Dave's entry into the Church

Reposted with Dave's permission:

My name is David and I was born and raised Episcopalian. However, my grandmother who is more on the non-denominational evangelical side, had me "dedicated" at her church. Apparently my grandparents founded a non-denominational Protestant Church back in the day. My father was raised in it and became hostile to established religion preferring to spend Sunday mornings at "his church" the Raquet Club playing tennis. My mother was Episcopal and I went to Church with her. Around 8th grade when my other grandfather (my mother's father) died I pondered actually being baptized. All this time I thought I'd been baptized as an infant when was merely dedicated. And so I was summarily baptized. Gradually I drifted away during High School and stopped going to Church as my mother had stopped going as well. I still believed in God and everything and had a reverence for Jesus, in short I became a lapsed- Episcopalian or what passes for many a Episopalian nowadays. However even at this period there were signs of the Holy Spirit drawing me to the Church I traveled to Europe and still remember my encounter with the Cathedral in Seville, Spain. I even worship at the shrines and prayed to the saints. Then I went to Italy and saw the Vatican. Then Paris. Funny thing is the only Paris I saw was that of Saint Louis and the Medieval University. It's not that I saw it so much as I perceived it as the kernel whence all the grandeur had sprung.
Then in college as is usually the case I was reintroduced to Christianity by a Jewish friend who started out an agnostic and then became Catholic. Now I had had many Jewish acquaintances over the years so more sensitive to him that I would have been to anyone else. The inner unity of the Jewish tradition and Christianity made sense.
I remained nominally Episcopal but began attending non-denominational Protestant congregations. I even attended some sects that would be considered out of the main stream. However all the while I secretly knew that the Catholic Church was the one true Church that Christ founded. And like many I recognized and admired the holiness of Mother Theresa and John Paul II. I was waiting to become a Catholic as an on the fence Anglo-Catholic type when I finally went through RCIA and was received into the Church on Easter 2004. And I have to say I'm glad to be home!