Windex for the Soul

I commute over one hundred miles round trip a day for work. I am spending between three and four hours a day driving. The radio is my sole entertainment. My preference changes from day to day and I jump from political talk radio to music to CDs of my beloved Jimmy Buffett. One day out of sheer boredom I decided to play radio roulette and spin the dial. Where it came to rest had a profound effect on my life and my walk on this road to Damascus.

The dial read 930AM out of Joliet, Illinois and the station was Relevant Radio, a Catholic radio alternative to EWTN. The priest’s voice I heard coming from the speakers was Father Richard Simon and the show was Go ask your Father. It is a call-in show where people can ask any question they have about the Lord, the faith or the Church. Father fielded the questions giving the nuts and bolts answers in a way anyone could understand.  He did so with charity and humility.  Humility – that was something I rarely heard on political talk radio. It was refreshing. I was interested.

I tuned in the next day. It was a different Father but the show was the same. I came to learn that the show was hosted by a core of three priests with an occasional guest priest filling any holes that came about. I liked all the priests but Father Simon was my favorite. He was a man after my own heart who could teach obscure facts with even more obscure humor. He knew how to laugh at himself and was always charitable, especially with those who just didn’t get it. Father Simon became so popular that Relevant Radio gave him his own show – Father Simon Says.  He now does a bible study of the daily readings as well as answer questions from callers. Most enjoyable are his harangues on any number of subjects concerning the Church and the faith. I was hooked.

Father Simon quickly became my favorite person to listen to. I worked backwards through his pod casts and his writings. Soon the Lutheran walls around my Catholic faith began to crumble as I learned why the Church does what it does. It was like looking through a window with forty years of grime on it. I couldn’t see anything clearly and therefore questioned the very fundamentals I claimed to believe. Father Simon cleaned that window allowing me to see the truth as never before. The truth will set you free and I was now free to grow in my faith in profound and monumental ways. So began my true conversion and I walked this road with new sight and understanding.

I am saved by grace through faith but if I had to give credit to those who brought me to Christ they would be:

My parents for believing faith instruction was something to be passed on.

Pastor Mueller for baptizing me.
Pastor Stienkie for confirming me.
Father Mullane for converting me.
Bishop Doran for accepting me.
Father Ariel Valencia for welcoming me home.

And special appreciation goes to Father Richard Simon for his continued instruction on what it means and takes to be a true Catholic in this world. His teaching broke my Lutheran mindset and was the instrumental force behind my second, my full conversion to the Catholic faith. If I had not found Relevant Radio and Father Simon I may have never found my way home.

 

God provides for all. Sometimes he will give you exactly what you need. Sometimes he gives you more. When he gives you more he provides you to someone else in need. He provided what I needed when I needed it but there is always a reason why.

 

To learn more about Relevant Radio check out their website:

 http://www.relevantradio.com/

 

To learn more about Father Simon or to enjoy one of his harangues start with his blog:

 

http://reverendknow-it-all.blogspot.com/                                  

Father Richard Simon