The Faith I Chose, Again and Again

There’s a moment—sometimes quiet, sometimes jarring—when you realize your life hasn’t followed the neat, predictable path you once imagined.
Instead, it’s wandered. Circled back. Started over more than once.
That’s been true of my faith.
I wasn’t a cradle Catholic. My early years were shaped by a loosely practiced Methodist faith—something present, but not deeply examined. It was part of life, but not something I had fully chosen for myself.
That began to shift when I attended Catholic schools from fourth grade through my senior year of high school. Catholicism became part of the rhythm of my daily life, especially in an all-girls school that shaped how I thought about education, womanhood, and faith.
But being surrounded by faith is not the same as choosing it.
During my senior year, my family moved from Chicago to Georgia. With that move came another shift—I began attending a Methodist church again with my mother and grandmother. In college, I briefly joined a Methodist student group. Faith remained present, but it continued to change depending on where I was and what season of life I was in.
After I became a mother, I found myself reaching again for something grounding. For a short time, I attended a Presbyterian church. And then, like it does for many people, life filled up.
For about fifteen years, I drifted.
Faith wasn’t gone. It just wasn’t central.
Then one Christmas, almost on a whim, we went to a Catholic midnight Mass. My daughter was six at the time. Afterward, she asked a simple question:
“Can we go back?”
We did.
What began as a return for her slowly became something deeper for me. I entered RCIA. I stepped into the Catholic Church not as a student this time, but as someone choosing it.
And for a while, it felt like I had found my way.
But the path didn’t stay straight.
After moving to Germany, I remained Catholic for a couple of years. Then, gradually, I found myself pulled again toward something I had explored before—Wicca. It spoke to a different kind of understanding, one that made space for questions I still carried.
Eventually, I returned again to the Catholic Church.
But not unchanged.
This time, I came back with a deeper awareness of how complex belief can be. I carried the questions, the searching, the detours. Even now, I hold pieces of those experiences alongside my Catholic faith—not as contradictions, but as part of a larger story.
A story that isn’t finished.
Along the way, I became a mother. I grew older. I learned—often the hard way—that life is less about having everything figured out and more about learning how to keep walking, even when the road turns.
That’s what this space is about.
The Long Way Home is where I reflect on faith, womanhood, and the winding process of becoming who we are. Some posts will wrestle with spiritual questions. Others will sit in the quiet lessons of everyday life.
I don’t have all the answers. I’m not sure anyone does.
But I’ve come to believe there’s value in paying attention—in noticing the turns in the road, and what they’ve taught us.
If your path has ever felt uncertain, nonlinear, or unfinished, you’re in good company here.
Sometimes the long way home is the way we’re meant to take.