at their high school in Indiana, and have been in love since they were fifteen years old. My dad started preaching in his dad’s church when he was a 13-year-old boy. It became a big thing to have the “Boy Preacher” come to your church and have services. After high school, my dad attended Asbury College in Wilmore Kentucky, and was there during the Asbury Revival that swept the campus and eventually, the nation. He worked his way through school as an evangelist and a stone mason. My mother attended Malone College in Canton, Ohio her freshman year, then married and joined my father at Asbury in 1971. When Dad graduated in 1973, mom was 6 months pregnant with me. They went back home to Indiana, and began their ministry together. They worked as a traveling evangelist and musicians (my mother is an incredible pianist) mostly in the Friends church, but also in churches that follow the Wesleyan/Arminian-holiness tradition. My dad has 2 younger brothers. My uncle Richard is a deacon in the Southern Baptist church in North Carolina. My Uncle Mark is a pastor in a non-denominational church in Greenfield, Indiana. My mom’s family is not Christian. It is something we pray about daily. Her parent’s are kind, giving people, who want nothing to do with the church. But, they love us, and support my family, which in it self is kind of odd.
My parents have always told me that the Lord named me. They both had separate dreams that they were going to have a son, and they were to name him “Micah”. The Old Testament prophet who cared this name was a country boy, who came to the cities of Israel and preached judgment, and the need for repentance and mercy. He prophesied the Messiah would be born in the City of David. Israel repented, and Micah went back to the countryside. He was a contemporary of Isaiah. It is a heavy name. Mom and Dad were adamant that I understand this. They told me that the Lord had something special for me, something different from the other children they would have. As a kid, I thought this was silly and a little scary, but kind of neat, too.
I was born on September 15, 1973. My dad was preaching a revival in Georgia, and I was 2 weeks early. Dad just barely made it home in time to be there for my birth. We spent those early years as a family traveling the USA, preaching in all kinds of churches. In 1975, we moved to Traverse City, Michigan. Dad had been called by the Friends church to “plant” a new congregation. We had 0 people at the beginning. We started with Bible studies, and 4 years later when we left, we averaging 400+ people on Sunday morning. While we were in Michigan, My best friend was born. My sister Christine. She is the total opposite of me. Bossy, stubborn, opinionated, but also one of the sweetest people I know.
In July of 1979, my life changed. We moved from the beauty of Traverse Bay to the flat, hot plains of Kansas. Haviland, Kansas. Population 853. And of those 853 people, roughly 700 attended Haviland Friends Church. My dad was to be the Senior Pastor. At that time it was one of the top 5 largest Friends congregations in the nation. Haviland is also the home of Friends Bible College, now called Barclay College after William Barclay, a Quaker apologist. Taking the position as Senior Pastor was a big step for my dad. He was only 28, and pastoring a church that was a major player in the denomination. Dad would spend hours late into night working on his Sunday Sermon. I’ll say it now; my dad is a great preacher. He has a real gift of evangelism. When he preaches, he is almost like a storyteller. I love to listen to him. Dad is the one who taught me a love for the Word. He studies the Bible regularly.
Haviland was a small town in all meanings of the phrase. I only had 15 in my class. 50 students in the whole high school! It was a tough place to be the kind of person I am. Artistic, non-athletic, expressive, passive, outgoing and smart. Did I mention non-athletic? If you weren’t a jock, good luck! I was always last picked in PE, but the first in music, art or any schoolwork. I am highly verbal, so English and history became my favorites. I was friends with everybody, but only had 1 close friend. I guess, looking back, I was lonely. I had an active imagination. I spent a lot of time alone, dreaming, playing musical instruments, and playing with my sister.
My dad resigned as pastor of Haviland Friends Church in December of 1986. He then did 2 things. He became Chairman of the Pastoral Ministries Department at Barclay College, and also started an evangelistic mission, going back to his roots of holding revivals in churches. This was a rough transition for me. A lot of my personal identity was tied into being the pastors’ son. It was a tough time for the family as well. We had grown twice. My brother David was born in 1983, and Jonathan was born in 1985. On top of that, there were the big scandals with the Bakkers/PTL and Jimmy Swaggart. Not a good time to be an evangelist. But we survived, and went on.
