Come Home: My Come Home Experience
How does one narrate a journey still in progress? Or speak of what only the Spirit knows, impulses not understood, choices made because they seem to be the only choice?
In 1967 I left the Catholic Church. Vatican II had concluded and I, like many of my generation, were inflamed with the breadth and depth of Christ’s love and the joy of being the people of God. Having been a member of a religious order, I experienced "culture shock" upon returning to a local parish not yet in touch with the openness and expansiveness of my religious community. The decision to leave was not easy. I sought guidance from those I respected,and eventually knew what I must do.
And so for the next 38 years I lived the gospel as best I could, finding my way as a member of the United Church of Christ and then upon coming to Westerville, as an ordained elder in the Presbyterian Church. I experienced the mercy and compassion of a loving God who embraces all. But always I longed for the liturgy I’d known and especially for the Eucharist, food for the journey.
When our eldest daughter married and became a Catholic, I re-examined old issues. But the time wasn’t right or perhaps I wasn’t ready. Ten years later my youngest daughter said she was drawn to Catholicism and when I volunteered to accompany her to classes, it seemed as if it were someone else using my voice. How could I be back in the same place again?
Good friends had told me for years that I would one day "come home." It was their witness to the Eucharistic Christ that warmed me when I was anxious, when I doubted the path. And then, when at the parish website I found words of acceptance and welcome, when I read Father Charlie’s apology on behalf of the Church, I wept. I could go home again.
Each week at the RCIA classes the Spirit nudged a little bit more. At the six Come Home sessions, the Spirit pushed and the resistance and old defenses crumbled. They were unnecessary. Here was a place of integrity without judgment, of clarity without narrowness. And while a sense of "home" has remained with me always, "being home" was now a choice I could make wholeheartedly.
In January, during what was once called The Church Unity Octave, almost 38 years to the day I left, I professed my faith in the Catholic Church. Troublesome issues continue, but because of what I have learned from Susan Bellotti, St. Paul Pastoral Associate and the many generous and kind people involved in this ministry, I see the Church differently. The tensions that can divide are the very tensions that make this Church alive. The Catholic Church’s struggle to be both faithful and responsive is my very human struggle too.
I am grateful to the Holy Spirit and all who serve with such love.
MaryAnn Titus
Come Home program participant & St. Paul parishioner