My Faith Journey

This is the story of how someone raised Catholic, educated in Catholic schools, and surrounded by the faith, nearly walked away from it all… only to discover that what I was looking for had been right in front of me the whole time.

Like many cradle Catholics, I had grown up knowing of the Church but not really knowing it. At first I didn’t care.  Then I got challenged here and there.  Then I wrestled with doubts, frustrations. Other Christian traditions, with their appealing simplicity, were starting to look attractive. I thought maybe the Catholic Church might be too rigid, too ritualistic, maybe even wrong. But God used unexpected people, awkward questions, and even anti-Catholic books to lead me deeper.

Like many cradle Catholics, I wanted little to do with it as a young person. I longed for everything the world had to offer instead. I’m a cradle Catholic, Catholic school from kindergarten through high school. Yet, despite twelve years of religion class, I can’t recall anything I truly learned apart from memorized prayers.

As I got older and stepped out of the school environment, I began to get challenged here and there, mostly by friends, about my Catholic beliefs or the way I was living. Some of them had left the Catholic Church for Protestant denominations, while others had just stepped away from faith entirely. I always held a quiet respect for those who became Protestant, because they seemed to be living genuinely Christian lives.

One night around a campfire, beers in hand, a friend asked me, “Why do Catholics worship Mary? I mean, why do you say the words Hail Mary?” I just shrugged. I didn’t know. To this day, I remember that moment more vividly than anything from a decade of Catholic schooling. Looking back, I believe it marked the beginning of something stirring deep within me.

A Promise Made

Around the year 2000, at the age of 36 (yes, I’m vintage!) I found myself buried in study, preparing for an important exam. In a moment of quiet sincerity, I made a promise to God: that once the exam was over, I would commit the same energy and time to learning about Him.

A few weeks later, I passed the exam and was feeling both relieved and thankful. With Lent approaching, I saw that our parish was offering a Bible study program. It felt like the right opportunity, maybe even a nudge from God, so I signed up.

I came into it expecting deep, scriptural answers about the Catholic faith. I wanted to know the “why” behind all the things I grew up doing but never fully understood. Instead, the study was more reflective, geared toward personal growth during Lent rather than theological deep dives.

Still, I tried to ask some questions like, “Why do Catholics give up meat on Fridays during Lent?” The answers I received were vague, lacking clarity or confidence. I had more questions, but no real answers were coming. It left me discouraged. I began to wonder: Are these answers even out there? Or are they just not meant to be found?

At the same time, I couldn’t help but think of friends who had left the Catholic Church for Protestant communities. These were people I respected. They seemed genuinely committed to their faith, and many of them could quote Scripture in ways I’d never heard from Catholics. The more I thought about it, the more it seemed like when people got serious about their relationship with God, they became Protestant.

That thought took root. Slowly, the idea of leaving the Church started to feel exciting. I imagined a version of Christianity with fewer rules. No more confession, no more meatless Fridays, no more holy days of obligation. I could fire up a grill on a Lenten Friday without guilt. I could find a church with a solid worship band and get involved there.

Looking back now, I see how self-centered that thinking was. But at the time, I convinced myself it was a move toward God. The truth was, I was still mostly living for myself, trying to do just enough to check the boxes to get into Heaven. Not realizing that I wasn’t even close.

The Weight of the Decision

But I couldn’t shake the feeling that this decision mattered more than I wanted to admit. I was raised in a Catholic home. My mom and dad are deeply spiritual people, firm in their Catholic faith, and that’s the environment I grew up in. It’s really all I had ever known up to that point. Their faith wasn’t just something they practiced on Sundays; it was woven into the fabric of our family life.

The thought of leaving the Catholic Church wasn’t something I could take lightly. I knew it would hurt them. Not because they’re rigid or controlling; they’re actually incredibly loving and supportive. But because their faith is such a core part of who they are. Still, I believed that if I could explain my reasons, and show them that it wasn’t a rejection of God but a sincere desire to grow closer to Him, they might come to understand.

But to do that, I knew I couldn’t just rely on feelings. I needed to dig deep into Scripture and Church history, and really understand both sides of the story. If I was going to make a decision this significant, it had to be grounded in truth, not just preference or convenience.

That realization marked a shift. I couldn’t just drift away quietly. I had to know.

The Book That Backfired

I started having conversations with my mom and dad, and a few others, about the questions I was wrestling with. I could see the concern in their eyes, but also a deep patience. They didn’t panic or lecture me. Instead, they listened.

