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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I haven't read this whole thread, but OP, if you are still here, I would recommend watching some videos by Bishop Robert Barron.  He has a lot of short clips that address some of the fundamental arguments (from logic and science) for the existence of God and he has a very approachable way of explaining these concepts.  As a convert to Catholicism myself, I find that most people who don't believe in God actually don't believe some false God they made up in their mind.  The absolute first question to answer is what we mean by God.  The why we believe and what we owe to God questions are somewhat naturally answered once we understand who God is (and what He is not).  So my advice is to focus on that fundamental question.

My other advice is to keep an open mind.  God cannot come into your heart if you keep is sealed.  You have to at least entertain the possibility that God exists, otherwise, don't bother down this path. But I think you are already there because you sense a dissatisfaction with the way things are.  My own spiritual journey started from that same feeling, and that was enough of an opening to let God in, despite my atheist upbringing.  As I started to read more theistic readings (I didn't start with Christianity but more general theism), i had all this skepticism (I am a lawyer by trade so the skepticism was endless).  But I remember the moment vividly when I just suspended my skepticism and pretended that God did exist (literally just a moment "let me pretend there is a God").  Everything suddenly sense and all the pieces of my worldview that clashed or seem disjointed all came together once  I looked at them through the theistic lens.  Not saying that it will happen for you like this, but just that everyone will have their own unique/personal ah ha moments and to be open to them. [/quote]

Why did you choose Catholicism Vs other Christian denominations ?
[/quote]

Once I was convinced there is a God, i started exploring different theistic religions. At first, i attended a Universalist Unitarian church because that was all I could handle.  But then as I kept reading, that church was no longer enough (they tend to stay very surfacy about loving everyone and doing good but shies away from deeper questions).  I read up on Islam but its view of God was not "that which nothing greater can be thought" imo, so I rejected that.  I was really hung up on the idea of Jesus, so it took me a while to come to terms with Christianity as a possibility, but once I did, i started attending protestant churches simply out of accessibility.  I found one I really liked (very intellectual approach to the Bible), but some reason, I just kept feeling like I had to keep searching. One day I walked into a Catholic Mass and while I was so confused by all the standing, kneeling, recitations, I felt a very deep sense of peace.  Then I started researching Catholicism and everything I read just clicked and felt right (the theology not necessarily all the social teachings, which took more time).  I remember reading the Catechism, which most people would probably find a dry read, and found it just so engaging haha!

I appreciate the depth of Catholicism, its comfort with and embrace of ambiguity and mystery.  I think on the logic side, I find Protestantism to be unsustainable.  In my exploration of protestant churches, some churches were so different from each other as to be almost separate religions.  That surely cannot be how God intends for his church to be, so it was more easy for me to believe that Matthew 16:18 meant that God established one church and will stand by her to the end.  Either that or we are all screwed imho, because otherwise we are just following our own egos by establishing 30,000 different churches. [/quote]

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