Intra-Christian Conversion is Okay?

I've got a buddy, whom I've known for about 10 years, and recently over lunch he told me so proudly, with a clear sense of triumph how after being a lifelong Roman Catholic he'd converted to the Russian Orthodox church. Apparently he'd had some kind of personal/organizational problem at his church, then with the diocese, which as it grew became a much larger crisis of faith, him actually questioning church doctrine and dogma. Nothing was resolved, and both sides just got more stubborn and intransigent as it went on--naturally--leaving my friend no choice but to abandon the church in which he'd grown up, gone through confirmation and first communion, had his first marriage and then finally an annulment, and all of the rest.

So where to go? This guy is an extremely dedicated religious guy, someone who takes the spiritual and mystical aspects of his faith extremely seriously. This stuff is absolutely central to who he is, and how he lives his life. This is a guy who takes huge solace in his faith, and who conceives of his personal identity in its terms. So what is a guy to do who's just gotten so pissed off at the hardheaded leaders of his Roman Catholic church that he's actually voluntarily abandoned their faith?

Well, you convert to Russian Orthodoxy, apparently. My friend went on and on, a bit much I thought, over our burritos and refried beans, about the history of Russian orthodoxy, the laydown of the priests and churches, the organization, all of it. This is a guy who'd done his ecclesiastical homework, researched his as-close-to-Catholic options, and felt he'd made the best religion purchase decision available to him, given his choices. He was very stoked about his new home, and talked about it, a lot. He was happy, and the church was happy to have pulled in a new member, especially someone who'd abandoned another branch to choose their way. His new wife was happy, and the kids were happy, too, at least they were supposed to be happy about it all, but didn't really know enough to make an informed and independent decision.

Okay, so my buddy is happy. He's resolved what clearly was for him a huge, tragic, and massive disruption to all aspects of his life and his faith. The need for this kind of stability and centering being so central to him and his entire outlook, this was something that had to be resolved, and he'd gone out and gotten it done. Okay, that's good that he's happy now, having found a new spiritual home. On the strictly personal and human level, it was a good thing that he found what he was looking for.

But the cynic and the free-thinking intellectual in me asked (of myself) this question: Did he leave the One True Religion, or did he finally make it to the One True Religion? Yeah, he's still within the larger bounds of the Holy Trinity and God and Jeezus and all of that; he's still in da house with Christianity. But that has never stopped the truly committed, the ones who are really, really down with God and Jeezus and all from criticizing other sects and branches and variations of belief. The big umbrella of Christianity, thanks to Martin Luther, has always been big enough for many, many, many committed folks to claim sole ownership, and issue condemnations and withering recriminations against all others. So, did a personal dispute which led to a voluntary withdrawal from Roman Catholicism start him on the path to damnation? Or was that God's own, special way of waking him up to the One True Faith, of getting him to leave a wrong path and step onto the true path to redemption, salvation, eternal life, and blah blah blah? And take along a mortal woman and two mortal children, unable to make the steps themselves? If the former is true, then why would God allow him to deviate, to actually leave the one true path? If the latter is true, then why aren't more people flocking to Russian Orthodoxy, regardless of their religious points of origin? Did he get saved with his move, or is he damned to hell?

Catholicism is not for me, and hasn't been since I was ten, actually going through the confirmation classes. My childhood memories of the Catholic church are about a complex series of highly choreographed words and movements. Sit, stand, sit, kneel, sit, kneel, stand, kneel, walk and kneel, stand some more, then some handshaking, all with the monotonous drone of never-changing ceremony drubbling through. So it was I landed in confirmation. Then I started asking my own questions of the priests. They'd been through all of this youthful inquisitiveness before, and had their stock answers, but I just kept asking questions, kept questioning their answers, kept at it: If Adam and Eve were the first humans, then aren't we all the descendants of incest? If that's the case, then God thought incest was okay, and condoned it, so why is it wrong now, why does the church condemn it when God forced it to occur with his actions in the first place? If Adam and Eve were the first humans, then why are their Australian aborigines and black Africans and Aleut Indians and all of the other cultural, societal, and racial differences in the world? I mean, a mere 6000 years of human history couldn't possibly account for that kind of wide species differentiation (I wasn't using these terms, of course). If Moses and his family were the only survivors of the great flood, then aren't we all--once again--the genetic products of incest? If Jeezus rose from the dead, what did he do in that period when he was re-alive and his ascension to heaven? Why is there no record of that? Are Buddhists and Muslims and Daoists and Rastafarians and all of the rest automatically condemned because they're not Catholic/Christian, and if so, why would God allow this to happen to them? If God cares so much about me, why won't he talk to ME? And on it on it went.

