My Journey Home: From Protestantism to the Catholic Church
This isn’t a story of rebellion. It’s a story of homecoming—home to the Eucharist, to authority, and to truth in its fullness.
This is my journey. It’s been winding, complex, sometimes painful—but divinely guided.
Three years after leaving the Protestant church, at age 33, I find myself standing before the threshold of something both ancient and ever new: the Catholic Church.
What I had been quietly searching for all along—perhaps without even realizing it—was here all along:
Home.
The Faith.
The Church.
The fullness of Truth.
The answers to all my questions.
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I spent the first thirty years of my life in a Protestant environment. Raised Southern Baptist, I was blessed with parents who valued faith and ensured regular church attendance. I am deeply grateful for that foundation. There, I encountered Scripture, came to love Christ, and met my lifelong best friend.
The Protestant world shaped me—but it was all I knew.
In my hometown, Catholicism wasn’t just misunderstood—it was virtually unknown. Aside from a single Spanish-speaking parish, the Catholic Church had no tangible presence. I was unaware such a tradition even existed.
That changed when I was twelve.
On an Alaskan cruise with my best friend’s family, I spent most of my time in the “teen club,” where I connected with five new friends. Only one remains vivid in my memory: Jared Occhicone from New Jersey.
One late night, we were sitting poolside somewhere between Alaska and Washington. Amidst the myriad topics that captivate young people's minds, we talked about faith and God.
“I’m a Christian, too! I’m Catholic.”
“What. What is that?”
“It’s the Faith. And it’s True.”
“But, do you believe in God?”
“Of course I do!”
That conversation etched itself into my memory—not because I fully understood, but because it revealed something I’d never known existed.
Catholicism wasn’t rejected in my world.
It simply wasn’t there.
One poolside conversation lingered quietly for over two decades.
In my early twenties, I transitioned to a non-denominational church and began a long season of spiritual wandering. I visited various churches, seeking clarity, identity, and a sense of belonging. Yet the more I explored, the more disoriented I felt. It was a time marked by confusion and contradiction. I believed in God—but I couldn’t reconcile what I saw with what I thought I was missing. Each denomination claimed Scripture alone as its authority, yet each interpreted it differently. I began to feel uneasy—not about the Bible, but about the fragmentation and contradiction that came from private interpretation. Implicitly, the message always seemed to be: “This is the Word of God—as I understand it.”
It troubled me deeply that the foundation of our unity—Scripture—was also the basis of our division. It seemed unacceptable to me that churches should divide and contend so fiercely over their distinct interpretations of the Bible.
After my divorce, I stepped away from church—not from Christ but from the confusion. I never stopped praying or seeking. I studied Scripture, theology, Church history, and even neuroscience, and slowly realized that I had been working with only half the puzzle.
What I longed for wasn’t novelty or better music—it was truth in its totality. It was cohesion. It was authority.
It was a home.
Though I hadn’t yet encountered the Catholic Church directly, I was drawing nearer with every question. As St. John Henry Newman once wrote: “To be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant.”
Then came a moment of Providence.
One evening, while searching YouTube for content related to my company, I stumbled across a teaching series from the St. Mary’s Summer School of Faith, led by the CEO of the company I work for—a man I deeply admire.
Curiosity, as it often does, took over. I hit play. And I didn’t stop.
I was captivated—not just by the knowledge, but by the conviction behind it. Something stirred in me again, something I hadn’t felt since that conversation by the pool two decades earlier.
The Faith had reappeared. And this time, it would not pass quietly.
Not long after, I was speaking with a friend, processing out loud my questions about faith, church, and the strange restlessness I couldn’t name. He listened patiently and then gently said, “You’re Catholic. You just don’t know it yet.”
I didn’t laugh. I didn’t protest. I just sat with it.
And something within me knew it was true.
I returned to those YouTube videos with new eyes. Night after night, I stayed up late, immersed in teachings I had once overlooked—or never even known were part of the Christian story.
What I discovered wasn’t a foreign religion. It was the fullness of everything I had ever believed, now made whole.
Everything I thought I knew about Catholicism (which was minimal) turned out to be either misunderstood or completely false. What I had dismissed for so long revealed itself not as error, but as completion.
Today, I live just outside Nashville—no longer hours from the nearest parish.
That same friend, the one who had pointed out what I hadn’t yet realized, directed me to a local Traditional Latin Mass parish. I went that Sunday. And I’ve been going ever since.
And now, here I stand—confirmed in the Catholic Church. Three years after stepping away from Protestantism, three providential conversations later, and at the age of 33, I've come home to the fullness of the Faith.
God’s timing is never rushed, never delayed—only perfect.
As St. Francis de Sales reminds us, “The same everlasting Father who cares for you today will take care of you tomorrow and every day. Either He will shield you from suffering or give you unfailing strength to bear it. Be at peace, then, and put aside all anxious thoughts.”
Truly, Divine Guidance is an extraordinary thing.