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March 16, 2008

Coming into the foldConverts to the faith share their journeys to the church

By Michelle Martin and Joyce Duriga

Each year during the Easter Vigil Mass, people of various backgrounds, religious and otherwise, step up to the altar – after months of religious instruction – and proclaim that they want to be members of the Catholic Church. They enter into the fold in what is for many, a very moving moment. Conversion is a journey we are all on and it doesn’t end until death. But we can learn from each other along the way.

The Catholic New World spoke to two recent converts and to some soon-to-be converted to gain insight into what attracts people to our faith.

God's sense of humor

Elena Segura was 50 years old when she was received into the Catholic Church in 2006, but in some sense, she said, she was Catholic her whole life.

Segura is widely known in the Archdiocese of Chicago for her roles as director of the Catholic Campaign for Human Development and the Catholic Campaign for Immigration Reform. She had a long-standing devotion to social justice before coming to work for the Office for Peace and Justice in late 1999; her only qualm was coming to work for an institutional church, especially the Catholic Church.

“God has a big sense of humor,” she said. “And he has a lot of surprises.”

Segura was born into a fundamentalist evangelical Christian family in southern Peru; their church was “Baptist in theology and Presbyterian in structure,” she said.

With the encouragement of her parents, she read the Bible cover to cover twice by the time she was 15. But then she started asking questions.

Her questions focused on social justice issues: Why were there not enough schools? Why were some children so poor they didn’t have shoes? Why did her friend have to walk so far to school with no shoes on her feet?

Those questions, her parents told her, had nothing to do with the spiritual world of church.

So she left the church, became a socialist, and fell in with Marxist- Leninist friends. In the Peru of the 1970s, she saw many of them killed or “disappeared.”

“Then, I wouldn’t have talked to you,” she said, explaining that she passionately opposed the United States and what it was doing in South America.

Through it all, she made silent spiritual retreats and prayed.

Then, doing a thesis on the educational effects on rural children when their fathers left their families to seek work in the cities, she met an American Episcopalian on a missionary assignment.

He talked to her about his faith, a faith that didn’t much resemble the faith of her parents.

Eventually, he came home to Chicago, and she followed him in 1984. They married and had two children.

She worked on social justice issues first for an Episcopalian agency, then for the United Way. Shortly after Segura’s father died, in 1999, Bill Purcell, then the director of the Office for Peace and Justice, sent her a job description for directing CCHD efforts in Chicago and asked if she would be interested.

“It was perfect,” she said. “But it was working for the Catholic Church.”

She took the job, and slowly learned more about the church.

“Bill Purcell was the greatest evangelist, because of the way he integrated his faith in every area of his life,” said Segura, although he never spoke to her about becoming Catholic.

Purcell left to work at the University of Notre Dame. Then, in 2005, her 20-year marriage ended. “It was like it was overnight,” Segura said. “I didn’t see it coming.”

That year, she said, she cried every day. But at the end of it, she found a faith that she had never expected.

“It’s like when I was a little girl and my father helped our neighbor dig a well. You go down and it gets darker and darker, but at the bottom there is water,” she said. “For me, it was the waters of baptism.”

Segura received her sacraments at the Easter Vigil in 2006, and her 19-year-old daughter, who has Down syndrome, joined her as a Catholic a year later. Her 17-yearold son is asking questions about it.

Meanwhile, she prays the liturgy of the hours and attends daily Mass.

“I don’t think a lot of Catholics understand that the Mass is a gift,” she said. “Our God gives himself to us to sustain us, to quench our thirst, every day. It is a great gift.”

They reached out, he gave in

Deacon Don Grossnickle found his way to the Catholic Church with the help of his wife, Kathy, and the community at Our Lady of the Wayside Parish in Arlington Heights.

It started when the couple married, with the nuptials celebrated by Father Richard Vaneco.

“Just the way he handled it kind of laid the groundwork,” said Grossnickle, who was raised in a family that was Lutheran “for several hundred years.” Vaneco was “respectful to an inrterfaith couple, and he really honored my family.”

Over the years, Grossnickle attended Mass with his wife and then their children. He volunteered in the parish, driving elderly parishioners to and from Mass and working with young people. The whole family was active in the Christian Family Movement.