I attended school in Haviland until I was in the 10th grade. The summer of 1990, my parents took a job with Damascus Friends Church in Damascus, Ohio. I spent that summer traveling with a group for our Yearly Meeting called Cornerstone. (Yearly Meeting is similar to a diocese, with 2 exceptions: a general superintendent instead of a bishop and it can cover multiple states. In this case it was Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas.)This gave me a chance to say goodbye to people I had met in dad’s ministry, and friends I had made at Quaker Haven, the Yearly Meeting summer camp. My family moved while I was on tour, and I joined them in 1990 to enroll in West Branch High School.
Personally West Branch was a better experience for me. I had attended a summer camp at Indiana University and had learned how to be a Student Athletic Trainer. I became the student trainer at West Branch, which has one of the best football programs in the state of Ohio. I was able to explore my artistic side, because West Branch had a great Fine Arts Dept with award winning bands, choirs and musicals. I was in heaven. Socially I was friends with the “right people” in groups, the jocks and the arts people. I was friends with all the popular people, so I was popular by association. I liked this. It allowed me to play advisor to a lot of people, and I had a lot of “shadow” influence on School events. Academically though, West Branch wasn’t that great for me. I had a lot of fun those last 2 years. Too much in fact. My grades weren’t that great, unless I liked the class, or I could BS my way though it. I didn’t really know how to study. I have since learned I am an auditory learner, so when I need to learn something, I read out loud.
At West Branch I discovered my passion for acting. I was in 2 plays, and 2 musicals. I had leads in all 4. I love to sing, dance, perform, and make people experience emotions they weren’t expecting to feel. I also fell in love with music again.
I graduated in June of 1992, and attended Mount Vernon Nazarene College in Mount Vernon, Ohio. The college is affiliated with the Church of the Nazarene, an Evangelical Protestant church that follows the Wesleyan/Arminian tradition. While at college, I changed my major 3 times, and participated in several extra curricular activities. I was in 2 plays, 2 musicals, concert choir, chamber choir, Nazarene Acting Guild – a traveling drama troupe to promote the school, Living Witness- another traveling group, student government, and had a part-time job. The classes I liked, I did well in. The others, not so much. I was very happy at school socially, but not emotionally, and certainly not spiritually. My parents moved again at the end of my college freshmen year to Trinity Friends Church in Van Wert, Ohio. I left school in May of 1994, really before they asked me to leave, knowing I had a call on my life by God for his active ministry, but not knowing what I was to do, but not wanting to be a part of it. Being raised in the Protestant Church, in my mind being in ministry meant having a wife, a family, and striving to be a Godly husband and father while juggling the works of the church. That scared the living daylights out of me!!! I knew what it was to grow up in the fishbowl of the parsonage, and I couldn’t imagine passing along the things that go with that on to my children. I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to HAVE children.
I spent the month of June ‘94 in Russia, traveling with Collegians, the MVNC choir. We were there on a mission trip, and went into many beautiful Russian Orthodox churches. In retrospect, I would have to say that I felt something there. Something in the reverential silence of those houses of worship, with all the icons, candles, and smells of incense reached into my heart. I was, of course, in no place to realize it, and definitely not in a place to respond to it. No…. I had a little more ways to go before I hit bottom.
I moved to Indianapolis, into my maternal grandparents’ home and got a job with the JCPenney Co. store at Washington Square mall in the Home department. My dads’ father passed away that August. I felt really, really guilty. I had shared with Papaw my feelings of “the call’, and here I am selling bath towels at Penney’s! I sang at his funeral, resting in the knowledge that he was with his 2 favorite people, my grandmother and Jesus.
