My Conversion
“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, behold, the new has come.” 2 Corinthians 5:17
Mine is a story of love. It is a testament to the unconditional, immense, constantly seeking love of God. It pays tribute to how He will wait, ever so patiently, for us to come to Him, even if it takes years or a lifetime. I truly believe that the longer we pretend that we don’t need Him, the worse the state of our being will become. Of course, some people are not even aware that He exists. That’s where my story begins….in the fog of atheism and the arrogance of youth.
I always remember feeling bad. I can’t really find a better way to explain it. A deep seeded feeling of malaise and heaviness. A crushing discontent that would never fully go away. I had no real reason for feeling this way, it seemed. I grew up in a loving family with two wonderful parents, both college educated but neither one particularly religious in a formal sense. Organized religion seemed more like a novelty or something very far away and esoteric to me as I was growing up. Honestly, I never really gave it much thought.
"They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them....."
My parents always made me feel like I could accomplish anything I put my mind to. Somewhere along the way, I lost the ability to see that fact for myself. My problems started in high school. I started hanging out with the “bad kids” and got into drugs and alcohol. My parents saw what was coming and tried to prevent my downfall, but I rebelled. I started changing schools and plummeting into a deep dark depression that would carry me downstream for 15 years of my life. The first time I attempted suicide, I was only 13 years old and in such a tormented place. I was cutting my body with razors every day and desperately wanted to die so that my suffering would end. There were so many days that I couldn’t even get out of bed. Only the grace of God kept me from taking my own life.
I continued down this road of drug addiction and criminal activity, which ultimately lead to multiple felony convictions as well as jail time. When I look at my mug shot from that time, I see the hollow eyes and the immense pain. I was consumed with self-hate. Drowning in my sorrow, I had lost all hope. At this point in my life, I really believed that there was no God, and we were all here by accident. I believed in evolution and had no patience to listen to those “crazy” religious people about humans having a “soul”. Christians particularly used to disgust me and I thought they were all ignorant and believed in magical thinking. I thought they were weak minded people who were just trying to make themselves feel better about dying. I never gave the thought of God a chance, not ever. I engaged in occult practices and was very promiscuous. I became addicted to pornography and could never feel satisfied, actively rebelling against my God given nature. The more I tried to fill the empty space inside, the emptier I became. It was almost as though my soul was a bottomless pit which could never be filled. I couldn't shake the feeling that something was missing, even though intellectually I vehemently denied it.
It was a miserable existence I lived, for I was not really alive. I truly was like the walking dead.
As the years went on, the consequences of my drug use became more severe. Like most people who go down the road of drug addiction my use of drugs progressed over time. I started abusing prescription opiates and from Oxycontin eventually graduated to heroin. The opiate epidemic we are facing is truly terrifying. Young people are dying every day and if it weren't for the grace of God, I would have been just another statistic.
The first time I ever tried heroin, I overdosed. I woke up strapped to a gurney in the ER, with a horrible pain in my chest. I later found out that the paramedics had to revive me with Narcan to reverse the effects of the heroin. My friend at the time just happened to come over to my apartment and saw through the open blinds, my lifeless body slouched on the couch. She broke in through the window to find my lips blueish/black....my tongue hanging out of my mouth. This sight terrified her, (she later told me) and she quickly called 911. To this day, I have no idea how long my brain was without oxygen, and yet I have absolutely no cognitive issues and my memory is still as sharp as it ever was. By His mercy, God would preserve my life and my mental faculties. He was right there with me, even though I didn't believe He existed.
"And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a base mind and to improper conduct."
Everyone in my life had finally conceded that I was beyond reproach, remorse, or possibly even rescue. In the worst part of it, during my years of active drug addiction, I had a vision of demons surrounding me one night in my motel room. While I am still unsure if these visions were a result of the drugs or they were real, or both…the desired effect was achieved by me seeing them. They were standing shoulder to shoulder and completely still, staring at me as I lay awake and terrified in my bed. They were standing the same way outside the window as well, looking in. The look on their faces, I can never forget. The pure hatred they had for me could be seen plainly on their faces...they looked almost 'hungry' for my soul. They all had the most terrifying smiles on their faces...it is a horror I cannot even begin to put into words. They had rotting flesh and rancid, putrid eyes. It seemed that something was keeping them back...a few feet from grabbing me. I got the impression internally that they were saying something like, "We can't get you now...but you're already ours. One day, you will die, then we will not be held back anymore and we will come for you.....we are patient." I got the impression that they were smiling because I was living my life in a pit of grievous sin and they knew that because of my choices, I belonged to them. I didn’t know it at the time, but it seems to me now that I was seeing straight into hell, looking at the fate of my own soul in a most disturbing way. I will never forget those things that I saw.....I can still see the room as I write this.
