Journey Home - 2016-07-25 - Denise And Tim Mergen

good evening and welcome to the journey home I'm Marcus Grodi your host for this program and once again thank you for joining us and I want to extend a thanks to all of you that send letters and emails and appreciation of this program especially of EWTN thank you for your prayers and support for EWTN tonight is a first I think I think it's a first the first time that I've had as a guest on this program a mother and a son sharing their journeys and how their journeys overlap as we'll find out in a moment Denise and Tim Merkin Denise is a former Church of Christ and Tim is a Seminary in a lifelong Catholic but will will tell you in a moment why he joins us on the program so once again thank you both thank you Mark for joining the same program it's good day have you both here both of you and let me get out of the way really quickly then because I know it's hard to get both stories in with the short time we have so Denise are we gonna do all right welcome well thanks you want me to start telling my story baby I grew up in the North Shore of Long Island the daughter of a very pious couple they were they were very proud of the fact that we were nondenominational my mother was a lifelong Church of Christ member and my father was a convert to Church of Christ and so we grew up that might be confusing to some people because it well they're nondenominational but yet they're Church of Christ well and we were very we said we were non-denominational yes and that was part of our identity right and and I was introduced to the Scriptures very young and I loved the scriptures and we we also were anti-catholic we living on the North Shore of Long Island there was a lot of Catholics that were we thought they were heretical you know that they didn't know their scriptures and so I was taught call no man father you know where you know who calls their clergy father I was taught the brothers and sisters of Jesus you know who's the taught that Mary didn't have any other children I was taught all the ones that appeared anti-catholic it was our duty in charity to you know to convert these people the Catholics that we know they were the ones that this was before the sexual revolution and she was my age you know but in the late 60s I really didn't have any friends that I knew of that were sexually active you know except the Catholics there was a few Catholics and they went out and they drank you know so really if I thought that Catholics weren't a reticle my parents would just pray to help the neighbors you know and so there were there was no incentive to find out what the Catholics really believed and if we did ask them they didn't know my mother would make comments like oh they just hide behind father's skirts you know and and so having that sort of prejudice growing up filtered my view so go and sadly we Catholics didn't give it very good right but we've heard about that we didn't look at ourselves either you know so that that's part of the story when you only look out and not look in so going off to college that changed that changed quickly now being in New York when I went to college I had two roommates that got pregnant and had abortions before abortions were legal this was before Roe vs. way that was in 1973 that Roe versus Wade came into being but there was it was state-by-state where abortion was legal and my roommate asked me if I would take her to Planned Parenthood to have an abortion and I said I would I honestly at that point there was no discussion about abortion I didn't know what really what what was gonna happen she just asked me and I did I drove her and it was a very horrible place I waited in the waiting room and in the waiting room there it was dark and dingy and there was I remember the writing like people had scraped in the chairs like John and Sue forever I'm thinking I was really weird you know like and here she comes she came out and she was in physical pain very visit she laid in the backseat of the car we stopped at the drugstore to get her a prescription for some medication because it was so painful but that was just the beginning because the relationship broke up within the month this release this a procedure was supposed to save this relationship I came home one day from and and found her at home screaming and praying and she was actually banging her head against the wall and I said to her you know what's the matter and she the relationship had broken up and her life was falling apart and she wound up quitting school she wound up later on getting into more dysfunctional relationships and I was witnessing post-abortion syndrome after abortion syndrome which didn't have a name at that point but it was very destructive the other roommate I wasn't living with her at the time ah she quit school too you know and this this was something that did not help so you make a really important I made a bunch of important points there but I think one just to make sure audience may not realize that what you're giving witness to that many pro-life people may not realize we look at Roe vs. Wade in 1973 as if that's when abortion became legal in America and what you're saying is that Planned Parenthood was actively state-by-state already doing abortions before Roe vs. Wade we may have forgotten that that that this abortion mill has been around for quite a while and accomplishing that whether it was known publicly or even legally but it was being done mm-hmm and all the other ramifications of it you're giving witness to before Roe versus Wade okay thanks right so fast-forward you know oh one thing that she did years later I did meet up with her and she she said to me I wish I had my baby if I only had my baby and I was I was confused that she took that with her that what she had done she missed this baby so she knew what it was but fast forward I graduate from college and moved to the Midwest you know and I meet this man who wants to marry me and he seems you know I didn't have very healthy relationships in college either but he was the C word you know and I thought well you know how do I tell my mother not marrying a Catholic