{"id":3255,"date":"2008-02-15T16:58:00","date_gmt":"2008-02-15T16:58:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/deaconsbench\/2008\/02\/are-converts-happier.html"},"modified":"2008-02-15T16:58:00","modified_gmt":"2008-02-15T16:58:00","slug":"are-converts-happier","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/02\/are-converts-happier.html","title":{"rendered":"Are converts happier?"},"content":{"rendered":"

A blogger over at Commonweal<\/a> asked the question, and explains: <\/p>\n

The woman I plan to marry converted to the Roman Catholic faith as an adult ten years ago. She seems to have had an experience quite similar to the experience of the daughter described in this post. Among other things her faith seems to have helped her heal her relationship with her parents, who did not treat her well when she was younger. She is also exceptionally faithful to the institutional Roman Catholic Church and is very happy to be so faithful. And her experience is typical of the adult converts I know. They all seem so happy and so loyal to the institutional Roman Catholic Church.<\/p>\n

I on the other hand was raised in the Catholic Church from infancy. And forgive me for being so rude, but to plagiarize Winston Churchill, many times I think that the Roman Catholic Church is the worst of all the Christian churches, except for the other ones. And most of those I know who were cradle Catholics have even more negative attitudes towards the Roman Catholic Church. For example, when my Mom died last year one of my brothers refused to attend the rosary in her memory the night before the funeral, so great is his antipathy towards the church of his childhood and early youth.<\/p>\n

Do you think I am right in generalizing that cradle Catholics tend to have serious problems with the Catholic Church while adult converts tend to be well adjusted in the Catholic Church? And if this generalization is right, does this mean that the Catholic Church is a good church to join as an adult, but perhaps not as a child?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Thoughts? Anyone?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A blogger over at Commonweal asked the question, and explains: The woman I plan to marry converted to the Roman Catholic faith as an adult ten years ago. She seems to have had an experience quite similar to the experience of the daughter described in this post. 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Prior to that, Deacon Greg worked for 26 years as a writer and producer for CBS News, where he contributed to \"The CBS Evening News with Katie Couric,\" \"60 Minutes II,\" \"48 Hours,\" (Emmy Award, Writers Guild of America Award) and \"Sunday Morning.\" He was co-writer for the acclaimed documentary \"9\/11,\" hosted by Robert DeNiro. (Emmy Award, Christopher Award, Peabody Award, Writers Guild of America Award.) His radio essays were featured in the bestselling book \"Deadlines and Datelines\" by Dan Rather. He's also a two-time winner of the Catholic Press Association Award. Other places you may find him: AMERICA, U.S. CATHOLIC, CATHOLIC DIGEST, REALITY (Redemptorist Communications) and THE BROOKLYN TABLET. He also contributes homiletic reflections to the parish resource CONNECT!, published by Liturgical Publications. In November 2009, he began serving a three-year term as a consultant to the Communications Committee of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). Deacon Greg grew up in Maryland (Go Terps!) but he and his wife today live in the beautiful borough of Queens, New York. You can contact Deacon Greg at dcngreg@gmail.com.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/author\/gkandra"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3255","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/204"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3255"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3255\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3255"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3255"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3255"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}