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As you can see, we are doing a little spring cleaning around here. We just got our new masthead from Erin and now we’re trying to get this house in order, so to speak. So colors and layout may be a little crazy for a bit while we figure out how to style everything. Lori’s just a tad on the “Type A” side when it comes to sites. ;) Thanks for stopping by! Hello, friends! Sorry we haven’t been around for a while. No, we did not give you up for Lent!! But thank you for checking in on us. We will be back to posting regularly very soon! In the meantime, we showed up in the April issue of The Catholic Connection, the monthly magazine for the Diocese of Shreveport, with our conversion stories. Appropriate for the season, wouldn’t you say? Hope you enjoy! Also in the works is a brand new look for our blog. We gotta spruce things up around here! OK, THIS new site look is NOT what I was going for. I did not intend fish, for Pete’s Sake!! More…better…later…ugh… Have a peace-filled Lent and a glorious Easter! Love, Guess what! We just got our own Twitter account. Watch out world! Two Converts are ready to tweet!!!! I don’t know if this makes us two twits now, but what the hay! You can follow 2CB by clicking the button at the right. Last Saturday I was cleaning underneath my bed—this is what I do when I am at my wits’ end, too antsy to sit still and too flustered to concentrate on “finicky” tasks. I found an old folder full of hand written recipes. I had taken the time, about thirty years ago, to write recipes from cookbooks, friends, and family. Stuck between some of the pages were several letters—long letters, correspondence between myself and two really dear women who became my friends, spiritual mentors, prayer warriors, sisters. The letters were written almost twenty years ago and told the stories of a mother waiting on her daughter selling yearbook ads, another day of decorating a new home, and of enjoying a letter one had received from me. Others told of a daughter’s birthday party and the angst of that same daughter becoming – as we called it then – a “pre-teen”, of books and lectures read and heard, and much cautionary advice on my behalf as I was pregnant with my youngest. Just normal stuff written by women who were a big part of my conversion, although they never said a word to me during RCIA beyond the cursory greetings at coffee and doughnuts, and never met me until after the fact when I joined (as a brand new baby Catholic) St. Francis of Rome Circle. It was then that the relationships began to form. We are still friends today. The day after my trip through the recipe files, our entrance or gathering hymn for Mass was a song that has seemed “dated” for a little while. With my recent feelings of over/under connectedness I had been finding the song especially awful; it sounded as stale as I felt. But on this overcast 2nd Sunday of Ordinary Time that same tune resonated deeply with me……..there was a common thread running through my mind: Constancy. Twenty year old friendships, familiar entrance songs, eternal love, God never leaving me and me turning around and running right back into his arms when my foot stepped too far into the pale. Constancy is one of the fruits of my conversion. I saw it clearly on Sunday morning, and have felt it deeply ever since then. We really are a family, this parish and me, my friends and me, my kids and me, unpleasant relatives (and those who pleasantly surprise me!) and most of all God and me. I don’t expect every song to resonate, every relationship to be always in the fruit bearing stage, and every prayer to fly skyward with no stops or layovers. I don’t except in this electronic age to sit down and write and receive several pages of chronicled daily events between my friends and myself. I don’t expect to always feel euphoric and giddy about God and my place in the kingdom. I do expect to run out of dish soap, mushroom soup, and toilet tissue at inconvenient times. I absolutely expect to have strong differences of opinion with those with whom I am in relationship, to be angry at myself, to laugh and cry at the right and wrong moments. Most of all I know that the liturgical year, our cycle of growth and faith lived out in every day life, both personal and communal, continues to be a north star for me, reminding me of the one constant that provides the possibility for all other gifts of consistency in my life: God’s love. Author’s note: I wrote this last summer and have just held onto it all this time, so the evening I speak of in this post was actually seven months ago. My apologies for its tardiness… I did not want to do anything tonight. The kids have been in Vacation Bible School during the evenings this week, and while I envisioned being right there with them to help out and hang out with the other moms, the planets aligned to keep me from going for the first part of the week. With one last effort to be a part of the VBS experience tonight, I had plans to attend the finale: Mass and a hot dog dinner. But as my day dragged on, my spirit dragged down. By the time work was over and I headed to mom’s to pick up the kids, I was hungry. With 50 minutes of driving ahead of me, and only 65 minutes before VBS