Around this time, one of the first things I was handed was an anti-Catholic book. It came from someone I care about deeply, someone I trust, who had left the Catholic Church years earlier. I don’t remember the title or the author, but the format was simple and striking: on one page, “The Catholic Church teaches this…,” and on the facing page, “The Bible says this…”

At first glance, it seemed like a straightforward attempt to point out contradictions. But I quickly began to see what Hank Hanegraaff, Protestant (now Orthodox) apologist and host of The Bible Answer Man, once described perfectly: “All too often, in this debate, people set up straw men and knock them down.” That’s exactly what this book did. It painted a distorted image of Catholicism and then knocked it over with cherry-picked verses and personal interpretations. It was less a fair critique and more a caricature.

Ironically, the book didn’t pull me away from the Church. It had the opposite effect. I still identified as Catholic and held a love for my Church, so the book felt like an attack. But it did force me to confront something I hadn’t dealt with before: how Protestants, especially former Catholics, often view the Church. I’d been challenged by friends before, but never like this.

It left me frustrated, confused, and even a little anxious. What if there was some truth in it? What if the Church really had gone off track? I even began to wonder if we were all too far removed from the original truth to even know what God truly wanted anymore.

But after a few days of reflection, I found myself asking two very simple, even childlike questions:

1. What Christian Church came first?
2. Did Jesus establish a Church?

Those questions might seem basic, but they shifted everything for me. Maybe the book had done what it was meant to after all, just not in the way the author intended. It got me asking the right questions.

Following the Thread

At that point, I didn't have the theological background to know good arguments from bad ones. I still hadn't come across a solid Catholic explanation for much of anything. So I decided to start with something simple: credibility. Which Church had the strongest historical foundation?

A quick internet search (followed by a secular encyclopedia check, just to be sure) gave me a surprising answer: the line of popes traces back all the way to the apostle Peter. That stunned me. Then I learned that Protestantism didn't even exist until the 1500s. I also discovered that the Eastern Orthodox Church had split from the Catholic Church around 1054 AD. I didn't dive into the details of the Reformation or the East-West schism at that point. I just remember thinking, Well, that answers my first question. That definitely felt like a point in the Catholic column.

Not long after that, I came across Matthew 16:18–19, where Jesus says to Peter, "You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church… I give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven." There it was. Jesus establishing a Church and placing Peter at its head. That answered my second question.

But I still had a hundred other questions. Questions I'd heard from friends, questions from that anti-Catholic book, questions of my own. I needed answers, but I didn't know where to find them.

The Tape That Changed Everything

I shared some of what I'd been discovering with my parents. They listened carefully, asking thoughtful questions, not trying to pressure me but clearly hoping I'd find my way to the truth. The next time they came by for a visit, they handed me something unexpected: a homemade cassette tape, clearly a copy of a copy of a copy. "You should listen to this," they said. I told them I'd need to convert it to a CD first, but I promised I would.

So the next morning, on my drive to work, I popped in the newly burned CD. That's when I was introduced to Dr. Scott Hahn.

Scott Hahn was a former Protestant pastor, a Bible scholar, and a professor at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. He was also, by his own description, once extremely anti-Catholic, proudly responsible for leading countless people away from the Church. What I was hearing was his conversion story, TO Catholicism.

Within minutes, my heart was racing. I thought, Finally! A Catholic perspective coming from someone who clearly knew the Bible inside and out, and who didn't have a reason to be biased in favor of the Church. In fact, he had every worldly reason not to convert. He had been offered the position of Dean at Dominion Seminary by age 26. A bright future laid out in front of him. Yet he gave it all up to become Catholic. I figured: if a guy like that made a move like this, there had to be some serious substance behind it.

What struck me most was how Scott discovered the Catholic faith not by abandoning Scripture, but by diving deeper into it. He studied the early Church Fathers. Men like Polycarp, Irenaeus, and Ignatius of Antioch, who had been disciples of the Apostles themselves. And what he found wasn't a departure from apostolic teaching, but a continuation of it. The Catholic Church wasn't getting things wrong despite history; it was getting them right because of it.

Then Scott described attending his first weekday Mass. He sat in the back with his Bible open, ready to observe critically. But as the liturgy unfolded, phrases he'd read dozens of times suddenly jumped off the page. "Lamb of God" from Revelation. The structure of worship the early Church Fathers had described. The connection to the Old Testament Passover, where the lamb had to be eaten to complete the sacrifice. It all came together in the Eucharist.

That's when it hit me, listening in my car: God didn't just want to tell us about His love. He wanted to give us Himself. The Eucharist isn't a symbol of God's presence; it's His actual presence. Just as I wouldn't be satisfied with a photograph of my father when I could have him at the dinner table, God doesn't offer us a mere memorial. He offers us Himself, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity.