"...in order that satan should not outwit us...for we are not unaware of his schemes....."
Moving all around the country, homeless at times, I was trying to find that perfect city, where all my problems would magically go away. Obviously, the part that I was failing to realize was that I, in fact, was the problem. I followed myself everywhere I went. It was the same story, on what seemed to be a perpetual cycle of pain and misery. It’s hard to really describe the intensity of the physical, mental and spiritual pain of this time in my life. It was a living hell and I never thought I would escape it.
Then, when I was 24, my life would drastically change forever. I received a phone call that would set me on a path to meet God. It would be my earthly mother who God would use to reach me. The mother who refused to abort me back in 1985, risking her own life because of her lupus, to give me mine. This heroic woman, who had loved me all my life, had finally come to a point where, even she doubted God’s goodness. For so many years, she had prayed for me. She had always held out hope that one day, I would be saved. Year after year, it never came. She was at the point of giving up. I seemed like a lost cause and everyone else had given up hope. God, in His wisdom, knew that my mom needed something direct and supernatural to reach her. It seemed that my mother had more of a connection with God then I ever realized.....
We had always known that my mom had a “special gift”. She could tell us things before they happened. She would see things in a dream or a vision. Sometimes she would tell us about an event beforehand and we would witness it coming about. I just thought she was psychic or something but never really put much more thought into it. I was in Michigan at the time and she called me from Florida. I’ll never forget the sound of her voice that day. She was absolutely HYSTERICAL. I thought that my dad had been killed in Iraq or something equally as horrible had happened. I couldn’t understand what she was saying to me, she could barely breath and she was sobbing. I told her that I was going to hang up on her and then call her back in a minute after she calmed down. She was emotionally out of control.....
I did so, and when I called her back she said these words that I will never forget. “It’s all real, Meagan. It’s all real!” I said, “What’s real mom?!” She said, “Jesus, Angels, Heaven….it’s ALL REAL!” She then started telling me how she saw an Angel, or something like one, in her car, a bright blinding light that spoke to her. It appeared to her as she was driving down a busy road in the middle of the day and scared her almost to death. What she described to me was a ‘being’ of bright, brilliant light, so intense that she could not and dared not stare at it. She pulled over on the side of the road and could see it out of her peripheral vision. It began to speak to her for it had come to give her a message......
Its voice was neither male or female and it said clearly to her, “Don’t worry about Meagan, Meagan is going to be ok.” Then, it said three times, “Pentecost, Pentecost, Pentecost” and disappeared.
God had come crashing into human existence this day and changed the course of our lives forever.
The only way I can describe it is, when I heard my mom’s voice and I heard the words that she spoke, I INSTANTLY believed that God was real. My mother was the most mentally sound person you could ever meet. Everyone would agree to this fact. She surely was no "religious fanatic!" God knew that I would believe her, and He chose to use her voice to impart His grace.
The scales fell away from my eyes. The veil was lifted.
"Let him who has eyes see, and him who has ears HEAR."
I knew, in an instant, that Jesus was a real person and that this really happened. That Jesus was God. Christianity was true. All of it was true.
I’m reminded of the song Amazing Grace: “How precious did that grace appear, the hour I first believed.”
I had never heard of this strange word, “Pentecost” before and neither had my mom. So, I went straight to the computer to Google a definition which I read to my mom on the phone. This was the beginning of my journey. God had called me out of the darkness. Now, I would need to find out where He was. This process would take me six long and painful years.
"The Lord does not delay His promise, but He is patient with you....not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance...."
I was taken in by a Baptist church and I was given a Bible. I started to read it and yet my faith remained hollow. I was still living a life of drug addiction and promiscuity. I knew, intellectually that Jesus was real, but I didn’t feel Him in any real way. There was no sense of intimacy. The people who took me in to their church were so wonderful to me and helped me so much but something was still missing, I felt I had “accepted Him as my Lord and Savior" like I was told to do, (which, to my misunderstanding, basically meant saying the words), but I never felt any different. Nothing changed. I had the desire to amend my life and turn from my sinful ways, but I just didn’t have the strength to do it on my own. I needed supernatural strength to help me. These demons were massive and I was so small. I realized that on my own I could do nothing to stop them.