but I figured the Catholic first I know but he had a genuine he had a genuine softness to him even though if you met him he sort of cruft he deep down he was you know I thought I could manipulate this guy you know and you know all I'd have to do he had that character all I had to do was give him a few of these this scripture verses you know I could pick him off you know so anyway we decided to get married in my church and he went to his priest to get a dispensation which is Marian boyo yeah to get married in my church back east we were living in Wisconsin and Madison this kind of the priesthood yeah yeah we'll have to tell you about Mary you know so yes what he did get a dispensation to to marry me so we had an individual marriage prep and the priest said I will you be open to life and I said of course you know I didn't know what that meant I thought well if I want to be open to life I'll be open to life you know I want children I really did one of the reasons I picked this man as I figured I could manipulate him and have children when I want to do I was I had you know I don't think my motives were world pure but anyway and then the priest asked how are you gonna raise your children and I said in my church because he doesn't know squat about scriptures I said this to the priest okay and the priest said that's fine and I'm that's fine he said well if you make Jesus the Lord of your life then you won't have a theist for children if you're fighting Catholic versus product and your children are gonna see religion as the main conflict in the family and they're not gonna want anything to do with either one of your religions and I'm thinking wow I had heard these horror stories about when people married Catholics that they had told to sign their children away and in our congregation in Long Island there was a woman who came forward because when you sinned in the Church of Christ a serious sin you came forward and you asked people to pray for you and she had confessed that she had married a Catholic and signed her children to be raised by him so I'd heard this you know what I'm thinking oh well the other thing he said was find something that you can minister together with and do it you know find and bring unity in your family and I can like Wow maybe I thought they never had a misconception about these priests so I decided we made this rule that we would go to each other's church once a month so he would come to mine once a month and I would go to his once a month and I mean being in Madison which is so strange because it's so liberal every time I went to Mass with him there was a pro-life homily and it wasn't you're going to hell if you have an abortion it was don't do this this is going to hurt you and I remember saying to him your church teaches that abortion is going to hurt you I there wasn't public discussion on this at the time I said this is all this is what we got to do this is what we'll minister with this together and so we did I joined a pro-life group and the very first meeting of the pro-life group that I went to was a woman who had had an abortion came in and gave her you know gave her testimony she talked about the self-destructive lifestyle of having sex before marriage getting pregnant and then aborting him like I wasn't used to disclosure in public I was used to being pious you know I'm presenting that face of if we were we were the holy ones you know and but then she talked about how Jesus had put her life back together and it was like I wanted what she had I didn't know how to get to that step to even admit anything you know so I I went on the coattails of the post-abortion women that's who I loved anything I could find out about post abortion I would I would gravitate forward I was very good at it I think about and the I'm with calls because I wasn't doctrinally saying don't do this I was saying this is gonna hurt you this is a Mack truck coming and if you do this you're never gonna forget it I thought you know I mean really and and I and I love doing that you know in our marriage now at this point he's not liking the call no man father stuff I mean he's I'm not picking him off fast enough you know the more that I would would give him scriptures and stuff though the more he would retreat in it it really wasn't working this one the month stuff didn't work he would retreat into his faith yeah or go into mine you know I thought he would see that he told me I was very subtle and I didn't think I was but but then okay so he we had two children at this point and he started his own business and I was alone a lot and it was very hard and our second son of our first son my first was a daughter and then we had a son and then he has another brother he's the fourth was very colicky and it was hard and I told him I begged him to have a vasectomy and he said I can't and I said well don't you see how burdened I am i we have our boy in our girl you know life was good it was responsible because contraception in our church was promoted as being responsible not having too many children and he said I can't I cannot do that it's against my religion it's the first time you use the religion card and I was so furious at him and that must have been so hard because he saw me burdened and he saw that I was doing a lot and he couldn't do the solution because you know his church said it was wrong but he didn't know why you know so I continued to go on as mad at him and I continued to go on with the crisis pregnancy stuff and did very very well and I decided I'm gonna bring this stuff back to my church this is I was doing Bible studies I was doing support growth this is really good I thought they'd love it and not only did they not love it after teaching for a while I got a phone call and I was told that I was going to be disfellowshipped if I continued teaching first we mention our the the woman speaking is Denise American and she's here with her son Tim in your passing on of the information that got in trouble were you passing on the catholic doctrinal explanations of it so you didn't realize it was catholic you just thought it was just the good biological foundation to