“All that we call human history . . . [is] the long, terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy.” This quote from C.S. Lewis inspired the title of Jennifer Fulwiler’s emotional, funny, and tear-jerking memoir. The story of her conversion to Catholicism had me riveted, and her experience of the divine reminded me of my own. Although I wasn’t an atheist while growing up, I did suffer from the same anxiety about “What’s out there?” that Jennifer did.
If you like Erma Bombeck, you’ll love Jennifer’s cheeky and entertaining stories. At times I giggled, and I cried too, when she described her first confession experience. Do you remember what your first confession felt like? For me, it was as if the world had been lifted off my shoulders. Talking to God this way is a great gift of the Church. During her struggles with belief, Jennifer discovered she has a life-threatening blood condition made worse by pregnancy. Told by her doctors to use contraceptives or get sterilized, she agonized over being forced to choose between following Church teachings and protecting her health—only to realize she had been sold a bill of goods:
I had considered using contraception while on Coumadin, which would have made it tempting to believe the lie that we were “safe” from pregnancy. . . . And the only reason . . . I had actually clued in [to] the obvious-sounding but little-known truth that if it really is that dire that you not have a baby, you need to avoid the act that creates babies—was because I’d been living according to the rules of the Catholic Church. These rules—the moral guidelines that I once railed against—had just saved me from potential disaster. (p. 211)
Jennifer’s struggle with her stance on abortion was one I also suffered. In my younger days, I felt no real allegiance to God or His teachings. And when I entered the Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults program to become a Catholic, I kept telling the priest that although I would never have an abortion myself, I couldn’t say no for someone else. As happened to Jennifer, it took extensive reading to reach my “aha moment.” When she realized that babies the same age as her son in utero were being murdered, she felt the same anger that I did.
The Lord works many wonders, and Jennifer’s conversion story is one of them. He reached her, and through her He will convert many more souls. Amen.
Something Other Than God: How I Passionately Sought Happiness and Accidentally Found It, by Jennifer Fulwiler; Ignatius Press; 2014; 248 pages; $19.51 (hard cover), $14.92 (e-book), $31.45 (audiobook on CD)
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