I had two children who were removed from my care by child protective services because of my drug addiction and poor parenting. One was adopted at birth and the other went to live with my parents. I put myself in a methadone program which I would stay in for 5 years, using it as a legal way to stay high. Eventually I would detox from of it after my second child was born addicted to methadone and taken from me. I continued this path of self-destruction. God was someone so far away, so hard to reach, even though the thought of Him was always in the back of my mind. Ultimately, my addiction took me to the darkest depths of homelessness and the daily use of IV heroin. I couldn’t stop; I was headed straight for death. The utter desolation and despair I experienced is something I will never forget.
"...left alone among the dead, like the slaughtered lying in the grave..... whom you remember no more......"
I ended up pregnant with my third child and this time, I was homeless in San Francisco, CA. One day, I couldn’t take it anymore, and I told God, “Just leave me alone! I never want to talk to you again!” I was so angry at God and I was blaming Him for all my bad decisions.
Some time went on and, thankfully, God did not respect my request.
After the despair of being without God set in, I recanted my previous position and called out to God again. I said, “I need to know where you are! Show me where you are God! If you don’t, I cannot live anymore!” I had been contemplating suicide and God answered me just in time. I walked into a church service in the City and asked them to help me. They were so kind and put me up in a hotel for the night. I was given a phone list of all the local shelters in the area and The Missionaries of Charity homeless shelter for pregnant women was the first name on the list. I called the Queen of Peace shelter the next day. Mother Superior said that they had a bed for me, and I should come now. I went right away.
Every day, at three o clock, one of the sisters would ring the bell in the hallway so we would know to come pray The Divine Mercy Chaplet with the sisters. I would spend extra time with them, asking them questions. They were so intriguing to me. I knew about their intense vow of poverty and was struck by their unshakable joy! They radiated happiness and love. I wondered how you could have "nothing" materially speaking, and be so happy! I had always thought that if I could just get enough of this or that, I would finally be happy. Happiness of course, never came. I could tell that what I was witnessing was authentic and that these sisters were genuine. And more than anything else, when they spoke about Jesus, I could tell that they ACTUALY knew Him! They were talking about someone they knew intimately. Yes, I instinctively knew that this was real.
God had crushed my pride enough through being homeless, breeding humility to prime me for this encounter. The humility allowed me to see the truth of the faith when it came to me.......in a white and blue sari, about four and a half feet tall. Such tiny women, but what mighty souls! Giants of faith and charity!
Oh how immense is His Divine Mercy for us! It is through praying the chaplet and the life of His sisters that Jesus softened my heart and made me aware of His life inside His Church.
Finally, I took one of the sisters aside and exclaimed, “You have something that I don’t but I desperately want .........Please, tell me about the Catholic Church.”
The sister told me plainly, "Well, Peter was the first Pope." She told me that the Catholic Church was the same Church that Jesus Himself had established. I knew that I had to be a part of it and to learn more. She told me about the classes I could take in order to be accepted into the Church called R.C.I.A, (Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults). I simply asked her, "When can I start?!"
"The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it...."
After coming face to face with my poverty, lost in the abyss of drug addiction, I reached out to the sisters for help. They made it possible for me to go into a residential program in the City and drove me there for intake. I went through RCIA inside the program thanks to my wonderful godmother who brought the classes to me where I lived. I was accepted into the Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil, 2015. I took the name Jude, the patron saint of hopeless cases, because surely, I was a hopeless case if there had ever been one. I had my son Judah while in this yearlong in-patient program and graduated with glowing reports. It was to be the first thing I ever finished in my life. After completion of my primary program, I entered a transitional program with the Salvation Army for 10 months, ultimately graduating from it as well. The same state that had taken my other children, after seeing all my accomplishments, eventually awarded me sole custody of my baby boy. I had redeemed myself in the eyes of the state and was declared a fit mother. I named the baby Judah the day I found out I was pregnant.
The mass reading from the day I took him home to the program, from the hospital, was "Weep no more, the Lion of the Tribe of Judah has triumphed."
Indeed, my years of weeping had come to an end. The Lion had triumphed.
I had proven to the state and to my family that I was truly rehabilitated. I was reunited with my parents finally after all that time away. My life was beginning to change.