pro-life one of the things that I saw is at this point I'm working with Catholics Protestants atheists Jewish you know I mean all sorts of stuff and I noticed that the CAF and was all the healing end I would go to project Rachel Vicky thorne you know there was a good friend and and they would send me to the conferences every year but the Catholic women got a deeper healing you know in our Protestant background I mean there would be Bible studies you're forgiven and and whatever but the Catholic women had the community of saints they would bring those babies back into their family they would name them they would I mean you'd ask how many children that happened they'd say six if they had aborted - you know there was a shame that was gone they had confession they had all that now in my Protestant background there's no communication with the dead I think of the witches of endures you know so like okay it's over you've done this in your forgiving where's the Catholics had this you know so I wanted to bring this back to my church I thought they'd love it you know but they didn't understand what brought me there so so basically I and at this point I'm taking the through the four children with me to church my husband did as he went to mass by himself every Sunday he'd never miss math and offered every math for my conversion during that time well you know where I was taking them teaching him scripture to try and get him out that you know so it was a very bad time because I felt abandoned by God almost like I would even solo shipped no because I never went back after that I thought how what am i you don't even know what I'm teaching I'm teaching whole life this is so good you know you're gonna like this and I started to think okay there there's some some things that were essential in Church of Christ woman couldn't speak there was no musical instruments baptism by immersion only and and some of the things I thought well I really believed in the baptism by immersion only I I didn't understand the difference between original sin and actual sin you know to us a sin was a sin not that original sin is just the absence of grace in your soul you know and once once you get baptized you're still going to send like part of the stuff in where I grew up is once you got baptized you thought you know now you're not going to sin and there was you would get rebaptised because you figured the first time didn't work you know not understanding confession therefore that so I'm I'm looking for different places to go where they had immersion baptism and for life those were my two pillars you look at the Baptist and they seem to be pro-life but they didn't have you know they didn't have baptism for the forgiveness of sins you know you've looked at all different so we we sort of Church shocked for a while and until okay here I'm back at a post abortion conference in Milwaukee and there was a Protestant pastor there giving a session on the healing of men and he started talking and saying we're just spinning our wheels helping these women until we help men because women get their identity through men the man is supposed to be the spiritual head of the family and we need to heal him so that he can heal his wife and I'm listening to this spiritual head of the family stuff and I'm thinking I have taken that away from my husband you know and my you know and I'm looking back the spiritual there's not a command that says man you should be the spiritual head of the family what it is is a statement of reality but no matter what I did he was going to be the spiritual head of the family and to acknowledge that so I went home that night and I said you have to forgive me I've taken this away I didn't think he could be the spiritual head of the family trust me because you know my my definition of a spiritual head of the family would be he would read scripture he would have devotions he would do the things that I wanted versus the masculine provide protectant and think about our God our God delights in us the spiritual head of the family the lights and his children and he did do that he he delighted in his children I mean he cried after the birth of all of our children I didn't cry I you know but but he did love children and that he was spiritually you know being the head of a family but not in the way that I interpreted it you know so so we started going with him and to his parish and he did start doing things differently not as I said the way that I wanted him to do he started we started a abstinence based sex education program in the public schools that was weird you know ambitious we were sort of ambitious but we started researching Values Clarification which came in in the early 90s when they their sex education courses in the Middle School were they were called values and choices and let the the child decide at 8th grade I don't think so you know so he was doing things but his parish was it was a social parish you know going with him I didn't find people that loved Scripture I didn't find people that wanted to do support groups you know but and I in it also the teachings of the church were not self-evident it was like a kumbaya Catholic parish so what's that what time period approximately early early 90s yes I came what happened 1993 when I've been going with him for a year and a half he had taken the boys to a hockey tournament they all played it you know in Wisconsin everybody plays hockey you know and I was home by myself and a woman called me on the phone who was poster board and she had that we had become friends through the ministry and she said I have some tapes here you might want to listen to them you know and I drop them off at your house I said sure you know my husband's gone come on over so she came over and she gave me Scott Hahn Kimberly Hahn Steve would I put this tape in and I was like I I was stunned I was absolutely stunned this can't be true he's talking my language I had never met a Catholic who challenged me never you know and I'm you know quite out there well you had mentioned just in case your audience doesn't know the name of some fairly well-known former Protestants who didn't come