That moment became my epiphany. If someone with Scott Hahn's intellect and biblical knowledge found the fullness of truth in the Catholic Church, maybe I'd been looking in the wrong direction all along.

Diving Deeper

That tape changed everything. For the first time in my life, I wasn't being talked down to for being Catholic. Here was someone saying not only was Catholicism defensible, it was true. And this was just the tip of the iceberg.

After that drive, I couldn't get enough. That's when I started immersing myself in Catholic radio, particularly Catholic Answers Live. I spent the next four years consuming talk after talk, mostly from Scott Hahn, but also from many other Protestant converts who had found their way home to the Catholic Church. I replaced music with Catholic radio during my commute.

Day after day, driving to and from work, I'd listen to callers phone in with every objection imaginable. "Why do Catholics pray to Mary?" "Isn't the Pope just a man?" "Where's purgatory in the Bible?" "Why do you need a priest to confess your sins?"

And what amazed me wasn't just that there were answers. It was that the answers were grounded in Scripture and history. The apologists would walk through the biblical basis, explain how the early Christians understood it, and then show where the Protestant objection actually missed the mark. It wasn't defensive; it was illuminating. I began to realize that many of the critiques I had heard weren't really aimed at Catholicism itself, but at a distorted version of it.

Over time, patterns emerged. I began to notice that Protestant objections often assumed things that weren't in Scripture itself, like the idea that the Bible alone is sufficient, or that authority died with the Apostles. These weren't biblical teachings; they were later innovations trying to justify a break from the Church.

But it wasn't just about winning arguments. I started to understand the Church as a family, a real, spiritual family...Through baptism, I realized, I had become an adopted son in God’s household. I had a Heavenly Father, a spiritual Mother in Mary, and brothers and sisters in Christ: the saints and fellow believers. This made sense to me. It mirrored the love and structure I already knew in my earthly family. And unlike anything I had experienced before, it gave context to love, sacrifice, authority, and grace.

The more I learned, the more I saw how everything fits together. The seven sacraments weren’t random rituals; they were God’s chosen means of dispensing grace at every critical juncture of life. Just as loving parents don’t just tell their children they love them but show it through tangible acts (feeding them, healing their wounds, celebrating milestones), God gives us the sacraments: birth (Baptism), strengthening (Confirmation), nourishment (Eucharist), healing (Reconciliation and Anointing), vocation (Marriage and Holy Orders). These aren’t human inventions or optional extras. They’re how God touches us, changes us, sustains us.

I came to realize I didn’t need to worry about every differing interpretation of the Bible. Widespread reading didn’t even exist until the fifteen hundreds, and God didn’t hand us a book and say to solve it on our own. He gave us a Church with shepherds, with sacraments, and with the full truth entrusted to it.

In contrast, many of the communities I had explored seemed to emphasize an individual relationship with Jesus, which has a certain appeal in its simplicity. But it felt incomplete to me. I didn’t see the familial structure, the way the Body of Christ is described in Scripture. I didn’t see the new Passover, this Eucharistic reality that Jesus emphasized so much in John 6. I didn’t see the fullness of “one, holy, catholic, and apostolic.”

Rethinking Worship

As my understanding deepened, I also began to confront something uncomfortable but liberating: worship isn't primarily about what I get out of it. In my mind, I had been shopping for a church like I was shopping for entertainment. Where's the best music? Where do I feel most engaged? Where do I leave feeling uplifted?

Don't get me wrong, an engaging service that keeps my attention is a beautiful thing. But true worship isn't about me being entertained; it's about offering God what He desires. When I spend time with someone I love, I shouldn’t constantly ask, "What am I getting out of this?" I'm there to give, to honor, to be present. The same is true with God. Yes, the Mass can be beautiful and moving, and it often is. But even when the music isn't my style or the homily doesn't stir me, I'm still participating in something transcendent: the re-presentation of Calvary itself. I'm there to give, not just to receive.

This shifted everything about how I approached Sunday Mass. I stopped asking, "What did I get out of that?" and started asking, "Did I give God the worship He deserves?" The focus moved from my feelings to His worthiness.

Looking back on my temptation to leave, I realize what was really at stake. I had been drawn toward comfort over truth, toward a more entertaining experience rather than the fullness of Christ. And if the Catholic Church truly is what it claims to be (the Church founded by Christ Himself), then leaving it for something that simply feels better isn't just a matter of preference. It means walking away from what God has offered us. That's exactly the mistake of Adam and Eve.

