Coming Home
Coming back to God has been a bit of a journey for me. I was raised as an Anglican by a strongly religious mother, and Christianity has always been a backdrop to my life. I drifted away for many years – the vast majority of my adult life. Science, materialism, and moral relativism had had labelled God and Christianity in my mind as mostly cultural background.
That changed the more I actually started digging into science, the history of Christianity, the Catholic Church, the historicity of the Gospels and the life of Christ. It became clear that Christianity is so much more than some sort of cultural movement the western world has inherited and which is now something of the past. And at the heart of this awakening was seeing the central place of the Catholic Church as a beacon of light in the history of Christianity.
Add to this the God-sized hole in my life and an unbaptised youngest son exploring Orthodox Christianity and Catholicism I found myself “coming home”, as so many lapsed Catholics and Protestant converts call it, and I was welcomed into the Catholic Church in July 2024.
Step-In sessions, organised by Fr. Joe at St Anthony’s Church in Kraainem, came after this and were originally for my son on his journey to be baptised. But he was happy for me to join, and I am so glad I did. Bringing together members of the Church and a mix of people exploring the Catholic faith, all at different stages and points in their journeys, it is a friendly, no pressure, all-are-welcome environment.
Step-In is a safe space in which you can ask questions, challenge assumptions, watch videos on the Catholic Church and the Christian faith, and find out about the Catechism, what I think of as the Operating Manual of the Catholic Church, and the core beliefs of the faith. It is a structured pathway into the Church where intellect, reason, historical background and science walk hand in hand with belief in God.
Every two weeks, over a period of about a year, each session is held on a Sunday evening, with about two hours of discussion and interaction followed by food and refreshments, all prepared with love and kindness by members of the Church.
If you are reading this and have some degree of curiosity, then join Step-In. You won’t regret it!