I spent that year of my 21st birthday living in a fog, jumping and from one shameful, sinful thing to the next. I heavily experimented with alcohol, and then began an even more serious addiction, covering it all with a thick web of lies. The addiction that I speak of is one that would haunt me for the next several years. Its name is Pornography. I believe it is one of the most powerful and subversive sins in our modern society. The porn industry has exploded, in large part because of the internet. I cannot tell you how many men and women, particularly men in the church, I have talked to about this painful and shameful addiction. This sin and the industry that cranks it out by the billions will only be stopped through the intersession of our Lord, His Blessed Mother and all the saints and Hosts of heaven!
I worked my way up in the Penney Company, despite my not having a diploma, into a supervisory role in the Watch and Jewelry repair department. I had a lot of friends at the store, and we would socialize for hours, sipping margaritas, gossiping, and complaining about the managers at the store. Most people who knew me then would have told you I was a happy, successful and religious man. I was attending the Westside Church of the Nazarene, primarily so I could sing in its great choir, despite it being clear on the other side of Indianapolis from my eastside bedroom community home. Yet, I was utterly lonely, miserable, and I thought, totally alone. Needless to say, the relationship with my family was very, very poor. I was a bitter, hurtful man, and I often lashed out that bitter and hurt at my family. My parents didn’t know what to think of me, my siblings were afraid of me and dreaded the weekends I would come home to visit. I was near the end of rope, and I didn’t even know yet.
The fall of 1995, my sister was a freshman at Bethel College, in Mishawaka, Indiana, which is a next to South Bend. Indiana is gorgeous in the fall, when all the trees are turning and the air is crisp and cool. I drove up one Friday to spend the weekend with her. Now, like I said, my relationship with my family was shaky at best, but Christine and I had a very good time that weekend. It was what I needed, and really prepared my heart for what was to come.
After attending Sunday worship, we went out to lunch, and then I wanted to have a tour of the area. We ended up driving around Mishawaka and South Bend for a couple of hours, ending up on the campus of Notre Dame. If you haven’t ever been to Notre Dame, please go there and walk around. It is a beautiful place. Very peaceful. We got out the car, and walked around the campus looking at all the lovely buildings and places we had seen on TV watching the Irish on the gridiron. In our journeys around the campus, we came to the Basilica Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. I think it is the real crown of the University, and urge you to go see the beauty contained in this Gothic house of the Lord. I asked Chris if we could go in, “Why?” she asked. I said I wanted to see the artwork, and maybe take a tour. She reluctantly agreed, and so we went in. As we entered the nave of the church, it was as if I was slammed in the chest with a 2 by 4! I lost my breath, my eyes weld-up with tears, and I nearly fell down! I was sp overcome with a flood of emotions that I couldn’t speak, or really even have a rational thought. I sat down, and tried to regain some of my composure. As I looked to the right, and took in the beautiful artwork of the Stations of the Cross, I had one thought. “Man, there has got to be something to all of this!” My sister, on the other hand was not so affected. “What is wrong with you? You aren’t sick or something are you?” I finally regained the ability to speak, and assured her I was OK, knowing full well I wasn’t. We walked around that Church, looking at all the artwork, the altars, and statues in awe of the beauty. I bought some books about the basilica, and the university. Chris thought it all artwork was pretty but not really necessary. She looked at the books I bought, and said “What did you buy those for? If you become Catholic, I will never speak to you again.” Chris thought all the artwork was pretty, but not really necessary, as we were raised in the simple and unadorned faith of the Friends Church. I, on the other hand, was walking around in a fog, without knowing that the Answer to my problems had reached out to me from behind Its place of reservation in the tabernacle. “Become Catholic? I would never become Catholic! I just wanted to read about the artwork and Notre Dame.” Chris and I walked out of the church, not knowing how prophetic her statement would turn out to be.