“I was the most active non-Catholic parishioner they had,” said Grossnickle, adding that he was never treated as “less of a Christian” because he wasn’t Catholic.

But it made him think about God, and about the divisions among Christians.

“I thought God would want us all to be together,” Grossnickle said. “But for that to happen, somebody has to give in.”

Then, when his third and last child was born, a medication mistake nearly killed his wife and baby.

Grossnickle prayed, of course, and he also called on the parish family at Our Lady of the Wayside to pray. That they did, and they rejoiced when it became clear that the mother and child would recover. They also pitched in with meals and household help until Kathy was back on her feet again.

The sense of community and belonging they brought to the situation led Grossnickle to decide, “Maybe I should be the guy to give in.” So he went into the RCIA program — and decided against receiving the sacraments the first year.

“I wanted to be really sure,” he said. “I didn’t want to be just going along as part of the process.”

The next year, 1980, he was received into communion with the Catholic Church.

“It was kind of a long, long journey,” Grossnickle said. “It was a constant awakening to God’s loving presence in the people of the Catholic Church.”

Five years later, he started diaconate formation and was ordained in 1988.

In 1999, he stepped in to assist Rob Komosa, a high school football player paralyzed from the neck down after breaking his neck in practice. That branched out — he helped create an organization that is working with five young men in northern Illinois who were paralyzed in high school football — and he serves as Vicar for Disabled Catholics in Vicariate I. “Disability is on nobody’s radar,” Grossnickle said, explaining why he thinks the needs of the disadled are often overlooked. “It’s such a privilege to serve those who are not being served. God has been electrifying in my life.”

Different people but same goal

Sixteen-year-old Justin Paetsch is inviting every family member he can think of to his first Communion at the Easter Vigil Mass on March 22 at St. George Parish in Tinley Park.

“I’m finally going to receive Communion. It will be nice,” he said. Paetsch is one of 16 people — 11 children, 3 teens and 2 adults — who will enter the church through the Rite of Christian Initiation program at St. George. They are part of the estimated 1,200 people who will enter the Catholic Church in Chicago this year.

During a recent Sunday morning RCIA session, Paetsch said his grandmother encouraged him to become Catholic. She doesn’t attend St. George but his grandfather does.

“I wanted to be part of the church. I like it here,” the football player said.

Paetsch was already baptized and will be confirmed as well at the vigil.

Brandi Wall, 35, will join Paetsch in becoming Catholic this Easter Vigil. Wall married a Catholic and she and her husband are raising their children Catholic, but she is Lutheran.

“There’s a lot of similarities but there are differences too,” Wall said of the two traditions.

Now that her two children are nearing ages when they will begin religious instruction, Wall said, “I thought it was best that I get on the same boat with them.”

Her husband has a good understanding of Catholicism and going through religious instruction has improved her discussions with her husband about God and faith, she said. And as an adult, she said she understands more going through RCIA.

“Now that I’m older, I can comprehend and tie things together. It’s like an enlightenment too,” she said. “It was perfect timing for everything.”

For Lloyd Stotts Jr, becoming Catholic has also been a matter of timing. The retired boilermaker and welder spent much of his career working long hours away from home so he couldn’t find the time to attend religious instruction classes. Many times he would be gone during the weekends so couldn’t attend Mass with his family.

“Now that I’m retired I’ve got the time to come to church,” the 66-year-old said. Stotts will receive baptism, Eucharist and confirmation during the Easter Vigil.

Although not raised Catholic, he married a Catholic, attended Mass with her and they raised their children in the faith. He said he always figured he would eventually convert. While he wasn’t able to work out religious instruction before retirement, that doesn’t meant God wasn’t a part of his life.

“He’s kept me somewhat out of trouble. He tells you the right and wrongs subconsciously,” the father of three said.

Stotts, who will take David as his confirmation name, said he’s learning more about Catholicism everyday.

“Some people are so devoted,” he said. “I didn’t know some of them came [to church] every day of the week.”

Readers share their conversion stories

We asked Catholic New World readers to send us their stories of conversion to the faith. Thank you to everyone who participated. The following are some of the submissions we received:

■ Though raised in the Reformed tradition since the age of about nine, I had a strong desire to become Catholic. In 1972 I married my wonderful husband, Jerry, who was Catholic. He went with me to Protestant denominations, as my family would have disowned me if I converted.