started, I knew dinner was out of the question. On the way home with the kids, I realized my air conditioner in the car was blowing hot air…in July…in Louisiana…on a hundred degree day. No, I really did not want to do anything but go home and lay down under a vent. My eyes had been itching all day from allergies, my hair was wrapped around my face from the windows being down, and I was sweating from the intense heat. I tried to think of what I could give the kids as a reason for my absence tonight. Nothing was gonna fly, and I knew it long before I tried to concoct my excuses. We got home, changed clothes, and drove to the church. I was a complete mess. I wore glasses I am not accustomed to in order to give my eyes a rest from the contacts, my makeup had completely dripped off my face in the heat, and in an effort to keep my humidity-wrecked hair from blocking my vision I had hoisted my bangs up in a claw clip. I’m not a vanity freak, but I do try to take a little pride in my appearance. You wouldn’t have known it tonight! As we entered the sanctuary for Mass the kids went to sit with their classmates and I found a solitary spot near the back. I knew I needed to pray. I was emotionally raw from the loss of a family pet, and the recent news of a child slain in south Louisiana. Once I sat – felt my back against the pew – it was like being at home. As Mass began, the kids sang cheerful songs about Mary’s decision to say yes to God. Our priest enthusiastically encouraged us to say “yes” also. And as we stood for the Our Father, my vantage point from a near-back row gave me a glimpse of something I have seen but not paid attention to…all of our parishioners holding hands and praying together. I immediately thought of Dr. Seuss’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Remember at the end, when the Whos in Whoville woke to find the material symbols of Christmas stripped from their midst, but they sang anyway because they know that true happiness comes from a grateful heart? Suddenly I was the Grinch looking down from on high, and realizing how stubbornly selfish I had been to deny my heart what it so longed for in this precious community of faith. Nothing else mattered in that moment. Not the heat, not my hair, not my itchy eyes. What mattered right then – and what will keep me afloat for the rest of the weekend – was that I recognized how blessed I am for the people in my church, and in my life. I walked in tonight feeling like I couldn’t stand up any longer. But I learned that the stresses and bumps and bruises of this week pale in comparison to who we are when we stand together. I can remember standing in my grandmother’s kitchen when I was 18 years old, talking to her about the guy I was dating, when she suddenly announced, “Well, you know you can’t marry him.” “MawMaw, we’ve only been hanging out together for a month. I don’t think marriage is an issue yet. But, just out of curiosity, why not?” “Because he’s Catholic, and my great-grandbabies cannot be Catholic.” It took only a few moments for my brain to process what she was saying to me, and basically I realized rather quickly that all the talk I had heard while growing up about Catholics being cultist statue-worshippers was deeply imbedded in my family’s belief system. Yikes. And so it is between religions and cultures – when we don’t understand the other party, our first instinct is to criticize. Indeed, it seems easier to close our minds and shut out all manner of conversation on the matter than it would be to open our minds and learn truth about the other side. Now, I’m going to step into a minefield here, and I do so knowingly. You have my word that I will tread lightly. But I want to address this for the benefit of both sides in your own families and friendships – when the two religions don’t “get” each other. I have family members who used to be Catholic. Two with their children are now Baptist and two with their children are now Methodist. And for the longest time, the matriarch of our family – a devout Catholic – was fit to be tied. How could these dearly beloved betray their roots? I reassured her by illustrating that my own grandmother had undoubtedly asked the same question when I converted. But the fact of the matter is that conversion is not a betrayal; it is a journey. Like I told my father when he flipped his lid over my conversion, “Good grief, Daddy, I don’t know why you’re so upset. I still believe in Jesus!” And here is what I have come to realize as a result of my conversion and the fact that I have seen both sides: The method and manner of our individual worship does not change the fact that there is only one God. And, in keeping with the “many gifts of the Spirit,” God leads each of us to him in different ways. He speaks to each of us differently. Our hearts are built to hear him, but it is our particular gifts – our unique abilities and interests – that help us respond to him. The journey is ours to walk, often with loved ones, but occasionally alone and off the beaten path. So I do not believe it is anything to fear when a friend or family member chooses another path. It is, rather, an invitation to more nourishing conversations, and more reason to cherish that which makes us different. Now, as you