I drove home to Indy that evening, and devoured those books. I was totally fascinated by all the information they contained. This Catholic stuff was kinda neat, as I knew diddlysquat about the Church. It was all so foreign to me. I mean, I knew the doctrine of my church, but I had no idea that a great deal of what I believed to be the Truth of my church had been hammered out in Councils by Catholics way back when! That being the case, I went to the library the next day, and checked out a whole slew of books on the Church and what she taught. I read the biography of John Henry Cardinal Newman, St. Francis DeSalles, the Summa by St. Thomas Aquinas, and a book called “Why the Reformation Happened”, “Crossing the Threshold of Hope” The biography of Pope John Paul II. All these books and it was like I couldn’t get enough! I discovered that I believed a lot of the same things as Catholics. Maybe they weren’t so bad after all. I didn’t understand about the Mary stuff, and what was the big deal about the pope? Why did they call him “Holy Father”? I thought the Holy Father was in heaven? Despite these few gray areas, I wasn’t about to deterred form the pursuit of my knowledge about the Catholic Church.
The more I read, the more excited I became. I realized that I believed A LOT of the stuff Catholics believed. Even stuff that my parents didn’t believe in, but I had always questioned in my heart. Doctrines like Authority, the celibate priesthood, and what baptism and Creed’s were all about. I read about the Real Presence, not knowing really what it meant, or that I had already come face to face with it. It was at this point that I decided to become a Protestant expert on the Catholic faith. I honestly had no intentions of joining the Church. Little did I know! I was checking out books at the library like a mad fool! I read every thing Catholic the Hancock County Public Library had, and then asked them to get stuff from other libraries! The more I read, the more I became excited. The more I became excited, the more I read! As I became more and more excited, the joy I felt made me want to be a better man, and a better Christian. So, I got involved in my Nazarene church with gusto. Choir, Sunday School, tithing, the whole works. Kinda funny isn’t it? Reading Catholic doctrine and the lives of the saints making me want to be a better Nazarene. Still, all the faith and knowledge was in my head, not in my heart or soul. My heart, where Jesus wanted to be, was cold and full of bitter sin and pain. I was worshiping and working with hundreds and hundreds of good, Christian people at Westside Church of the Nazarene, feeling totally alone and isolated, knowing that I was a sinner, with a shameful, dirty secret.
This went one from mid-October of 95 until April 5, 1996. On this fateful Sunday morning, I was running behind. Ordinarily I would get up early (7:00AM) go to breakfast, be done by 8:30 and then go to morning worship at 9:00, followed by Sunday School at 10:30. Well, this day, everything was against me. I overslept, not waking up until about 9:00. I woke up with a start, and knew I was in trouble. It took me almost an hour to drive to church, and so I was running around like an idiot, trying to get ready. I couldn’t find my dress shoes, I couldn’t find socks that matched, and my tie wouldn’t tie right. Like I said, I was a mess.
So I finally get ready by 9:30, get onto Interstate 70, and realize there is no way I was going to make even the 2nd service at 10:30, because there was bad traffic on 70. So I am sitting there, on the interstate, fuming and wondering what I was going to do. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a cross, and I remember that I am near downtown, by St. Peter and Paul Cathedral. Now, I had not been to a Mass. Ever. So, I thought I might as well start putting my new found knowledge to work, and find out what all the “fuss” was about, this thing called “the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass”.
So I walk up the steps to the church, cross the lobby area and pull open the large glass doors that lead into the nave. Again, I am nearly knocked down by this overwhelming emotional experience. My eyes were filled with tears, and again, I had to set down. So I sat in the back row of chairs and was just unable to comprehend what was going on. As I sat there, the emotions became stronger and stronger. I began to cry. The more I cried, the stronger the emotion became. I cried out all the bitterness, loneliness, fear, and hurt I had been carrying around in my heart for years!!! After about five or ten minutes of this, an usher came by and asked if I was OK. I said I was fine. And then he handed me something. I looked at what it was, wondering what I was to do with it. It was a palm branch. It was Palm Sunday. The day in the Church we celebrate Christ’s triumphant entry into Jerusalem. God does have a sense of humor, doesn’t He? The organ began playing the opening hymn, and I had this overwhelming sense of peace. I began to cry again. This time, I wasn’t crying in sadness, I was weeping with joy! I was home. For the first time in my life, I was truly home, at rest with the Lord. I held that palm like a trophy, (I still have it, but it looks pretty sad.) And tried to follow along with everything that was happening in the service. I felt so happy, so free, and so alive!!! I never went back to my Nazarene church. Later that summer, I wrote a letter resigning my membership from the Church of the Nazarene.
