My wife wanted them to have a Catholic education and I realised that the best local school was Catholic so I didn’t object. This was ironic because it was because I wouldn’t promise to have the children brought up as Catholics that we weren’t able to get married in a Catholic church but had a civil ceremony instead. Thus it was I found myself going along to the Catholic church with her and the children. Through this we became friendly with another Catholic couple, whose children went to the same school as ours. We were very close to them so, when they moved from our big parish to a smaller satellite Mass centre at St John Fisher’s school in Marshalswick, we went with them.

I wanted to belong

As a young man going to church just hadn’t been part of my routine, but now I found I was always going to school Masses and events at the church. Over a period of time God worked on me and I felt a real desire to join this church as an active participant and so I decided to become a Roman Catholic. I signed up for the RCIA programme, which another friend of mine had done and learnt all about the Catholic faith and its beliefs. Looking back I realise it was more of a head decision than a heart decision, but I wanted to belong to this lovely vibrant community of people.

For me my whole journey of faith has been one of slowly opening myself more up to God rather than there being any sudden big Damascus experience. God always leads us at our own pace and gives us what we need at the right time. I had received so much from the parish community that I felt I wanted to pay back in some way. I have always had a heart for young people, and through the church I got very involved in their youth work and other things too. A lot of the people in my parish used to belong to the Upper Room Community, which doesn’t exist any more but left a lot of deep friendships among the former members. Their love and welcome really drew my wife and my family close and we became part of the big group of almost 50 people that goes every year to the Celebrate Conference in Devon.

I had never been to anything like that before, where there was so much joy and friendship and prayer. We had a fantastic time and as a family have been going every year since (8years). I just couldn’t believe that you could have a week of teaching, prayer and peace from the stresses of everything else. Going on this week together has also helped cement our community with about a quarter of the Mass-going congregation (160 people) going to Celebrate. There were lots of other things in the parish too like bible studies and prayer groups and these all helped me build up my faith.

Giving myself more to God

I suppose the key moment for me, however, came one Friday evening in 2004 at Celebrate, when I decided to go forward to be prayed with for the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. This was a new step in giving myself more to God and allowing him to use me. Before that although I enjoyed the company of the people from the parish, I hadn’t committed my life to Christ in a personal way, acknowledging that He had died not just for the salvation of the world but for me personally too. Before that I was trying to do lots of things that I felt were the right thing to do because I wanted to be accepted into the faith. Now I find that it flows out of my heart more and from love rather than duty. I also feel I want to do something about it. Everything we do in love is God’s love. God has given us that love to share with others. Now if someone comes to me with a problem my first response is to pray with them. People at work who know I am a Christian now come and ask me to pray for their needs.

I am much more up front about my faith and I find myself almost compelled to go out to others. I travel quite a lot for my current job with Her Majesty’s Inspectorate, which oversees the police, and now, before I board a train, I always pray and ask God if there is anybody He wants me to speak to. I have had some incredible conversations with people and been able to pray with them.

I remember one time I was talking to a lady on the train, whom I used to see going to London. She told me her friend’s mother was going into hospital for cancer treatment and asked me to pray for her. When I saw her again, she told me that because of the timing of the ambulance taking the mother to the hospital this patient had to spend a long time waiting around and this was causing her distress. I prayed for her, and as I did it occurred to me that I should give the lady a book that she could give her friend’s mother to read while she was waiting for the ambulance. The book that came into my mind, because it showed how powerful God is and how he can change anything was called “From Gang Land to Promised Land” by John Pridmore. When I got home, however, I just couldn’t find it anywhere. I felt really frustrated as I had such a heart for this book for the lady. The next morning, however, before I left the house, I found another copy of the book had appeared suddenly in our letterbox. I couldn’t believe it. I don’t know how it came to be there, because I discovered my own personal copy in the church library some time later. This seemed a confirmation that this was the book that God wanted me to pass on and I gave it to my friend the next day on the train.

I have had other conversations too. Another lady was worried that she couldn’t be saved because of all the wrong things she had done in her life. I was able to reassure her about this and about God’s love for her. Another lady was worried about her job and I was able to pray for her and God gave me some words of counsel. He has also given me a special heart for the homeless and instead of just giving them a few coins, I will take them for a cup of coffee and listen to their stories and pray for them. I remember one time I did this I found I came back with some extra fleas too. This just brought home to me how fortunate I have been in my life, and the suffering that some people quietly endure.

I always tried hard to do the right thing, even before I became a committed Christian, but because of this you can have unrealistic expectations of others and become very disappointed or hurt when they let you down. As time has gone on, however, God has helped me to realise that whenever this happens the pain you feel from your expectation not being achieved can be filled with God’s love if you let it and this helps you to stay in peace and forgive the person. God doesn’t just want the good bits in our life but all our pain and difficulties too so he can transform them into blessings. If we hold on to them, however, then he can’t do anything about it.

My passion is to love people

In the past, my primary concern I suppose was my work and my family’s needs. Now I would say my primary passion is simply to love people. When I talk to people it is not to convert them. It is just to let them know how much they are loved by God. I have always loved my family and my friends but it is as though God has widened my love now and made me to want to love everyone I meet, even the people I don’t get on with or find difficult in some way. Because I now know how much God loves me I feel I must share it with others. I spent so long just being aimless in my life, and now through the love of God my life has been so enriched, and I have done so many things, and met so many lovely people, that I want others to experience this love of God too.