After being received into the Church, I started to notice that I was changing; permanently, internally, spiritually, intellectually and morally. I started to think and feel differently. I was becoming a new person, literally experiencing a re-birth. I quit smoking cigarettes after 15 years of heavy use and I no longer needed my rescue inhaler and asthma medication. I stopped taking my antidepressants because I felt like I no longer needed them.
I never again drank alcohol or used drugs and to this day I have no desire to. In fact, the thought of my previous sins is repugnant to me. Nothing can compare to the love that I was feeling from God and the closeness I experienced through the Sacraments. Every other earthly pleasure I had experienced up until this point didn’t come close. I started thinking more about others than myself. The thoughts I had about continuing some of my sins began to quickly vanish. I began to not only follow all the teachings of the Church, but to fall deeply in love with them. Jesus was a real person to me. He became the object of my desire and the true love of my life. Without His Holy Spirit present within me, I could not have conquered these demons that had tormented me all my life. I had tried every way you can imagine for so many years. I really had found the answer! The thing I had been longing for my whole life, I had found. What an incredible grace to be so afflicted for so many years which led to my discovery of the faith!
I continued to change morally as time went on. I promised God a life of chastity after all my years of sexual sin and pornography addiction. His grace allows me true repulsion to these types of sins now....the thought of ever getting close to any of it again, makes my stomach turn.
Mother Angelica told me through the t.v screen that we are all called to be great saints! I started going to daily mass, regular confession and began to passionately study the faith. I couldn't get enough of the Catechism, the lives of the saints and the Scriptures. For a time, I was able to go to daily adoration which really helped me develop the beginnings of an interior life. I knew that I could show Jesus my love through fidelity to His apostles and their teachings. The Church had become my home.
I obtained the grace I needed to make my first confession. Going over all the years of my life, all the horrible sins, I confessed them all. It took me some time to read all three pages front and back to my priest. Sobbing, unable to look Father in the eyes, Jesus gave me the courage to complete it. After Father absolved me of my sins, I knew that something supernatural had taken place. God had not only forgiven me through this loving, holy man; He had taken my sins away. I really felt that the only way that He remembered me was the way I am now. Now I understood why Jesus instituted the Sacrament of confession. To hear the words of absolution was one of the greatest gifts I’ve been given. Now I could begin to forgive myself. I truly was a new creation walking out of that room.
"Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow...."
God had made a promise to my mother all those years ago......and He always keeps His word.
Quite often, people will open up to me about their personal struggles and ask me questions about the faith. I can see God using me to draw others to Himself and to the Sacraments. This brings me such joy.
I always say, “If you knew me before, and know me now, you could come to no other conclusion other than the Sacraments are real. Everything the Catholic Church proclaims must be true. The Church is truth itself."
My life is filled with a peace I cannot explain. After witnessing the transformation in my life, my father went back to confession after being away from the Church for forty years. I had the incredible honor of walking my dad to the priest and watching him go inside with Father with his confession on a list in his hand. He now attends mass every Sunday, with my mom and my daughter. I sponsored my mother through RCIA and she was accepted into the Church this Easter Vigil. She took the name Monica as was so fitting for surely, "it was impossible that a daughter of so many tears should perish." After so many years of trying many different treatments and doctors, with little success, my mom became convinced that the Sacraments of the Church had healed me. Once she witnessed the fullness of my transformation, she said to me, “I want what you have.”
I knew exactly how she felt....
The ripple effect had begun.....
Life is still hard at times, but looking back, the contrast is astounding. My sufferings now make sense to me, united to the cross of Christ. Without this understanding, my suffering seemed meaningless. God wanted a relationship with me for so long, and now I was starting to get to know Him. I know He loves me. I also know that He saved me for a reason, and I have a lot of work to do. My story is proof that miracles do happen; that no one is "too far gone" for God to reach.
I remember how it felt to be invisible and to feel almost subhuman and abandoned by everyone when I was homeless. I have a special love in my heart for people the world scorns and throws away. I’m involved with three different ministries in Portland that involve street evangelization. It is such a joy to be able to share my story of conversion with others and to show them how much they are loved and cherished by God. I tell people to not be afraid of confession. I tell them that no sin they have ever committed is too big for God to forgive..... He is just waiting for them to ask.
Addiction is a real problem in our society and it must be reckoned with. There are so many different treatments available for addiction, all of them miss the mark. Trying to fill the void within us with the pleasures of the world will never satisfy. What all of us are searching for is Him, and we will never be satisfied until we find Him. Jesus preserved my life to be a living witness of this.....
"It's real.....It's all real....."