We don't come to Mass because it always moves us emotionally or because it's the most engaging hour of our week. We come because Christ asked us to, because He is truly present there, because this is our family and God is our Father. This is what love looks like. And sometimes the most profound things in life aren't the ones that entertain us. They're the ones that form us, slowly and steadily, into who we're meant to become.

The Question of Authority

One of the objections I kept hearing, and one I wrestled with myself, was about the Church's authority. How could I trust an institution that had been marked by scandal and human failure at times throughout its history?

But there was something else that gave me pause. I had grown up in a culture that's naturally skeptical of authority. We've all seen authority misused: leaders who demand obedience without earning trust, institutions that make rules without understanding individual circumstances. It made me wonder: Why should the Church be different?

And honestly, there was a certain appeal to the simpler approach I saw in Protestant communities. They seemed to emphasize a direct, personal relationship with Jesus without all the layers of hierarchy. Even though I didn't know Scripture well, the idea was attractive: learn the Bible, follow Jesus, and let that be enough. Why complicate it with bishops, popes, and institutional demands? Church leadership doesn't know my life, my struggles, my particular circumstances. How can they make universal rules when they haven't walked in my shoes?

I wasn't angry about it, but I did wonder: Is submitting to Church authority really necessary? Or is it just an obstacle between me and God?

But the more I studied, the more I realized I had been asking the wrong question. I was looking at the Church's leaders and judging the institution by their failures and by how authority made me feel. What I needed to ask instead was: where did Jesus say His authority would reside? Did He leave us a book to interpret on our own, or did He leave us a Church?

The early Christians didn't have the New Testament as we know it. For decades, they had something else: the living teaching of the apostles and those the apostles appointed to carry on after them. The faith was passed on through people, through a church with authority to teach, interpret, and settle the misunderstandings created by heretics. That's what the Catholic Church has always claimed to be.

And here's what I came to realize: the very fact that I didn't know Scripture well proved the point. Without Church authority to teach and interpret, how would I know which books even belonged in the Bible? How would I understand the difficult passages? How would I know if my understanding was correct or just my own opinion? And when it came to understanding God's revelation, why would my personal interpretation, shaped by my limited knowledge and my own biases, be more reliable than the collective wisdom of the Church guided by the Holy Spirit across two millennia?

Authority in the Church isn't arbitrary control. It's protection. It's the assurance that the faith handed down from the Apostles remains intact, that I'm not just making up my own version of Christianity based on what feels right to me at the moment.

Jesus never promised the Church would be free from sinful members or corrupt leaders. But He did promise it wouldn't ultimately fail. That's a different kind of promise. It's not about moral perfection in every member. It's about the preservation of truth across generations.

When I looked at it that way, the Church's survival started to mean something. Two thousand years of persecution, division, scandal, and internal corruption, and yet the same essential faith remains. The same sacraments. The same core teachings. That kind of endurance doesn't happen by accident. And the authority that has preserved that faith, despite all the human failures along the way, suddenly seemed less like a burden and more like a gift.

Coming Home

When I started this journey, I was looking for simplicity. Something convenient, something that felt undemanding. But it had to be true. I wasn't willing to settle for opinions.

What I discovered was truth and a beauty I didn't know existed, a richness I would have missed entirely if I had left.

Over the years that followed, I went through countless Bible studies, conferences, and talks. I studied Church history, read the early church Fathers, wrestled with hard questions. And I found peace in knowing I was following what Christ Himself instituted. That peace led to a desire to share what I'd discovered, which is why I eventually got involved in our parish OCIA program, walking alongside those discerning whether to enter the Church. My mission is to help newcomers discover the treasure that is the Catholic faith and to help cradle Catholics like me realize the incredible gift we've already been given.

Ironically, I learned most of my Catholic faith not in school, but from converts who had left other traditions to come home to the Church. And this is providential. They're making the Church better by helping its people see the beauty it has already had for centuries. They bring with them a deep love of Scripture, a passion for evangelization, an urgency about the faith that many of us cradle Catholics have lost. They didn't abandon the Bible when they became Catholic; they brought it with them and found it enriched. As Scott Hahn puts it, they had been living on the menu, and now they have the meal too. The Word of God in Scripture and the Word of God in the Eucharist.

The greatest irony is this: I almost left searching for what I already had. The Catholic Church offers not just a memory of God or a symbol of His love, but God Himself, truly present in the Eucharist. I nearly walked away to find Jesus, only to discover He'd been there all along, waiting in the tabernacle.

That's grace. That’s love. That’s home. And that's why I'm still here, and why I'll never leave.

-John Scott