A lot of people ask about different theologies that they have had a problem with in their conversion process. The Pope was easy to accept. I had experienced the “Church with no one in charge” phenomenon, and I so I knew those problems. Obviously, the Eucharist wasn’t a problem. Confession took some reading, and then a lot of question asking once I got in RCIA. But there is that one big issue. The one that many trip over on the way to Rome. Mary.
Ah…. Yes. The Blessed Mother. What did I think of her? Well, I thought she was nice and all and I was grateful that she said yes to God, but other than Christmas Eve, I really didn’t think much of her. Until I began to read all this Catholic stuff. Then, I kinda had to think about her. She was everywhere! So, I thought about her. Well I tried anyway. I just couldn’t wrap my head around all this “Mary stuff”. So, having read Dr. Scott Hahn’s book Rome Sweet Home, I decided to do what he did. I put a fleece out before the Lord and His Mother. I said “Mary, if all this stuff about you that the Church teaches is true, you are going to have to show me. I will buy a rosary and pray it every day until I get answer from Someone up there. Either it is real, or it isn’t.” Kinda crazy and dangerous, huh? Obviously, I was trying to understand, and needed the love of a Mother to help me out.
Our Lady, of course, was totally up to the challenge. I went to Krieg Brothers Catholic Supply downtown, walked in and was flabbergasted at the number of rosaries! So I told the lady, “I need the least expensive rosary you have.” (I wasn’t going to invest a lot of money in this experiment, in case it backfired. I should have known better!) She said, “I have never had someone ask that before”. Well, that is what I wanted, so she pulls out this small plastic one, and I said it was fine. I also stated that I would need something to show me how to pray it. She gets a pamphlet with all the prayers and some small pictures with meditations. So… I paid less than 10 bucks for the whole thing.
I left the store, and sat in my car and prayed my first rosary, repeating the deal I made with Mary out loud. I used that rosary everyday on my way to work, learning the prayers slowly, until I didn’t need the card. After a month, I was a pro at the form of the prayer, and I have to admit it, I kinda started to enjoy it. But I was still wary of the whole thing. UNTIL, I came home from work one day, and was going through the mail. Now, I had told no one about the Catholic thing. The only people who knew I was even remotely considering it was the librarian who was feeding my book habit, and the lady I bought the rosary from! At this point, I hadn’t registered in a parish, or even resigned from my Nazarene church. Nothing. Nada. Zip. But there it was in the mail. A letter. Addressed to me. At my home. From the Rosary Center. With a big picture of Mary on it! I dropped the mail, and totally freaked out! How did they know! Where did they get my address? It had to be from Her! From that day on, I believed. The whole kit and caboodle. Immaculate Conception, Perpetual Virginity, Assumption, Coronation. The entire Marian dogma package. Granted, I then read up on this doctrine, but it was with the eyes of expectant, hopeful faith, and not doubt. I love Our Lady, and realize she is a Christian’s greatest ally. With her yes to Gabriel, she stepped out on faith, into an unknown, potentially dangerous situation. So she knows what we face daily, and only wants what is best for her children.
I was going to sign for RCIA classes at the Cathedral where I attended from Palm Sunday until later that summer. But, God had different plans. He planted a desire in my heart to return to Mount Vernon. Not to return to go to school, but to live in the community, and kind of reintroduce myself to my friends who still lived there, and to develop on my own, without my family. I still had a lot of growing up to do, and a lot of baggage to unload.
