From Judaism to Russian Orthodoxy to Catholicism

Many of you know me as that Jew that got saved by the Russian Orthodox Church.

From nineteen eighty-seven to twenty twenty-five, this is true.

But in those years, the church's leadership began to change its view.

We all know that any form of organized power attracts corruption that ultimately degrades the system's original intent.

Communism, for example. It has fantastic intents, but has repeatedly metastasized horrifying results.

All churches exist in a fallen world. Thus, to the surprise of no one, a church's leadership can grow askew. A church can be divided into three categories: leadership, message, and community.

What happens when the Russian Orthodox Church's leadership begins to wage conquest against the very biblical message it once promoted and attacks its members with means that look psychopathic? Well, yours truly becomes a Catholic.

As Christians, we are called to continually right wrongs, confront demonic rot with biblical truth, and strive to please Jesus Christ. This calling is the force of good that resists the continual evil-driven erosion of our fallen world.

Being a Christian is a process, something we do daily, like a clean kitchen.

We have to clean it again and again and after every single meal.

When I was a Jewish kid, I knew there was something sickeningly wrong with Judaism.

I tried to find the light within the leadership of the synagogue, the message from the Talmud, and the community of my upbringing. It wasn't there.

Instead, I found light for the first time in the Russian Orthodox Christian Church in America.

It was my home. But as of late, that light flickered away as they have unfortunately contorted themselves into a Jewish-fearing narration. Sometimes you leave the church, but sometimes the church leaves you.

Why then am I now Catholic? The Catholic Church's deep piety, its worldwide reach, its formation of Western civilization, and with its founding upon St. Peter the Rock, it underwrites a strength of character and a welcoming community of which I can belong.

I enter the Catholic Church neither blindly nor silently, but to worship Christ among His people, receive His grace, speak the truth, and oppose whatever disfigures His face within the Church. Amen.