I now live in my own house and I drive a car. I go to college and I pay taxes. These “little things” were a big accomplishment for someone who was homeless and destitute. I moved to Virginia to attend a Catholic liberal arts college called Christendom. They are allowing me to pursue my BA and MA at the same time. I am set to graduate with my Bachelor of Arts in History in May 2021 and my Masters in Theology in August 2021. After I graduate, I plan on attending the Dominican House of Studies in Washington DC to pursue the ecclesiastical degree, ultimately ending in the Sacred Theology Doctorate. I want to teach theology at the college level and my area of concentration will be in Moral Theology and Ethics. Teaching at a Seminary and being of service to forming future priests would be my dream job.
My parents finally could help me and my children as they had wanted to for so many years. They support me while I’m going to college and it is such a great gift. I have such a deep appreciation for these things that I took for granted before I became homeless. A shower every day, food to eat, a bed to sleep in. Clean clothes to wear. Safety, away from the rain and cold.
The daughter who was taken away and went to go live with my parents has been reconciled with me. Even though she still lives with them, we have a relationship now. Her five-year-old brother, the little baby who I was pregnant with in San Francisco, is with me and is a thriving, beautiful little boy. My first son was adopted by a loving family and I hope to one day get to meet him. Giving him life and then giving him up for adoption was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.
I also was blessed to find a nonprofit in Portland that helped me remove all my tattoos with a laser. Little by little, they are disappearing.
One of the best jobs I ever had was to work for the Dominican Friars at the parish in Portland, volunteering as a caregiver for our 102 year old priest. He was such a blessing to me and really helped form me spiritually. I was very involved in the pro-life movement in Portland and was one of the local 40 days for life leaders. To stand and pray at these abortion clinics, and to share my story with some of the women going in for an abortion, especially regarding the adoption of my first son, has been such an incredible experience. The goodness of God can shine through us if we just let it happen.
I not only believe this, I know it. I know it because I’ve lived a transformation that cannot be explained away.
Jesus saved me, through His Church, from a life of torment and surely an eternity in hell. I want to be like the leper who came back to thank Him. I so much relate to St. Mary Magdalene, the sinful women who loved our Lord so much for His mercy shown toward her. I am the servant who was forgiven the much higher debt by the master, and in turn burns with love for Him.
"Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted....."
Now, the work begins. With a grateful heart, I look forward to the joys and sorrows in this life as well as hope in the life to come. Most of all, I’m waiting for the day, if I persevere to the end, when I will get to meet Jesus face to face and hopefully hear the words.......
“Well done, good and faithful servant.......well done.”
“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, behold, the new has come.” 2 Corinthians 5:17
Mine is a story of love. It is a testament to the unconditional, immense, constantly seeking love of God. It pays tribute to how He will wait, ever so patiently, for us to come to Him, even if it takes years or a lifetime. I truly believe that the longer we pretend that we don’t need Him, the worse the state of our being will become. Of course, some people are not even aware that He exists. That’s where my story begins….in the fog of atheism and the arrogance of youth.
I always remember feeling bad. I can’t really find a better way to explain it. A deep seeded feeling of malaise and heaviness. A crushing discontent that would never fully go away. I had no real reason for feeling this way, it seemed. I grew up in a loving family with two wonderful parents, both college educated but neither one particularly religious in a formal sense. Organized religion seemed more like a novelty or something very far away and esoteric to me as I was growing up. Honestly, I never really gave it much thought.
"They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them....."
My parents always made me feel like I could accomplish anything I put my mind to. Somewhere along the way, I lost the ability to see that fact for myself. My problems started in high school. I started hanging out with the “bad kids” and got into drugs and alcohol. My parents saw what was coming and tried to prevent my downfall, but I rebelled. I started changing schools and plummeting into a deep dark depression that would carry me downstream for 15 years of my life. The first time I attempted suicide, I was only 13 years old and in such a tormented place. I was cutting my body with razors every day and desperately wanted to die so that my suffering would end. There were so many days that I couldn’t even get out of bed. Only the grace of God kept me from taking my own life.
