My Journey

I thought it might be interesting and somewhat helpful for me to tell you of my journey in life and faith. You may not care now (or ever) but it may help you understand more about your father and possibly your childhood with me. You may notice that I have had an up and down but ever rising faith.

It seems to me that I had a childhood sensitivity to God and spiritual things. Prior to my parents divorce we went to Lutheran Church. I was Christened there, attended Sunday School, and remember my grandmother giving me Tic Tacs during church. I still love Tic Tacs to this day. She taught me a common bedtime prayer and my parents were pretty faithful to pray with me at bedtime even after the divorce. I added to the end of the prayer she taught me to pray for everyone important to me by name. Prayer before bed was comforting to me in the midst of chaos that came with my parents split. I am not sure when this practice stopped.

I was an only child until I was 10 years old. It was pretty isolating especially during and after the divorce. I learned how to completely entertain myself and became very independent. My parents had me in youth sports but once I got to the higher levels (but before high school) they were unreliable to get me to practice. In 6th grade I was trying out for a youth baseball team and was slotted for second base and playing well. But they did not bring me to practices for a week just before the team roster was announced and I didn't make the team. The coach said it was because I missed too many practices. I never played organized sports again until Harvest Farm. During middle school I did complete two years of confirmation classes in the Lutheran Church. I remember a conversation with Mom in the car where I expressed interest in becoming pastor.

My home life was exposed to sexual ethic of the age and new ageism. Both households had pornography and marijuana use by step parents. These things impacted me. I did not like my step mom much and I saw my step dad get fired for drug use and had to take part in his recovery process. As I got older I saw less of my dad. A lot of time I did spend with him revolved around LSU sports. As you know I have a very emotional attachment to LSU sports. My relationships with my grandfathers and uncles on my moms side really resonated with me and were very important to my growth during these years. They were blue collar and outdoorsmen. And they brought me hunting and fishing but I never really felt I was taught those things just participated. My step dad also involved me in outdoor activities a lot. The one thing I got okay at was water skiing. One summer Pappy did teach me how to shoot well. I've never lost that. I learned about good food from grandmothers on my moms side, my step dad and going out to eat with Dad.

My sophomore year I was introduced to LSMSA. I knew immediately that I wanted to attend. My time at Tara High had been okay but not great. I really did not have a way to plug into anything and thus just had a couple of pretty close friends. At home I felt that I was more of an appendage to the family after my sisters were born. I saw LSMSA as an opportunity to start over, fresh and plug into things. Drama become my thing. I still only had a few close friends which I later learned that that is just how I am wired. High school also saw me really pour myself into feeding my passions, looking to other relationships to fulfill me, exploring all truths as ultimate truths so as to not be in conflict or seem condemning. But I knew something was amiss and was left unfulfilled. I remember one night in the dorm while rereading a new age book my stepdad exposed me to, my roommate Tony asked me if I believed in all of the Jesus stuff and Christianity because he didn't. I told him that I absolutely did believe that Jesus really lived, died and rose again.

I got to go to LSU and loved my time there. Early my freshman year I was exposed to Campus Crusade for Christ. Their weekly meeting had girls and pizza so I was all in. It didn't take long for the staff members to meet with me and for me to pray the prayer at the back of the Four Spiritual Laws. What's funny is my mom was more Catholic in her response to my involvement there. She told me I was already a baptized Christian and don't let them tell me otherwise. But I listened to them more than her and ended up at First Baptist Baton Rouge and they dunked me. Crusade is were I really committed to my faith, discipleship and learned leadership. It was in my junior year that someone first told me that I had a calling to be in ministry.

You all know the basic story that your mom and I met on a summer mission with Crusade at the El Caribe hotel in Daytona Beach, FL. I had made a commitment with my friend from LSU that we both would not pursue any girls. We really thought we needed to focus only on God. I lost focus, he didn't - LOL. Your mom and I spent a lot of time together and got married less than a year after meeting in line for the first Jurassic Park movie. She is the best thing that has ever happened to me. I didn't know anything about the Catholic view of sacramental marriage and the graces that come to you and other from that. But I have know something was special about us. I understand more about that now as a Catholic. During our senior years we both first sensed a desire to be missionaries at the Crusade Christmas Conference. That stayed with us over the years.

When we got married I wanted to be in ministry. I took a job with the state but kept pursing something ministry related. Through our church I was exposed to the Exchanged Life Ministries and the Reinertsens. My desire to be in ministry drove me to choose to move away from family. God works in our choices even if they may not be the best. And sometimes there is no knowing which is best. We have regret from moving but also thanksgiving for what we found.

In Protestantism I struggled to find firm ground. The many many denominations and conflicting theology left me incomplete and discontent. No matter where I was when I challenged a key theological tenet with scripture I was told I needed more maturity or faith to rest in this truth I was being fed. The history behind the beliefs being taught were at most 500 years old and generally that history was considered irrelevant and maybe even spun to cover true human reasons for their development. Their was no solid ground to find. And the most common denominator for these teachers was a satisfaction that “we are not Catholics who at best lost the true faith and at worst support abusive corruption.”

During a period of deeply painful trial and suffering - some self inflicted and some inflicted upon me - all while “serving” in what I thought was the preeminent role of a Christian, as missionary - I began to slowly drift back to my high school ways of “everything is true”. I was trying to justify myself, my choices and what had happened to me. What jolted a correction in me was a call to support a dear coworker and friend whose husband of many many years came out as gay and divorced her. This man was a pastor that searched for teachers to justify his homosexuality biblically. Witnessing the emotional devastation pushed me to search out the truth on these issues. Protestantism didn't have consistent, settled answers for me.

The foggy conceptualization of the sacrament of marriage was the rescue line. Your mom and I had been living this sacrament without calling it that. But more so because we saw divorce as so painful and soul wounding based on my experience in my family. We were told in premarital counseling that we should ban the word divorce from our lexicon and never even use it even in jest. We really owned that admonition. So when deep trials and pain arrive at our doorstep over the years we have been held together by supernatural grace. Certainly our desire has been to stay together but it has not been possible removed from God’s gracious intervention. So when this friend lost it all due to her husband’s decision to abandon himself to his sexual passions which he used liberal Protestant teachers to justify, it became clear that there can be no such thing a plurality of truths.

After we returned to the United States, we heard about the Roberts family converting to Catholicism. We found that totally intriguing knowing that there was no way that they would make that decision unless utterly convinced. As we asked questions, they were so gracious and patient. I remember hearing one say that it was the authority of the Church that they were looking for. Personally, I didn't think I could resolve to say that this entity has authority over truth and if I disagree with something, I am wrong and should conform. It take humility to become a Catholic and it takes ongoing, active humility to maintain Catholic faith and remain. That is very difficult for Protestants and Americans. And it was very hard for me.

At first, I approached Catholicism as just another of the many Christian denominations. Similarly I challenged what I was hearing, reading. Yet I found and enduring preserved truth from the beginning of the Christian faith. There was a coherent answer consistent across ages for every question I had. There was no fear of my question or equivocation in the answer. Even those that I initially disagreed with, I found that the Catholic belief was more historic, biblical, and concrete than any argument I could bring from my own thinking or from Protestant thinkers. It came down to whether or not I was humble enough to let go and dive in to the ocean that is the Catholic Church.