Catholic and these were their conversion stories the reasons why yeah but they become open yes to the church yes so I got on the phone right away and called a former Catholic who I'd Bible studied with and I said can I drop these tapes off at your house cos you know I didn't want to tell Greg yeah well he was gone for the weekend but I wanted to know if this was true Catholic teaching so I gave her the tapes and I'm it might be four hours it takes to go through that she calls me back and she is like excuse me I've got to find a priest I'm going to confession I mean within a week she went to confession yes this is true that's a return yes this is what she was looking for when she left you know so I spent the next six months because this was 1993 November of 93 going through church doctrine going through everything to find the answers to my questions you know and we had to take a mortgage out in order to afford the tapes that I bought when I when I hear the programs and I said Scott Hunt gave me these tapes I'm like why didn't I have no I'm listening to these tapes because I know what's going on is I'm gonna have to tell my parents and I was the jewel in my mother's crown my mother was a wonderful person and I knew I mean as much as I was excited about coming in I knew this was going to kill her and my sister you know she had to verify my baptism because and when you convert you have to have your certificate of baptism bow Church Christ go down to the river you don't look I was baptized in a church but a lot of my friends were at church camp you know and you don't get a certificate of baptism and basically my mother would not have done that she would not have done so I asked my sister sherry would she would she do this and she says she'd love to and she said to me do you understand what if your daughter Heidi called you and said I'm gonna be an abortionist this is what mom is gonna hear the worst thing that you could do you're doing to her and she was a wonderful woman and so of what I did is I week before Holy Week you know coming in and Easter Vigil I sent her a birthday present and put this little letter under the towels you know I got some monogrammed towels and I was right she didn't she wouldn't talk to me she had she was fierce and his birthday was the week afterwards we even even they came in at a parish I found a parish that did immersion you know back in the the 90s so that I he was baptized the same way I was in the name of the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit immersion you know so I thought that would soften the blow but she was furious she was she wouldn't talk to me she didn't send him a birthday card and finally what my husband did was a month later he said you know really before email he sent her a FedEx a FedEx he figured should open it a letter saying this is killing your daughter you know please talk to her she didn't she didn't abandon you you know and so she did call me she called me and said I got this letter from your husband we're never talking about this again well in our family you're never talking about this again means the next time I see you you know so I did go out they were they were retired in the Seattle area at this time and so well I did go out by myself and got up early in the morning cuz it's a two-hour difference and she's up and all of a sudden we're we're gonna have the talk and she went through every scripture you know she went through all that and I and I responded I said don't you think mom that that I had to deal with these scriptures too you know and I gave her name and then I even gave her some scripture so that she didn't have my sense you know what about this one about her Paul saying you know oh I long to be with the Lord I wish I was out of here and you know there's no talk of purgatory you know and it's like when I would say I was pregnant I longed to be I want to have my baby I never talked about labor you know give her we went on I seem like hours I don't know how long it was but at the end you know she said to me she said well I guess the reason you became Catholic is because you have to convert the Pope she couldn't believe that that's what Catholics thought and she really believed that you know so it was it was bittersweet it was a you know coming in and then coming into a Catholic community where I didn't have a lot of support either a Catholics weren't really I came in and I was all in we had to find a parish that had a school you know to put them in Catholics schools you know well your your witness is is not uncommon in the sense of somebody come from fundamentalist backgrounds if they have the audacity to be open to the Catholic Church is just like your sister said it's like saying you were gonna marry you're gonna become an abortionist or become an atheist Amina so it's because people don't understand mm-hm and just as you also said that many of us Catholics confirm their misconceptions because often we don't talk about Christ like we should or we you know we don't read scripture as we should because it's our book right in Christ is our Savior so Mayock oh that's why we're saying that every Sunday again is because we are as the best witnesses that we ought to be to our separated brothers and sisters I mean even that sense many Catholics look at them as our separated brothers and sisters you know they look at us that way at all that's our aesthetic we'll take a break now we come back you might have a little bit more of your journey we also want to we want to now you're Tim's side of this equation all right so let's dig break go back welcome back to the journey home I'm Marcus Grodi your host and tonight we have mothered son Denise and Tim Merkin and I haven't given you a chance to say even hi yet but we're still gonna pick up a little bit more on what you were talking about today sings well I just want to clarify when I came in it was very confusing what does the truth truly teach and I had people on all sides of you know I was bringing Protestant friends to confession I didn't know that you can pick a confession was so awesome like I didn't know you couldn't pick and choose the