{"id":2276,"date":"2012-12-01T21:02:00","date_gmt":"2012-12-01T21:02:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/daffeythoughts\/2012\/12\/a-conversion-story-complements-of-st-augustine.html"},"modified":"2012-12-01T21:02:00","modified_gmt":"2012-12-01T21:02:00","slug":"a-conversion-story-complements-of-st-augustine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/daffeythoughts\/2012\/12\/a-conversion-story-complements-of-st-augustine.html","title":{"rendered":"A conversion story complements of St. Augustine"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Thomas McDonald is kicking around St. Augustine. \u00a0The first post is here<\/a>. \u00a0But this one caught my eye<\/a>. \u00a0It\u2019s a tale of his journey back to Catholicism. \u00a0Me? \u00a0I was brought up in a pseudo-religious household. \u00a0But the surroundings were very much American-Protestant. \u00a0By the time I left, I embraced agnosticism only to give some\u00a0intellectual\u00a0muscle to my\u00a0unbelief\u00a0 which was really\u00a0unbelief\u00a0for\u00a0convenience\u00a0sake. \u00a0My own journey to the Faith was a hodgepodge of intellectual reflection, study, a few common sense hunches, a couple experiences, the witness of a few\u00a0believers\u00a0 and just general\u00a0distastes\u00a0for the modern secularism that I tried so hard to fit in with. \u00a0In the process, I came to a few conclusions, and I can\u2019t help but notice how often converts to the Faith, particularly that expressed through the Catholic Church, share certain experiences. \u00a0I was\u00a0particularly\u00a0thinking of this:<\/p>\n

\u201cSubmission of the will and intellect is what the Church calls for on its central elements of dogma. Modern ears hear that as simple tyranny, because, of course, in our few decades of life experience we know far better than the inherited wisdom of ages as guided by the Third Person of the Holy Trinity working through the Church. You don\u2019t really know much until you grasp the enormity of all you do not\u2013indeed,\u00a0<\/span>all you cannot<\/em>\u2013know as one mortal living a\u00a0circumscribed\u00a0and brief life. That\u2019s the great lie of the modern world: I am my own man! I am self-invented! I can figure it all out!\u00a0<\/b><\/span>I took a class!\u201d <\/i>(emphasis mine)<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I realized that, too. \u00a0And to this day, I have the strong belief that we are a generation far less educated than we would care to admit. \u00a0We took Western Civ. 101, so we believe we know everything about European history. \u00a0We had to take Biology Intro 100, so naturally we are experts at the entire discipline of\u00a0biological\u00a0sciences. \u00a0Added to the fact that Google can make anyone sound smarter than they are, and I wonder how many decisions on what to believe are based on sound reasoning and research, and how many are based on the idea that somewhere, at some point, in some place in time, I took a class.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thomas McDonald is kicking around St. Augustine. \u00a0The first post is here. \u00a0But this one caught my eye. \u00a0It\u2019s a tale of his journey back to Catholicism. \u00a0Me? \u00a0I was brought up in a pseudo-religious household. \u00a0But the surroundings were very much American-Protestant. \u00a0By the time I left, I embraced agnosticism only to give some\u00a0intellectual\u00a0muscle […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2805,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nA conversion story complements of St. Augustine<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Thomas McDonald is kicking around St. Augustine.  The first post is here.  But this one caught my eye.  It's a tale of his journey back to\" \/>\n<meta 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