I had a million of these, and just kept asking. Finally, the main priest said, pulling me aside and talking to me in his best man-to-man, sighing in his most controlled exasperation, "You've just got to believe, you've got to have faith." That was his endgame, and he never had any more answers, or attempted any more answers for me. I was a 10-year-old asking what I thought were important questions, questions that were important to me then and still, questions that I'd never really stopped to think had been asked millions of times before. But for me they were new, and they just kept coming. The priest told me to just memorize the confession of faith, say all of the prescribed words when I was told to, what to do and not to do during the communion, and I'd be fine. His message was a cooperate-and-graduate one, and even at age 10 I knew he was putting me off. He didn't want to take the time to answer my questions or discuss any of this with me, but just wanted another warm body in the pew. All I had to do was yammer out the doctrine, and as far as he was concerned I'd be a good Catholic. Just give in to the conditioning, and you'll ease right on into being a good Catholic, like so many untold millions before. Even at 10 I could see I was being put off and relegated and that the priest's words and actions did not match up with what had been put out in church about love, acceptance, how much everyone cared for and about me. This was my first encounter with corporate hypocrisy, although I didn't know the word at the time. I was being told to just shut up and do what I was told, and the tacit message was to stop asking questions.

At age 10 I came to a conclusion: there were two possible answers. First, there were no good answers to the questions I was asking, and I was being told to just shut up. That didn't give me too much faith in the church, and it certainly didn't convince me that was where I wanted to spend a lifetime of Sundays. Second, there were answers to the questions I was asking, but no one involved wanted to take the time to provide them. They were either very complex or something else, but for whatever unknown reason I was not being provided with the information I was honestly and sincerely seeking. Again, that didn't place the Catholic church too well with me. After all, this was about making a life choice, about formally accepting a religious faith as your one-and-only, about taking it all in, accepting it, giving onself up to the faith and the deities, the whole package. This was something important--that's what the priests and the parents were hammering into us--yet none of them were willing to take the time to sit me down and go through all of my questions with me. Either I or my questions were not important enough, and I was being pushed aside and put off. That didn't place the Catholic church too well with me either.

I went home and talked to my dad about this, told him I wanted out of confirmation. I went through all of my questions and thoughts and concerns, all of the observations I'd made, all of the things that I saw and heard which led me to question what I was being told. All of my friends were doing it, and they ended up finishing, but this was definitely not a peer pressure issue. I told him I didn't want any of it, that I truly didn't believe, and that the priest has not helped me at all. And God bless my dad, a lifelong Irish Catholic, he listened to me, paid attention to me, we talked one on one together, and he agreed with me.

So, a highly structured religious organization such as Catholicism was and is not the thing for me. And what I know of Russian Orthodoxy, I can say that this one also is not my religious cup of tea. Way too much structure, rigidity, doctrine and dogma. But it is for my buddy, and he's happy where he is. Regardless of all my ranting and questions, this is undeniably a fantastic thing for my friend. He's happy with where he is and what he's doing, so that's a good thing, no matter where you come down.

So, is this not a manifestation of God's will? Does it not please the Supreme Being that one of his children has had a crisis, has sought release and relief and refuge, and has found it, regardless of the final resting point? Isn't that what the larger God Concept is about, finding one's way and achieving peace and happiness? That sounds like the desired endstate of most religions to me. So is he okay that he went from one to the other, and is happy now with where he's landed?

But I can't help but wonder if he's saved himself or condemned himself, and how in the world any of us are to know if these choices are right or wrong. I'm still waiting for the priest to answer this question.