sacraments but then I had somebody at one time give me these candles and she said you had to have these blessed candles because there was someone said there was going to be three days of darkness and unless you had a blessed candle in your house there would be no light and I just look that up and you know there was there was a prophecy about that but the blessed candle in the home is me you know the prophecy of that unless you had a blessed candle in the home there's not going to be light for your family is what I was experienced because true Catholic teaching I couldn't I had to go back into books to find out okay in the late nineties there's a lot so I got the Catena Oriya you know the the chain that was written by Thomas Aquinas and I would you know do readings every day on the daily readings and see what the Saint said and then what I would do is I would tell him you know what this means so you know I would get him excited about and as we were to figure out what we were gonna say were you know like what vein should we go because there's a bunch of veins here you know he said to me well think about it if you didn't go through and explain get so excited about these teachings if there was good teachings at that time you wouldn't have done that and maybe I wouldn't have been excited oh ha ha one thing they know you during the break you admit you were going to talk about is you know it's one thing to to accept the teaching even though there's a lot of voices out there and at that time well what is the real teaching of the church but does it automatically make you in every way holy or even your marriage and the struggle of coming into the church actually what it did was it gave us the grace to look at the dark stuff because even though he was a wonderful husband I mean it was a good Catholic we had tons of issues you know a lot of it due to the contraception a lot of you know that's so subtle it's such a subtle thing when you start to use rather than love and it you know a lot of Protestants that are coming in don't realize you got a wound there you know and we did we went to retro by you know in 2011 and we still do retro right post sessions you know to deal with those issues coming in is not easy you know it wasn't a great party it was very it was hard and very lonely again for the audience Marriage Encounter is a is a program that helped no it's retro as you say Marriage Encounter those for helping couples good marriages but retro by is specifically for our ages and and it's out there and available for those listening that need that assistance alright but you were there in the midst of all what were you thinking when your mother were you old enough to appreciate what she was going through I was given a very unique perspective into her conversion so I was the youngest of four and I've always said that it was a great gift that I was given I was the only one in my family to be essentially Catholic their whole life that was five years old when when she came into the church and I was baptized and I only have a couple of even memories before my baptism so in many ways baptism is when my life began it's when my spiritual life began it is unique one of the very few memories I have before baptism was the whole family we went to a pro-life rally and we were out on the street carrying a sign that said abortion saves children and I have no idea yeah that's true then we had Jesus say you know I always wanted not just to put out there you have to put jesus heals yeah yeah so Horsham kills children Jesus Saves right so I had that from a young perspective and she shares her story I look back at how grateful I am for her upbringing and her love and knowledge of the Scriptures and I was given the great gift of the Catholic faith but I was also given this great gift through the lens of a former Protestant so when she was teaching the faith and my father was teaching the faith to me they would pass on well this is what the Church teaches but here's why and here's what I used to think and here's how it could be misleading and it was just a great benefit I mean so many people are raised Catholic their whole life and they don't know the gift that they've been given here I was given this wonderful gift and explained why I never had a crisis over whether or not is this church the true church is this the real church are these teachings correct I struggled in following them as everyone does all of us being sinners but but there was never that that shred of doubt and I'm so internally grateful eternally grateful for that and and her passion and joy is what really really rubbed off on me in a way that I don't think I'll ever really know and so many people today come up to her and say Denise how did you raise your kids you've got kids that are going to church still you've got kids that are practicing tell me your secret and she tells them fall in love with your faith focus on yourself understand that unless you internalize come to know with the love of Christ the deep union that you're called to that can only come through his church through the sacraments through prayer through Scripture until you understand that your kids won't pick up on that and from a very young age there was no doubt her passion and her joy her zeal was was so encouraging and and it was interesting because I was the youngest so I got to look at my older brothers and sisters who weren't raised with that the whole time so when she came into the faith just as she was very confused the older brothers and sisters they were a little confused too like we have a do-over forget whether our oldest was a senior in high school you know and she inspired a real genuine joy for the faith in me and I and I saw that but then I just noticed my brothers and sisters it wasn't it was hard for them and and and I've been trying to talk with them more to tech because I really want to hear their experiences and know what was it like cuz that must have been really hard you come home you know my sister's now about to enter college and all the sudden mom has a great life-changing event how does that affect her how does that correspond so in many