‘I was finally moved to open the Bible out of a mixture of curiosity and hostility…’
‘I was amazingly ignorant of any context for what I was reading, and had even thought Christians worshiped fish…’
‘I understood for the first time what I had read about and heard of. Todd, the youth pastor, then preached a sermon that crisply outlined how simple it was to submit oneself to Christ…’
‘The Bible no longer consisted of mere stories, but of personal letters from God to me…’
‘I found many Catholic practices offensive to my understanding of the unadulterated Word of God, but this was often because I did not understand the underlying beliefs…I sensed that Catholicism requires some form of submission…’
‘I spent much time learning particular Catholic teachings from both Scripture and history, and eventually I distilled the wide array of issues down to the one central teaching on Church authority…The Church’s teachings, considered one at a time, appeared to me to be credible but not especially inspiring, but, when considered together, quite substantial.’
‘…For if the Church is right in claiming a divine mandate to interpret Scripture and to articulate infallible doctrines, then even the most outrageous assertion becomes binding…’
‘I was not tempted by the expedient path of ignoring difficult teachings, and there was no reason to swallow Rome’s demanding morality if her authority were less than divinely inspired…’
‘Months of studying history, theology, and (surprisingly) Scripture led me to one simple and inescapable conclusion. The papacy was right, and I was wrong…’
‘I was driven to Rome by my love for Scripture and my desire to learn how Christ and His Church intended for me to understand Scripture….’
Now, read the whole thing in context…