So, I moved back to Mount Vernon, a person on the road to Rome. I moved into a house with 3 other guys (all affiliated one way or another with MVNC). A friend of mine was getting married and moved out of this house, so I took his place. I didn’t know these guys at all, but I knew Mike, and he was a good guy. So I felt OK about it. Now I will say this, I didn’t broadcast to the world my decision to convert. But I didn’t hide it either. I put a crucifix above my bed, and had a statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus on my desk. I wore that cheap rosary as a necklace, taking it off only to pray with it. I called St. Vincent De Paul and registered for RCIA. But I had bigger problems on my plate. JCPenney was supposed to transfer me to a store in the central Ohio area. However, the paperwork got screwed up, and I didn’t have a job. I was in trouble. Money was tight anyway, and now, I had no source of income.
So I put my application in everywhere. The only place that called me back was a grocery store, called Big Bear. I got hired as a bag boy. Quite a change huh? Department head to bag boy. God was breaking me down, and was going to build me back up, in His image, not in the one I thought was right. But God knew what He was doing. The store manager of that grocery chain was an active member of St. Vincent’s, and the assistant store manager was in my RCIA class. I started both RCIA and the job at Big Bear on the same day. Those people in my class were my support system, and I made it though some dark days because of there friendship. Little did I know how dark it would get!
Like I said before, I didn’t really know the guys I moved in with. I make friends easily, so I wasn’t worried. Yet, there was uneasiness with these guys I couldn’t explain. It came to a head one day when I came home from work in January, and all 3of my roommates were waiting for me. Not a good sign. By this time, I had been attending RCIA for about 5 months, and had been through the Rite of Acceptance. My roommates had never asked me one question about my faith, or where I was going to church. When I walked into the house, I will never forget it, it was a Friday afternoon and it was unusual for all of us to be together, except at night when we were all in bed. They said they needed to talk to me. So, I sat down and they began to ask me questions. Questions like, “So, are you Catholic? Why have we seen your car at St. Vincent’s? Do you know that Catholics aren’t real Christians? Do you pray to Mary?” Stuff like that. Then they proceeded to pull out items that belonged to me. Like my RCIA study materials, and the Catholic Bible I had received at the Rite of Acceptance, and other devotional materials (holy cards, prayer pamphlets, ect). They had gone through my desk, my closet, even my briefcase. I was totally shocked! I tried to answer their questions as adequately as I could, but it I hadn’t read enough apologetics yet to know hoe to answer the questions they were throwing at me. After about a half hour, the guys saw they were getting no where, so they concluded, and left the house. I was left totally alone to lick my wounds, and try to put my self back together.
I didn’t know what to do, so I tried to call Sister Jean. She wasn’t home. So I started down the RCIA phone list. Eventually I got an answer at Maxine Baxter’s home. Tearfully, I told her what had happened. She said, come up here to my house immediately, so I did. And she was truly an angel of mercy that night. She fed me, prayed with me, and just let me know that I was doing was of God. I stayed there that night, and the next day, I went to my friend Jeremy’s apartment. I told him and some other friends who were there what had happened. They were furious! They were ready to storm the house with torches and pitchforks. Luckily, this didn’t happen. I did go back 3 days later to pack up and move into the apartment at Jeremy’s. I left with my head held high, and my faith intact. I told my roommates that they what they had tried to do, and the manner in which they did it was wrong, and that there would be judgment for it. I found out later that several months after I had moved out that the basement wall collapsed in that house, and all the guys had to move out.
OK so, I moved out of that mess. I continued to go to RCIA, and it was great. Then Lent began. My first Lent. The church I was raised in didn’t have any liturgical practices like that. So… I decided to go hard core. I would give up meat for Lent. ALL meat. No fish, beef, pork, or poultry. I was going to tough it out. And I did.