ways I had a different childhood than my brothers and sisters and the only way I can describe it is gift it's it's a gift to be able to receive the sacraments from an early age it's a gift to be able to to go to confession and be taught about confession as a child and go to confession as a child I so that even acceptance of the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist was something you got very young yes which is a blessing yes yes because it's often one of the more difficult things for a convert who was brought up in a totally different way in fact one thing that crosses my mind adds in in a in a family where mother and father are completely not just different faiths but you're from an anti-catholic interfaith living with a Catholic were you ever in this situation where with your children you're trying to pass along your anti-catholic idea that was handsome you were so least your older siblings we're getting more of that right they were indeed not we got to get him baptized you know they were this was teammate you know my mother was team D you know let's have a plan what do we do at halftime you know cuz I really didn't believe he was baptized like that bet if you didn't have that you you decided yourself you didn't have a baptism where you know that we needed to get him don't you know see even as a child think about it too I was I was showed that scripture in Romans the Churches of Christ welcome you you know in this even our church name is in the you know well I want to correct something we've often talked about your husband in the past tense but he's very much supportive with you and then it was afraid to come I don't bite I wouldn't if we wouldn't be here today if it wasn't for my father Greg and and his faithful witness to the Catholic faith he he's mentioned several times he was he was confused he was challenged by by my mom and he admits there was real doubt in his mind what do I do and it's beautiful we asked him about this a while ago and said what is how did you how did you verse how did you hang on so many have left the church how did you hang on and he said I thought about it I went back and I realized I was confirmed in the Catholic faith I stood up and said I believe this I believe and I will hold true to everything that the Catholic Church teaches I made that promise he said I was at an age of reason I understood what the commitment I was making and he understood the grace that would flow from the sacrament and it was an eighth grade not a in high school sure yeah so so he that was just a beautiful witness so so I tried to get him to come on the show like I I'm eternally grateful he was the I mean the family the family is the mirror of the Trinity and and he was the st. Joseph in our family who who worked so wonderfully for our family and provided and as she said he delighted in arch and his children he would come home and he would anytime he could take us fishing or go to a sporting event or he'd coach us and everything and that was just beautiful and my mom was just passion and on fire and enthusiasm and and the two of them mirrored the Holy Family and from my eyes I mean they they talked about and this is what's interesting cuz my brothers and sisters I think have a little bit different perspective and and I've obviously these are you know seeing this the Rosie I says it as a child but I saw the love and the faith that was brought in the family and it inspired me to want to get married that was all I desired and because I saw this beautiful witness so talk about your your on different grubs and I appreciate your seminarian yes but in your particular seminary as you start theology you where the clerics correct right what did you discern a cult well it's it's been a long process and I had thought about it early on as they taught me very well that the Lord has a plan in a vocation for everybody and whatever the Lord calls and chooses you to you should respect respond generously with great grace and there's three boys in the family and she would joke that one of us would become a priest so as a child that scared me I looked at my my brothers and sisters and I kind of measured their piety looking at them maybe they're gonna get married maybe not I don't know but there's a sphere growing up that that one the priesthood wouldn't make me happy and two there was a genuine authentic desire to be married to have a good family life that they demonstrated so well and there a series of events you know through all of my life I have pursued marriage and through a series of events the grace of my father guiding me I went to the Air Force Academy for school and graduated from there went to went to flight school but at the end of my time at the Air Force Academy I met a beautiful one young woman who I was convinced I was gonna marry and just as mom was was always trying to get the Catholics out of the Catholic Church she instilled that sort of evangelistic outreach and I thought well I could marry a Protestant and get the Protestant out of her faith and so it seemed every every woman the Lord sent in my life was was a Protestant and I thought well worked with my folks so why can't it work with me and I ended up getting engaged to this this young woman the end of my senior year at the Air Force Academy and I have nothing but respect and admiration and great great love for her and and the relationship we had but it was in preparing for marriage and looking at what what it is that would would what a family life look like what would this mix marriage look like and we got to many of the issues we got through so much but it was honestly the the contraception piece was really a sticking point and I at the time couldn't couldn't defend it the way I know I should have I couldn't explain the beauty and the joy of the and the truth of the teaching on sex and marriage that the Catholic Church has and this this engagement was called off and I'm thinkin like you know it's funny this this this contraception piece does keep coming back I mean if it wasn't for my dad standing up for the baby here I wouldn't be here and and here I was thinking that the only way