Why I became Catholic: My appearance on “The Journey Home”

From time to time people ask me how a nice Dutch Calvinist boy like me wound up converting from Evangelical Protestantism to Catholicism.

I’ve written and talked about this in the past, notably in a 2003 appearance on EWTN’s “The Journey Home” with Marcus Grodi, but this hasn’t been readily available — until now!

Thanks to an alert friend on Twitter, I’ve just learned that EWTN has posted my appearance on  “The Journey Home” on YouTube for all to see. So here it is! 

Revisiting this early TV appearance, years before “Reel Faith,” I find that, despite some mistakes, I’m reasonably pleased with how I did, given my level of inexperience. (It occurs to me that “The Journey Home” occasionally brings guests back … and with my journey to the permanent diaconate well underway, I have a new story to tell. Maybe I’ll drop them an email and see if they’d like to have me back!)

One omission that has always nagged me about this appearance: I talk quite a bit about my father, a former Dutch Reformed pastor, and how, despite his anti-Catholic beliefs, he helped set me on the path to Catholicism with his emphasis on apologetics and following the argument. I never got around to mentioning that, two years after I was received into the Church, I was his sponsor at his own reception! He is now Catholic and often attends Mass with us. 

Wow, I looked young 11 years ago. Anyway.