know, I became Catholic of my own free will, married a Catholic man, and am raising Catholic children. My grandmother came to the babies’ baptisms, and accepts that we are, at least, still Christian. I believe God spoke to me through my genuine interest in ritual and tradition, and that he led me to the Catholic faith so that he could speak to me more intently, and so that my heart, through my own desire to understand the Catholic Church, would be prepared to listen. By the same token, I also feel that he led my family members to other denominations so that they would find what their souls most need in order to hear, listen, and respond to his plan for their lives. I know that my friends and family members of other faith denominations pray for me, as I do for them. Most beneficially, we pray not to change each other, but to love and nurture each other throughout our own spiritual journeys. By being of different faith traditions, by choosing separate paths, we exemplify the Scripture as it teaches us,
…Just as he desired. Kind of makes all the pieces seem to fit a little better, doesn’t it? Conversion is a touchy subject, due in part to the fact that there are overtones of leaving something lesser behind as we aspire to new heights. But one of the wonderful things about Catholicism is that we understand that conversion is ongoing – a continual turning toward God. But, oh, the twists and hairpin turns we make! I help with the adult conversion classes in our parish which were previously called “taking instruction.” I am always amazed that there are any adults who have managed to evade the sloshing waters of baptism and come into Room 4 looking parched and dry. In talking with a catechist and friend I mentioned that we had eight people studying to receive the sacraments at Easter Vigil that particular year. She was simultaneously excited and mystified that anyone would choose the Catholic faith since she was having a bit of time pitching an at-times sedate type of Christianity to her ninth graders. I said yes, it’s true there are converts, reminding her that I am one. My family was supportive when I became Catholic, but my mother told me in no uncertain terms that I would have to be the one to tell my grandmother that I was “leaving the Baptist church,” emphatically adding that there was no way she would tell her. So, I did. I got in my car, drove three hours east to my small hometown, let myself into the kitchen of my grandmother’s house, made us two cups of hot tea, and we had “the talk.” I still think my mom must have clued her in because she was so calm, stating in hushed tones that there are Christians in all churches and just because one claimed (loudly) to be a Christian didn’t make it so. All throughout the rest of her life my grandmother was a touchstone, especially in matters of faith! Universal faith, faith in good overcoming bad, and family trumping the outside world. Most of all, though she expressed it in her own language, Baptist-ease, she believed in the incarnation of God in humanity that we are preparing to celebrate with a flourish of three purple candles and one pink candle and fragrant greens. She believed in the possibility of humanity, never more fully expressed than the day I shared my “conversion” with her. After reading Lori’s comments on baptism I had a trip down memory lane. I too was raised Southern Baptist in a small rural town. I too chose Catholicism as an adult, though not in solidarity with my husband, rather in response to God’s generous invitation extended through the parish community. Enter memory lane… Sunday morning worship, which we affectionately called “big church,” was the centering point of our lives. The music was sung from the heart and point of view of true believers. Who but true believers could belt out the chorus “are you washed in the blood of the lamb, are you truly trusting in His grace this hour, are you washed in the blood of the lamb” with such innocence and trust? Thundering words from the preacher, the gospel filtered through the lens of small town dynamics. Hats, suits, men in coats and ties, children buttoned, sometimes severely, into their “Sunday best”. That heavily charged and sometimes abused phrase meant to us that we radically departed in a physical sense, from our work weary week of school, housework, and jobs. These were our “glad rags” reserved for the Lord’s Day. In retrospect this effort to leave the ordinary week behind is repeated as I bless myself upon entering a Catholic Church. As I immerse my fingers and bring them to my forehead, my heart, and both shoulders I am reminded of the incarnation, of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; of the fact that God covers all bases, is present in all things, walking with me no matter where my feet take me, Bethlehem, Calvary, a parent teacher meeting, or the grocery store; of the fact that I am bringing all that to my Father at Mass. As I bring my hand back to a normal posture by my side I am reminded that this blessing is part of the baptism ritual. I am never alone, no matter how lonely or lonesome expectations and circumstances make me feel. For that blessed (re)assurance I would gladly dive into the water! |
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