I continued down this road of drug addiction and criminal activity, which ultimately lead to multiple felony convictions as well as jail time. When I look at my mug shot from that time, I see the hollow eyes and the immense pain. I was consumed with self-hate. Drowning in my sorrow, I had lost all hope. At this point in my life, I really believed that there was no God, and we were all here by accident. I believed in evolution and had no patience to listen to those “crazy” religious people about humans having a “soul”. Christians particularly used to disgust me and I thought they were all ignorant and believed in magical thinking. I thought they were weak minded people who were just trying to make themselves feel better about dying. I never gave the thought of God a chance, not ever. I engaged in occult practices and was very promiscuous. I became addicted to pornography and could never feel satisfied, actively rebelling against my God given nature. The more I tried to fill the empty space inside, the emptier I became. It was almost as though my soul was a bottomless pit which could never be filled. I couldn't shake the feeling that something was missing, even though intellectually I vehemently denied it.
It was a miserable existence I lived, for I was not really alive. I truly was like the walking dead.
As the years went on, the consequences of my drug use became more severe. Like most people who go down the road of drug addiction my use of drugs progressed over time. I started abusing prescription opiates and from Oxycontin eventually graduated to heroin. The opiate epidemic we are facing is truly terrifying. Young people are dying every day and if it weren't for the grace of God, I would have been just another statistic.
The first time I ever tried heroin, I overdosed. I woke up strapped to a gurney in the ER, with a horrible pain in my chest. I later found out that the paramedics had to revive me with Narcan to reverse the effects of the heroin. My friend at the time just happened to come over to my apartment and saw through the open blinds, my lifeless body slouched on the couch. She broke in through the window to find my lips blueish/black....my tongue hanging out of my mouth. This sight terrified her, (she later told me) and she quickly called 911. To this day, I have no idea how long my brain was without oxygen, and yet I have absolutely no cognitive issues and my memory is still as sharp as it ever was. By His mercy, God would preserve my life and my mental faculties. He was right there with me, even though I didn't believe He existed.
"And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a base mind and to improper conduct."
Everyone in my life had finally conceded that I was beyond reproach, remorse, or possibly even rescue. In the worst part of it, during my years of active drug addiction, I had a vision of demons surrounding me one night in my motel room. While I am still unsure if these visions were a result of the drugs or they were real, or both…the desired effect was achieved by me seeing them. They were standing shoulder to shoulder and completely still, staring at me as I lay awake and terrified in my bed. They were standing the same way outside the window as well, looking in. The look on their faces, I can never forget. The pure hatred they had for me could be seen plainly on their faces...they looked almost 'hungry' for my soul. They all had the most terrifying smiles on their faces...it is a horror I cannot even begin to put into words. They had rotting flesh and rancid, putrid eyes. It seemed that something was keeping them back...a few feet from grabbing me. I got the impression internally that they were saying something like, "We can't get you now...but you're already ours. One day, you will die, then we will not be held back anymore and we will come for you.....we are patient." I got the impression that they were smiling because I was living my life in a pit of grievous sin and they knew that because of my choices, I belonged to them. I didn’t know it at the time, but it seems to me now that I was seeing straight into hell, looking at the fate of my own soul in a most disturbing way. I will never forget those things that I saw.....I can still see the room as I write this.
"...in order that satan should not outwit us...for we are not unaware of his schemes....."
Moving all around the country, homeless at times, I was trying to find that perfect city, where all my problems would magically go away. Obviously, the part that I was failing to realize was that I, in fact, was the problem. I followed myself everywhere I went. It was the same story, on what seemed to be a perpetual cycle of pain and misery. It’s hard to really describe the intensity of the physical, mental and spiritual pain of this time in my life. It was a living hell and I never thought I would escape it.
Then, when I was 24, my life would drastically change forever. I received a phone call that would set me on a path to meet God. It would be my earthly mother who God would use to reach me. The mother who refused to abort me back in 1985, risking her own life because of her lupus, to give me mine. This heroic woman, who had loved me all my life, had finally come to a point where, even she doubted God’s goodness. For so many years, she had prayed for me. She had always held out hope that one day, I would be saved. Year after year, it never came. She was at the point of giving up. I seemed like a lost cause and everyone else had given up hope. God, in His wisdom, knew that my mom needed something direct and supernatural to reach her. It seemed that my mother had more of a connection with God then I ever realized.....
We had always known that my mom had a “special gift”. She could tell us things before they happened. She would see things in a dream or a vision. Sometimes she would tell us about an event beforehand and we would witness it coming about. I just thought she was psychic or something but never really put much more thought into it. I was in Michigan at the time and she called me from Florida. I’ll never forget the sound of her voice that day. She was absolutely HYSTERICAL. I thought that my dad had been killed in Iraq or something equally as horrible had happened. I couldn’t understand what she was saying to me, she could barely breath and she was sobbing. I told her that I was going to hang up on her and then call her back in a minute after she calmed down. She was emotionally out of control.....
