JMJ+ This is probably not the response you are hoping for, but here it is…. I grew up with no catechesis, but somehow managed, as a very young child, to know GOD THE FATHER, JESUS, THE HOLY SPIRIT, The Virgin Mary, St. Joseph and a few Canonized Saints. I was not special. I wanted to know…. need to know. I could read and retain and understand the relationships between what GOD did and what I could and should not do as a created human being. I read and understood the Ten Commandments given to us by GOD. I knew the Beatitudes. Some basic prayers. I knew most of the major stories in the Old Testament and the Gospel. Did I always understand the complete meaning? No. That came later after a million hours of study of world and Church history and how they related to one another and myself. I am still learning. Point being, if I can, so can other people.
One would think, to hear some folks tell it, that we were living in another “Dark Age.” We are not! Even in this crazy world of huge servings of insanity to go, GOD gave me HIS Will to seek out the Truth. I believe it is HIS Will that everyone want to learn to know, love, and serve HIM in order for us to be happy with HIM in Heaven. If you want to, you will, but…..it is a choice. I did not mistake JESUS’ warnings about an eternal life in Hell with no way out.
I wonder if we are going to witness the Church being sued for bad catechesis as well as all of the sacrileges that have come from far too much of the Priesthood at large. That doesn’t mean JESUS has left the boat. HE has not! If HE had left, all of the Priesthood would be swimming in a cesspool of sin. They, are not. We make our choices. Some of them are absolutely terrible! Some are wonderful. And, personally, I think Satan gets far too much credit for our bad choices. We have a tendency to do what we want rather than what GOD wants, even knowing that we should not do thus and such. And then, we have the gall to blame HIM for our bad choices that HE told us not to do in the first place…. hmm???
I am extremely happy for Bob and all of the other folks that have been able to recognize GOD in their lives, and the lives of others. I just wish that none of us had had to go through so much getting to where we are in this adventure with the LORD JESUS. But, this is how we learn: scraped knees, broken bones, patched up clothes, blistered ankles, a plethora of illnesses and heart breaks and other losses and strike outs, while eventually coming to JESUS begging for forgiveness, and getting it… “Go, and sin no more lest something worse befall you.”
GOD told us in many different ways that HE would never leave us, and HE never has, nor will HE ever……..amen
God writes straight with crooked lines….He has ways of getting our attention that we don’t realise, until AFTER the event of His having successfully called us back to Him ! Deo gratias ❤️
Thanks Bob for your testimony! Although I’m quite younger than you (24), I had a similar journey to yours. My family was also Catholic, and I was even an altar boy, but nothing made sense to me. I felt like a hypocrite when I went to mass because I didn’t believe a word of the creed. So one day, to be fully authentic with myself, I just stopped going to mass altogether. But the idea of God never really left my mind and continued to poke at me, especially as my girlfriend at the time was a faithful Catholic. After becoming an atheist for a while, then an agnostic, I finally reconverted to Catholicism after discovering that belief in God is a very rational thing, not just a bunch of fairy tales, like the tooth fairy.
I believe that the highly materialist and scientific society we currently live in makes it a lot harder to conceptualize spiritual realities. There is very little room, if none, for anything that isn’t made out of matter, so we don’t really know what to do with the idea of God. Even merely accepting miracles that go against the natural order of things can be a challenge when science is embraced as the only reliable source of truth. Sadly, because God doesn’t seem to fit anywhere in the modern framework, he is oftentimes rejected, along with 2000 years of tradition. But reality is that the God-shaped hole left in the heart of the people needs to be filled in one way or another. Money, power, fame, pleasure, etc. can only go so far. Only God can fill this infinitely deep hole, satisfy every human desire, and bring true peace and Joy.
Let’s not get discouraged, because with God, nothing is impossible. By way of convincing arguments, moving testimonies, true witnesses and even through near-death experiences, people can change their deeply held convictions, and make their way back to God and the Church, because God has been making His way to them since day one. This has been the case for you and for me, and as I’m sure it is for you, I’m forever grateful to be back home!