After our children had all been raised, we were “between” churches. One Sunday evening, I decided I was going to the Catholic church. I attended St. Julie's in Tinley Park and immediately knew I was home. Shortly after this, we had four grandchildren almost die in a collision with a drunk driver.

I do not have the room here to explain the whole story, but St. Francis, the beloved saint of his dad who had passed away two short months before the accident, came to comfort Jerry on the hardest night of our lives. This brought a renewed faith to him.

We officially joined in August 2006. In October we took a trip of gratitude to Rome and Assisi. Our dedication to the Catholic Church was cemented and in November 2006 I was confirmed Catholic.

Each celebration of the Eucharist brings joy and strength to our daily walk. We are home. — Nancy Bailey

■ I came into the church in April of 2003 during the Easter Vigil at St. Mary of Vernon Church in Indian Creek. My mother was a baptized Catholic but had fallen away from the church. Her grandparents were among the founding members of Holy Name Cathedral in Chicago and my greatgrandfather ’s obituary appeared in the Catholic New World in 1903.

However, I was raised Protestant as my father was Protestant. During the 1960s I took instruction in the Catholic Church but did not follow through. The second time, in 2002, I did enter the church.

I was attracted by the miracles at Fatima and Lourdes and the mystical life of the church. I also became familiar with eucharistic adoration and that has deepened my spiritual life and was another one of the many reasons I came into the church. — Bill Shafer, Libertyville

■ As a teenager with many Catholic friends, I became interested in the church and sent for a “mail order” course in the Catholic faith sponsored by the Jesuits. Several months went by as I read all the materials and sent back my answer sheets.

Convinced then that I wanted to become a Catholic, I met with a priest from Old St. Mary’s Church several times and he agreed to baptize me into the faith. One Saturday, after marching with my high school band in a Chicago parade, I was baptized, wearing my ROTC band uniform, at the age of 16. A wonderful day, 51 years ago. — Elaine Babiar Sniegowski, Tinley Park

■ I was in a spiritual-growth group and I paraphrased one of the Gospel stories. Jesus asked the disciples who they say he is and Peter said “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God”— it was as if I was speaking.

I knew I needed very much to know Jesus more intimately than I did and I recall saying to God: “Okay, I don’t know how or where, but I want to know your Son better. I’ll go where ever you lead me.” I had no expectation that it would be to the Catholic Church. — Peggy Scolan

■ I was raised Methodist but always felt a longing for the Catholic Church. At 16 I inquired and was given a booklet by a priest, which caused my parents some discomfort. I agreed to wait until I was older to convert.

Time passed and one day at age 24 I entered the rectory at St. Turibius on the Southwest Side of Chicago, my closest parish. Thus began my studies under Monsignor Mrozkowski, who patiently answered all my concerns and led me on the correct path to my conversion.

At age 26, my parents respected my wishes. Most of my friends were Catholic. I married a Catholic girl and sent my children to Catholic schools. No problems. — Lee DeMars

■ In 2003, my stepdaughter, Suzanne, suggested that my wife and I accompany her to visit a Marian shrine. I wasn’t Catholic and was uncomfortable when we arrived.

As Father’s Day was near, Suzanne bought me a rosary. I was unsure if I should have one, thinking this may be inappropriate. She taught me to pray the rosary, and I was filled with great joy and immediately began doing daily rosaries.

Suzanne is education coordinator in her parish and she took me through the RCIA process, serving as my instructor. I gratefully received the sacraments of Communion and confirmation in 2004. — Ted L. Van Landingham

■ It’s been almost 50 years since I became a Catholic. As a young woman I felt something was missing in my life. Not being raised in a traditional family, I was fortunate to share time with my co-worker’s family. Their Christian faith and family life inspired me to begin instruction in the Catholic faith.

Two years—and a lot of questions and soul-searching—later, I found Our Lord, my family and myself. My conversion didn’t cause the sky to fall, but it has given me peace and strength to live my life daily in the Lord and serve others. I found what was missing in my life. — Chris Irpino