God Bless the Unbroken Road
Author Neil Combs reads Sharing Your Catholic Faith Story to Jack
By Neil Combs
Featured in Sharing Your Catholic Faith Story: Tools, Tips, and Testimonies
Many faith journeys and conversion stories are filled with trials and conflict, with obstacles and hesitance—a “broken road,” as they say. My road, though fairly long and winding, isn’t so broken. I’m not saying that I’ve never had any spiritual struggles—I’ve had a few. The most notable one was my family’s move from Long Island to Rochester, NY, during a difficult time in our marriage. This simple change of jobs was supposed to end in Syracuse but that didn’t work out, so we scrambled to make a move to Rochester with the same company. I didn’t even know where Rochester was! Then we couldn’t find a house in the area where we were looking. I was fighting God at every turn because I had a plan and he wasn’t cooperating!
As it turns out, God’s plan was way better than mine. We’ve never been better, and the move ultimately resulted in my conversion to the Catholic faith. My road has been an intellectual journey. But let me start closer to the beginning.
I was born on Long Island in Oceanside, NY, in a Lutheran home, the faith of my father. We attended a wonderful Lutheran church there, and I attended youth group with most of the people I would (and still do) call best friends. I learned to appreciate my Christian faith early in life and was usually fairly close to the church. When I was 19, I met a girl who would become my wife almost six years later. Mary was and is a devout Catholic. While we dated, we attended both my Lutheran church and her Catholic church in Oceanside, sometimes going to Mass and sometimes going to “church.” As time went on, we went a bit more often to her church, St. Anthony’s, where eventually we were married. Attending the two churches, I noticed many similarities in the services and didn’t give much thought to which church we attended.
When we had children, we brought them up in the Catholic faith, since we were attending the Catholic Church more regularly. I started to notice a few differences from my Lutheran faith (which I hadn’t truly let go of) but not enough to make me do anything other than becoming more attentive. I think I had an intellectual understanding of God, but not an emotional one. I didn’t have that “personal relationship” I hear people talk about. I continued to attend Mass and “follow the leader”: sit, stand, kneel, sit. I still struggled with my faith.
I can’t say I lived a life of virtue, even in front of my family. I may have appeared virtuous, maybe even holy, from the outside, but I had a dark side that I rarely brought out in front of others. Let’s just say my morals were a bit askew for much of my life. My wife once said to me that sometimes I treated the people from church better than my family, and that hurt. But she was probably right—no, she was definitely right.
In 1999, at the age of thirty-seven, I got a bit of a wake-up call. I had a partial blockage in a coronary artery, which required the insertion of a stent. I felt very vulnerable at that time. My marriage was struggling because of my behavior and my bad choices. I couldn’t seem to put my wife first consistently; it was all about me. This was when my company “asked” me to take the job in Syracuse. You know, the one that ended up in Rochester (actually Hilton, a tiny suburb.) And it brought us to that tiny town’s small Catholic Church, the Church of St. Leo the Great. They were so welcoming that I took notice. It felt comfortable—almost Lutheran.
By the time our children were ready for Confirmation, I had grown a lot in my faith through reading books and Scripture and listening to radio and CDs. I was learning more about what the Church taught, rather than what I thought it taught. I had to admit to myself that it made a lot of sense. So I decided to go through the RCIA program in our current parish, St. Leo’s in Hilton, NY, and to enter the Catholic Church with my kids. There were no skyrockets or major transformations, but I had become a Catholic. Emotionally, it felt right. Intellectually, it made sense.
I didn’t have a lot of preconceptions about the Catholic Church, but those that I had melted away quickly with sound and logical explanations. I appreciated the continuity and unwavering strength of the Church. And it was such a great feeling to go through the Sacraments of Reconciliation and the Eucharist at the same time as my kids. That is something we will always share. My wife was overjoyed, because we had become a happy Catholic family. I soon began working with our youth ministry program and was teaching high school teens.
About a year later, the biggest catalyst of my faith life occurred: I went on a retreat called Cursillo. There I learned more about my faith and my role in the church as a member of the laity, realizing that we are all a part of the Church and that sharing Christ was up to priests, as well as the deacons and us laity. I had time to pray and talk with Jesus, and it hit me clearly: I didn’t talk to Jesus nearly enough. I didn’t have a relationship with him. Oh, I prayed—telling him what I needed and asking for help—but I never listened for him to talk to me. When I began my relationship with my wife, I spent all kinds of time with her, sharing feelings and failures, yet I hadn’t given God that same part of me. But that weekend I prayed. I poured my heart out to Jesus in a way I had never imagined possible, like I was talking and crying with a dear friend.
That began a three-year voyage to learn about and understand prayer, leading me to do something I’d never dreamed I’d do: write a book on what I learned. A Body in Prayer is really about having a deep relationship with Christ and including him in our daily life. In a way, the writing was a big part of my heart’s conversion. As I spent more time with Christ, I was also studying more about my newfound Catholic faith and listening to CDs. The more I learned, the more sense it made and the more I loved it. I realized the genius of Catholicism. It all made sense, and it all fit together. And it all came down to having (and living) that relationship with Christ. When I wrote A Body in Prayer, it was a retelling of the relationship I’d developed with Christ. I started to include him in my whole day by making decisions about what I watched, what I read, what I listened to. The amazing strength I experienced fasting just one day a week gave me the love I experienced through time in adoration, and I felt the joy and satisfaction of reaching out to those in need.
I love my Lutheran roots because they taught me to love Christ and to go out into the world to bring his message to others through my actions. I don’t think of my journey as a conversion, but as more of a progression. I believe my early faith has gotten me to the place where I am now. Some people may have been surprised that I became Catholic and may even feel that I made a mistake. To them I say: don’t worry, it was a well-thought-out, rational decision made along my unbroken road.
Neil Combs is a pharmacist and the author of A Body in Prayer. Neil is active in the youth ministry, Knights of Columbus, and the worship band, Hearts Ablaze, at St. Leo the Great parish in Hilton, NY. He and his wife Mary teach Pre-Cana classes and work in social justice and other ministries. His website is A Body in Prayer.