I did so, and when I called her back she said these words that I will never forget. “It’s all real, Meagan. It’s all real!” I said, “What’s real mom?!” She said, “Jesus, Angels, Heaven….it’s ALL REAL!” She then started telling me how she saw an Angel, or something like one, in her car, a bright blinding light that spoke to her. It appeared to her as she was driving down a busy road in the middle of the day and scared her almost to death. What she described to me was a ‘being’ of bright, brilliant light, so intense that she could not and dared not stare at it. She pulled over on the side of the road and could see it out of her peripheral vision. It began to speak to her for it had come to give her a message......
Its voice was neither male or female and it said clearly to her, “Don’t worry about Meagan, Meagan is going to be ok.” Then, it said three times, “Pentecost, Pentecost, Pentecost” and disappeared.
God had come crashing into human existence this day and changed the course of our lives forever.
The only way I can describe it is, when I heard my mom’s voice and I heard the words that she spoke, I INSTANTLY believed that God was real. My mother was the most mentally sound person you could ever meet. Everyone would agree to this fact. She surely was no "religious fanatic!" God knew that I would believe her, and He chose to use her voice to impart His grace.
The scales fell away from my eyes. The veil was lifted.
"Let him who has eyes see, and him who has ears HEAR."
I knew, in an instant, that Jesus was a real person and that this really happened. That Jesus was God. Christianity was true. All of it was true.
I’m reminded of the song Amazing Grace: “How precious did that grace appear, the hour I first believed.”
I had never heard of this strange word, “Pentecost” before and neither had my mom. So, I went straight to the computer to Google a definition which I read to my mom on the phone. This was the beginning of my journey. God had called me out of the darkness. Now, I would need to find out where He was. This process would take me six long and painful years.
"The Lord does not delay His promise, but He is patient with you....not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance...."
I was taken in by a Baptist church and I was given a Bible. I started to read it and yet my faith remained hollow. I was still living a life of drug addiction and promiscuity. I knew, intellectually that Jesus was real, but I didn’t feel Him in any real way. There was no sense of intimacy. The people who took me in to their church were so wonderful to me and helped me so much but something was still missing, I felt I had “accepted Him as my Lord and Savior" like I was told to do, (which, to my misunderstanding, basically meant saying the words), but I never felt any different. Nothing changed. I had the desire to amend my life and turn from my sinful ways, but I just didn’t have the strength to do it on my own. I needed supernatural strength to help me. These demons were massive and I was so small. I realized that on my own I could do nothing to stop them.
I had two children who were removed from my care by child protective services because of my drug addiction and poor parenting. One was adopted at birth and the other went to live with my parents. I put myself in a methadone program which I would stay in for 5 years, using it as a legal way to stay high. Eventually I would detox from of it after my second child was born addicted to methadone and taken from me. I continued this path of self-destruction. God was someone so far away, so hard to reach, even though the thought of Him was always in the back of my mind. Ultimately, my addiction took me to the darkest depths of homelessness and the daily use of IV heroin. I couldn’t stop; I was headed straight for death. The utter desolation and despair I experienced is something I will never forget.
"...left alone among the dead, like the slaughtered lying in the grave..... whom you remember no more......"
I ended up pregnant with my third child and this time, I was homeless in San Francisco, CA. One day, I couldn’t take it anymore, and I told God, “Just leave me alone! I never want to talk to you again!” I was so angry at God and I was blaming Him for all my bad decisions.
Some time went on and, thankfully, God did not respect my request.
After the despair of being without God set in, I recanted my previous position and called out to God again. I said, “I need to know where you are! Show me where you are God! If you don’t, I cannot live anymore!” I had been contemplating suicide and God answered me just in time. I walked into a church service in the City and asked them to help me. They were so kind and put me up in a hotel for the night. I was given a phone list of all the local shelters in the area and The Missionaries of Charity homeless shelter for pregnant women was the first name on the list. I called the Queen of Peace shelter the next day. Mother Superior said that they had a bed for me, and I should come now. I went right away.
Every day, at three o clock, one of the sisters would ring the bell in the hallway so we would know to come pray The Divine Mercy Chaplet with the sisters. I would spend extra time with them, asking them questions. They were so intriguing to me. I knew about their intense vow of poverty and was struck by their unshakable joy! They radiated happiness and love. I wondered how you could have "nothing" materially speaking, and be so happy! I had always thought that if I could just get enough of this or that, I would finally be happy. Happiness of course, never came. I could tell that what I was witnessing was authentic and that these sisters were genuine. And more than anything else, when they spoke about Jesus, I could tell that they ACTUALY knew Him! They were talking about someone they knew intimately. Yes, I instinctively knew that this was real.
