I'm converting to Judaism and want to document my journey in someway that helps me, but others as well, maybe.
I became Catholic (fully Catholic - I was baptized when I was a baby and raised secular) in college after being guilted by my grandmother that I should be.
Conversion was quick and no real time to stop and consider what I was doing and the reasons I was doing this.
So I did the only logical thing I could do after the Easter vigil Mass - dive in head first and fake it 'til I make it. I got so good at faking it, i even fooled myself, for years. I thought I would find my husband in college, have that beautiful Catholic ceremony and adopt several children since I can't physically have any of my own. All while ignoring my liberal upbringing (I said things like I didn't believe in abortion even though I did), a subtle yet life long attraction to women (which I later identified as bisexuality), and my persistent desire not to have children - physically or emotionally (I continued to tell myself I wanted at least 3 kids, picked out names and only dated "potential fathers"). Church became my whole life - I lived at church, worked at church, volunteered at church and even the dean of my Religious Studies degree was a priest at my church.
After college I slowly drifted away. Moved to a liberal city and slowly became a Christmas/Easter Catholic. The more conservative friends fell away and the more liberal stayed. When I finally identified my sexuality, I got shamed and it truly no longer felt like home. I can no longer align myself with a faith thats party line about LGBTQ+ as “love the sinner, hate the sin”. I hate the line because all it does is serve a heavy dose of shame and communicates "I love you, but I hate this huge part of your identity, so I don't actually love you".
I did some “faith tourism” when I moved back to my small college town. This place is so insular in its religious communities, I couldn't go back to Catholicism and other Christian faiths were too judgemental as well. I spent some time identifying as a Unitarian Universalist but I just missed the ritual aspect of religion - isn't that weird after years of faking it, only one thing stuck? So I wound up investigating a faith that is world's away from Catholicism - Reform Judaism.
The impetus for my conversion is no longer present, as my grandmother died 8 years ago. I was able to let go of this need to hang on to Catholicism in order to stay close to her and finally walk into a synagogue like I've always wanted to. It checks all my boxes so far - your conversion journey is your own and takes however long you want it to. There is a strong push towards the intellectual application of the faith and encourage the taking of various classes, writing essays, meeting with a rabbi one on one and presenting your desire before a committee - all before conversion is allowed. I could take one year or fifteen.
So this is where I'm at so far. More to come.
