James Rutter

I was raised Catholic, but I didn’t fully understand the faith while in school. I even attended a Catholic school from 5th to 8th grade and even went to a Catholic college. I hesitate to say the reason I fully fell away from the faith after college was that I was poorly catechized. It likely had more to do with my lack of interest, although it is hard for me to imagine that if the importance of the Eucharist was explained or stressed to me that I wouldn’t have fallen away because ultimately that is what brought me back Home.

While in law school, I began attending a non-denominational church with some friends after having not gone to any church for years. I met my wife in 2014 and she, another fallen away Catholic, was also attending a non-denominational church. Once we were engaged, I started to think seriously about our faith and how our children would be raised.

That is when I decided that I wanted the truth no matter what direction it sent me even if it turned out to be the Catholic Church, which I was opposed to at that time. After researching to find the answers on major issues that separate protestants and Catholics, I discovered that the answers and explanations Catholics had made much more sense and some were answered with basic logic.

Before we were married, my wife and I started doing double duty (going to both the non-denominational church and to mass). Eventually, it got to the point I couldn’t ignore what I was learning and I promised God to be open to whatever the truth was. So two weeks after our wedding, as we were getting ready to sleep, she asked me when we were going back to the non-denominational church. I had to tell her that we weren’t. Then she cried for four straight hours until 2:30 in the morning.

The next day I had to travel for court and I asked her to ride with me. My friend had given me a Father Mike Schmitz CD titled “True Worship.” We listened to it on the way to the hearing and that’s what officially started our journey back Home. That’s when we finally knew what we were missing in the Eucharist.

Ever since then we never looked back. That was in May 2014 and today we attend daily mass with our four children and are involved in many activities with our local parishes. We both continue to dive deep into our faith and never cease learning.

Reading and researching has turned me into what I’d considered somewhat of an apologist. So now my goal is to show as many other people the truth and what I had missed all my life. After all the studying I’ve done, I feel much more empowered to have the tough conversations about faith and in the past eight years we’ve been able to assist multiple families through their conversions.