In 2024, I gave a talk at a women’s conference at a traditional Catholic parish called My Two Conversions. I explained how in high school, I was a pretty liberal Catholic who worked at The Catholic Worker Soup Kitchen in the afternoons. Perhaps in the evening, I might be found at a downtown Denver coffee-shop writing letters against the death penalty for Amnesty International. >Then, at 16 years old, I had a big conversion and I came to believe that Christ was truly present in the Blessed Sacrament. Then, another 16 years later (several years after ordination, in fact) I became a traditional Catholic. It’s mostly in the above-linked talk.>In between those two conversions, I went to a mainstream Catholic seminary that styled-itself to be one of the most conservative ones in the nation. At that time, I learned French and Spanish and Portuguese in order to be able to preach the Gospel wherever God might send me as a missionary. Pope Benedict XVI was the Pope, and I was very happy doing a conservative Novus Ordo Mass for the rest of my life. Life was good. Or so I thought.

Originally published in Padre Peregrino. Read original article