Thank you for bringing God to others, may He continue to bless you and your family. 🙂
JMJ+ This is probably not the response you are hoping for, but here it is…. I grew up with no catechesis, but somehow managed, as a very young child, to know GOD THE FATHER, JESUS, THE HOLY SPIRIT, The Virgin Mary, St. Joseph and a few Canonized Saints. I was not special. I wanted to know…. need to know. I could read and retain and understand the relationships between what GOD did and what I could and should not do as a created human being. I read and understood the Ten Commandments given to us by GOD. I knew the Beatitudes. Some basic prayers. I knew most of the major stories in the Old Testament and the Gospel. Did I always understand the complete meaning? No. That came later after a million hours of study of world and Church history and how they related to one another and myself. I am still learning. Point being, if I can, so can other people.
One would think, to hear some folks tell it, that we were living in another “Dark Age.” We are not! Even in this crazy world of huge servings of insanity to go, GOD gave me HIS Will to seek out the Truth. I believe it is HIS Will that everyone want to learn to know, love, and serve HIM in order for us to be happy with HIM in Heaven. If you want to, you will, but…..it is a choice. I did not mistake JESUS’ warnings about an eternal life in Hell with no way out.
I wonder if we are going to witness the Church being sued for bad catechesis as well as all of the sacrileges that have come from far too much of the Priesthood at large. That doesn’t mean JESUS has left the boat. HE has not! If HE had left, all of the Priesthood would be swimming in a cesspool of sin. They, are not. We make our choices. Some of them are absolutely terrible! Some are wonderful. And, personally, I think Satan gets far too much credit for our bad choices. We have a tendency to do what we want rather than what GOD wants, even knowing that we should not do thus and such. And then, we have the gall to blame HIM for our bad choices that HE told us not to do in the first place…. hmm???
I am extremely happy for Bob and all of the other folks that have been able to recognize GOD in their lives, and the lives of others. I just wish that none of us had had to go through so much getting to where we are in this adventure with the LORD JESUS. But, this is how we learn: scraped knees, broken bones, patched up clothes, blistered ankles, a plethora of illnesses and heart breaks and other losses and strike outs, while eventually coming to JESUS begging for forgiveness, and getting it… “Go, and sin no more lest something worse befall you.”
GOD told us in many different ways that HE would never leave us, and HE never has, nor will HE ever……..amen
God writes straight with crooked lines….He has ways of getting our attention that we don’t realise, until AFTER the event of His having successfully called us back to Him ! Deo gratias ❤️
Thanks Bob for your testimony! Although I’m quite younger than you (24), I had a similar journey to yours. My family was also Catholic, and I was even an altar boy, but nothing made sense to me. I felt like a hypocrite when I went to mass because I didn’t believe a word of the creed. So one day, to be fully authentic with myself, I just stopped going to mass altogether. But the idea of God never really left my mind and continued to poke at me, especially as my girlfriend at the time was a faithful Catholic. After becoming an atheist for a while, then an agnostic, I finally reconverted to Catholicism after discovering that belief in God is a very rational thing, not just a bunch of fairy tales, like the tooth fairy.
I believe that the highly materialist and scientific society we currently live in makes it a lot harder to conceptualize spiritual realities. There is very little room, if none, for anything that isn’t made out of matter, so we don’t really know what to do with the idea of God. Even merely accepting miracles that go against the natural order of things can be a challenge when science is embraced as the only reliable source of truth. Sadly, because God doesn’t seem to fit anywhere in the modern framework, he is oftentimes rejected, along with 2000 years of tradition. But reality is that the God-shaped hole left in the heart of the people needs to be filled in one way or another. Money, power, fame, pleasure, etc. can only go so far. Only God can fill this infinitely deep hole, satisfy every human desire, and bring true peace and Joy.
Let’s not get discouraged, because with God, nothing is impossible. By way of convincing arguments, moving testimonies, true witnesses and even through near-death experiences, people can change their deeply held convictions, and make their way back to God and the Church, because God has been making His way to them since day one. This has been the case for you and for me, and as I’m sure it is for you, I’m forever grateful to be back home!
Thank you for bringing God to others, may He continue to bless you and your family. 🙂