I could be happy was being married and I was willing to give up on my dream and at this point everything in my life had been going so well and I was willing to give up on that for the faith while I realized I needed to take a little bit closer look at the faith and it was around that time I finished flight school I was moved to a small base in New Mexico by myself assigned to a squadron where I didn't know hardly anybody didn't even know what I what sort of plane I was gonna be flying and I realized I need to get more serious about my faith I need to I need to take a look a little bit deeper because there's something missing and it was there that I had always known and believed in the true presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist but it was there that I met Jesus Christ it was there that I met him in the Eucharist it was one hour a week at Eucharistic Adoration that utterly changed my life and I began to fall in love and fall in love and fall in love and it took a tug on my heart and there were all sorts of other events I started to read scripture more I started with spiritual reading daily Mass I met some incredible friends there's a men's group that was formed and they helped shaped me in the virtues and all this all this stuff started building and building and then finally I said okay Lord all right I can do it I'm gonna I'm going to look at the priesthood this is the way you're leading me and of course right when you do that there's always one more test and it was in the middle of nowhere New Mexico a friend that the parish came in and said we know you're a great guy you've been helping out around the parish we'd like to introduce you to our sister-in-law a beautiful Catholic girl and I think you'd really get along with her so here I am thinking that that all this is is put to the side and and I met her and and was captivated by by her beauty by her love of Christ by the the purity in her heart that I saw and seeking spiritual direction ended up dating her so a year and a half passed by and how things in my life are just right where they need to be I had everything I ever wanted I had a great job I had a marriage potentially in the future with with a great woman I literally had everything I thought that would make me happy but something was still missing something was tugging at my heart and I was able to go to a retreat at a seminary and I was open and honest with the girl I was dating at the time that said this may be a possibility and I went on this retreat it was a three-day retreat out of seminary and within hours I knew I knew that this was where the Lord was leading me and I had to do it and I I went home and took about a week to let the retreat high and sink down a little bit and I told her and I was dreading this conversation and I'll never forget what she said and I told her the story I told her what had happened at the retreat and my thoughts and she looked me in the eyes and said Tim the piece that you found and you described on that retreat is something people spend their entire lives looking for you have to go to seminary you have to do this and that was just a great a great release and great great amount of freedom that enter in my heart and the Lord opened doors that weren't possible for the only he could open and it's been an incredible experience so far and by the grace of God I'll continue to to move forward towards the office when you finish finished your prithi finished my first two years of philosophy study and four more years to go you're gonna do that in Rome I'm healthy doing that a place we had there you mentioned one other thing that I mean my evident couple question but that I'm thinking of a Church of Christ viewer happened to be watching right now they would wonder how how does sitting in front of a piece of bread and wine bring you closer to Jesus because you were saying that that was really a big talk about it you remember why why would sitting in front of the Blessed Sacrament have brought you closer to Christ there can only be one answer to that and that that's not bread and wine that literally is the body blood soul and divinity of Jesus Christ I'll go to my death proclaiming that is it's true I met him there it's not a figment of my imagination it's not it's not something you can create the the peace that flows through through the Lord and the peace and the grace that he wants to give us we talk about a personal relationship with Christ and you can't get more personal than receiving him physically into your body it's I remember saying to Greg you really believe that's God you really believe why aren't we prostate well you know why why don't we just kneel that's real I mean it overwhelmed me that that he didn't explain that to me you probably thought I would think he was nuts you know but the point of I would defend to the death you know God said let there be light and there was light you know like the God said and it happened why didn't I think God said this is my bottle and it becomes his body and blood yeah that's one of those anti-catholic things that you picked up along the way that blinds you have to see there's an inconsistency here I'll accept all this time scripture but I'm not going accepted sort of thing but we we really believe spiritual was symbolic no not real not another you know and I think in the pro-life and seeing the Catholic women who were able to look on the other side of the veil to see that spiritual is just another you know it's where time does not exist you know not symbolic that we symbolically have this meal once a week let's take an evening a Dan from Waterbury what is the best approach when your spouse doesn't share your faith my wife and I sometime to go to each of our churches I'm Catholic and she isn't and sometimes we go to each other's church but there is always tension on Sunday morning and I'm concerned about the overall impact that's having on our marriage I would say the same thing pray for every Mass for your family and get to know how she's you know the rest of God regimine that's a conflict that's a huge conflict that that will teach you how to communicate if