The best thing about that Lent of 97 was what my parish did. They had Eucharistic Adoration every Friday of Lent from the Noon Mass until 7pm after the fish fry, when they had Benediction. I signed up for an hour, from 4-5. It was just me and Jesus. I prayed, cried, and most of all sang. I love music, especially hymns of the church. So…I sang to Jesus, and I know He sang with me. It was some of the best time I have ever had in Church. It ignited a fiery desire for the Eucharist in my heart. I couldn’t wait for the Easter Vigil.
When it came time for the Vigil Mass, I was so excited I thought I would pop! I could hardly sit still. I had never experienced such a beautiful liturgy. The litany of the saints, all the readings, and then, the Sacraments. I received them all that night. Baptism, Confirmation, and Holy Communion. I took the Confirmation Saint of St. Joseph, which is my middle name. Since then, I have developed a strong devotion to St. Joseph. He is my “Catholic Dad”. This is to say nothing against my own father, but sometimes I just need a father to talk to who knows this Catholic stuff.
When it came time for me to receive the Lord, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity for the first, I just about ran down the aisle. And then, when they placed the Host on my tongue, and I swallowed, I felt so full of joy, so full of happy, excited emotions, that I began to cry, but tears of sadness. Tears of joy. It was the same joy I had felt at Notre Dame, and at the Cathedral in Indianapolis. Only this time, it was even more, because Jesus was in me! I had received Him who made the universe into my being, and we were one Body. It was great! I thought I just might fly. And it has continued to be like that, every time I receive Communion. So it was official. I became a baptized and confirmed member of the Holy Catholic Church on March 29, 1997.
Well, the Christmas of 1997 was when I finally worked up enough courage to tell my family. I had been Catholic about 9 months now. It really hit me, when I was sneaking out that Christmas Eve to go to Midnight Mass. I thought “some people sneak out to go to a bar, or see a girlfriend. I am sneaking out to go to church!” I had to tell them, and I did. I said, “Mom, Dad, I have joined a new church. (My mom later told me she thought I was gonna say I had become a Mormon, or a Jehovah’s Witness or something) It’s the Catholic Church. I’m Catholic.” Their response was “Oh. Well. Oh. Catholic? Oh. Hmh. Are you happy?” I said “more than I have been in years.” Dad asked “Do you think this is what God has for you? “ I responded “yes, I’m quite certain.” They said “Well, as long as you love Jesus, and are serving Him in the center of His will, we don’t care where you go to church.” We continued to talk for hours, and they had lots, and lots of questions. But it was good, and they could see the beginnings of positive changes in my life.
The downside here is I continued to struggle with pornography. It would have its hold on me for 3 more years. I would try to do it on my own, throw all the magazines and videos away, and say to myself “No more. Never again”, only to wind up back in the Adult book store, and then back in the confessional, confessing the same sad, addictive behavior all over again. Until my dirty little secret met my sister.
My career changed during this time. I got into the hotel business. It was purely an accident, but it fit me like a glove. I moved from Mount Vernon to Decatur Indiana, and then back to Indy. My sister and I had an apartment together. One day, she was doing dishes, and was collecting the glasses I had on the nightstand in my room, and she found my stash. To say that there were fireworks would be an understatement. She basically staged a one woman intervention, and was not going to take no for answer. Thanks to her love and support, I began to get therapy. And I discovered a great and powerful tool to overcome anything. The Chaplet of Divine Mercy. The counselor I went to was a priest, and he encouraged me to pray this. Let me tell you. It works. Thanks to the Divine Mercy, and the intercession of Our Lady and Saint Joseph, I have been free of pornography since June of 2000. I still pray the Chaplet daily, but I pray for other things now, and am thankful for the freedom that comes with the peace of forgiveness.
Now days, in September of 2003, I have gone back to school fulltime. I am a student in the Pre-Theologate of Ave Maria University in Naples, Florida. I am preparing to be a priest. I hope I can persevere. I hope I can have the privilege of standing at the Altar of the Lord, allowing Him to use my hands and my voice as channels of His power for bread and wine to be changed into Flesh and Blood. I hope that I can one day baptize converts into the faith.
But most of all, I hope.

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