religion is the conflict in your family you need to learn how to communicate it even if you're never unified and that and you can do that because you don't want to you know the people that I see that came into the Catholic Church as the path of least resistance aren't in love you know and you don't want them to change until they're in love at least that's my perspective you know and retro vibe I mean that's a funny answer but it's really will help you communicate that you really love your faith and she does too and not fight and get the atheist kids excellent excellent let's I'm gonna try and get as many emails as I can so let's that's good let's let's go David from Orlando writes how can you dialogue with someone who is absolutely convinced that the Catholic Church is a false religion and that anyone who is Catholic is probably not even a Christian most of the things this friend believes our complete misconceptions and falses but I haven't made any headway trying to tell him what Catholics really believe intellectually it's very hard to make that headway I mean faith is is a gift it's grace so so much of it does have to be practiced and demonstrated and I think her her answer of fall in love with your faith really is one of the most simple and profound answers to that to that dilemma because you you have to realize that you can't you need to you need to defend the scriptures you need to know and have an apologetic outlook but that's going to get you to a point and and very few people come into the church justly on an intellectual level that there has to be so much more of this the grace there there's no formula to bring someone into the church and to help them see give them the eyes of faith to understand but slowly but surely falling in love with the faith praying for them offering mass Eucharistic Adoration is profound yeah you know in our work in the coming home network which the main reason we exist is as an apostolate is to help non-catholic Christians discover the beauty of the Catholic Church that's why we exist that's pickly helping clergy and we have kind of a 10-step process the way we believe that we outreach to non-catholic Christians and the first step of course is to be a friend right you gotta have connections at the number to prayer is the most important thing but it's but step three and four are they need to understand that we love Jesus they need to see that they need to hear that and then if they can at least get this understand the Catholic that good Catholics are good Christians then they need to see that the Catholic Church is a Christian Church there's no awful like your background you didn't believe that right right and we weren't very good models of it either right we were confirming what you believed because we weren't living that faith very well that's why you said we got to fall in love with our faith we have another email Jacob and Cindy from North Carolina right my family and I are Catholic converts and are realizing how many things we just don't know about practically living the faith what are some ways we can incorporate Catholic devotions and practice into our family there are so many rich traditions in the church we really don't know where to start I would say start with the family rosary that is so powerful the the power of the rose are you prayed it once a week on Sunday nights and we had a sign that said the family that prays together stays together Nick that offend I think that is that and it's one of those I still have not met personally someone my age that prayed the rosary as a family that has left the church no so and I always would have to have the scriptural rosary and and it's it's not easy to do if you're not used to praying with your spouse well it might be uncomfortable and also the first time I did say the Rosary you know I remember practicing in a way I went with a friend and we preface it with we said a prayer Lord if this is offensive to you or society you know because the repetition of words you know word like it it still goes like that but then realize realizing that our Lord doesn't take away your issues he gives you the grace to deal with them and the fruits of the mysteries you know of you know we have that little booklet and says the fruits of the mystery is patience or perseverance or whatever and then realize that after we prayed it this was a friend who was a former who came in a couple of years later he put us in situations where we had to develop patience and perseverance he didn't just infuse it into us you know like I guess now patient person so you know be surprised our Lord works and in incredible ways you know not just taking things away as we were taught in our so if we were covered in blood and now we just went out and evangelized and we didn't have to do the work to let him heal us of all those things that he wants to write yeah a lot of converts there's so many issues that we have to get through when you've come from other traditions because the baggage remains doesn't just the morning he Easter morning you know it's just not all gone it takes a while so we need to pray for those on the journey as well as Catholics who grown up in the faith and never really learned their faith very well and you know fortunately you you and your husband by the grace of God stuck it out and and God opened your heart to the church and gave your husband's strength doesn't stand firm when you were trying to fight against it god bless you both and we ask our prayers to be with you is you go off to Rome and complete your studies and continue discernment of what God's calling you to do and thank you for your witness both as a Catholic but also in the pro-life work that you did for so long thank you both thank you for joining us on this episode of the journey home I pray that Denise's journey is encouragement to you and Tim's call to serve the Lord might be called to you to consider what your vocation is god bless you see you next

Channel: EWTN

Views: 11,871

Rating: 4.8095236 out of 5

Keywords: JHT, JHT01534

Id: CfErdX0xBwI

Length: 56min 10sec (3370 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 25 2016