God had crushed my pride enough through being homeless, breeding humility to prime me for this encounter. The humility allowed me to see the truth of the faith when it came to me.......in a white and blue sari, about four and a half feet tall. Such tiny women, but what mighty souls! Giants of faith and charity!
Oh how immense is His Divine Mercy for us! It is through praying the chaplet and the life of His sisters that Jesus softened my heart and made me aware of His life inside His Church.
Finally, I took one of the sisters aside and exclaimed, “You have something that I don’t but I desperately want .........Please, tell me about the Catholic Church.”
The sister told me plainly, "Well, Peter was the first Pope." She told me that the Catholic Church was the same Church that Jesus Himself had established. I knew that I had to be a part of it and to learn more. She told me about the classes I could take in order to be accepted into the Church called R.C.I.A, (Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults). I simply asked her, "When can I start?!"
"The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it...."
After coming face to face with my poverty, lost in the abyss of drug addiction, I reached out to the sisters for help. They made it possible for me to go into a residential program in the City and drove me there for intake. I went through RCIA inside the program thanks to my wonderful godmother who brought the classes to me where I lived. I was accepted into the Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil, 2015. I took the name Jude, the patron saint of hopeless cases, because surely, I was a hopeless case if there had ever been one. I had my son Judah while in this yearlong in-patient program and graduated with glowing reports. It was to be the first thing I ever finished in my life. After completion of my primary program, I entered a transitional program with the Salvation Army for 10 months, ultimately graduating from it as well. The same state that had taken my other children, after seeing all my accomplishments, eventually awarded me sole custody of my baby boy. I had redeemed myself in the eyes of the state and was declared a fit mother. I named the baby Judah the day I found out I was pregnant.
The mass reading from the day I took him home to the program, from the hospital, was "Weep no more, the Lion of the Tribe of Judah has triumphed."
Indeed, my years of weeping had come to an end. The Lion had triumphed.
I had proven to the state and to my family that I was truly rehabilitated. I was reunited with my parents finally after all that time away. My life was beginning to change.
After being received into the Church, I started to notice that I was changing; permanently, internally, spiritually, intellectually and morally. I started to think and feel differently. I was becoming a new person, literally experiencing a re-birth. I quit smoking cigarettes after 15 years of heavy use and I no longer needed my rescue inhaler and asthma medication. I stopped taking my antidepressants because I felt like I no longer needed them.
I never again drank alcohol or used drugs and to this day I have no desire to. In fact, the thought of my previous sins is repugnant to me. Nothing can compare to the love that I was feeling from God and the closeness I experienced through the Sacraments. Every other earthly pleasure I had experienced up until this point didn’t come close. I started thinking more about others than myself. The thoughts I had about continuing some of my sins began to quickly vanish. I began to not only follow all the teachings of the Church, but to fall deeply in love with them. Jesus was a real person to me. He became the object of my desire and the true love of my life. Without His Holy Spirit present within me, I could not have conquered these demons that had tormented me all my life. I had tried every way you can imagine for so many years. I really had found the answer! The thing I had been longing for my whole life, I had found. What an incredible grace to be so afflicted for so many years which led to my discovery of the faith!
I continued to change morally as time went on. I promised God a life of chastity after all my years of sexual sin and pornography addiction. His grace allows me true repulsion to these types of sins now....the thought of ever getting close to any of it again, makes my stomach turn.
Mother Angelica told me through the t.v screen that we are all called to be great saints! I started going to daily mass, regular confession and began to passionately study the faith. I couldn't get enough of the Catechism, the lives of the saints and the Scriptures. For a time, I was able to go to daily adoration which really helped me develop the beginnings of an interior life. I knew that I could show Jesus my love through fidelity to His apostles and their teachings. The Church had become my home.
I obtained the grace I needed to make my first confession. Going over all the years of my life, all the horrible sins, I confessed them all. It took me some time to read all three pages front and back to my priest. Sobbing, unable to look Father in the eyes, Jesus gave me the courage to complete it. After Father absolved me of my sins, I knew that something supernatural had taken place. God had not only forgiven me through this loving, holy man; He had taken my sins away. I really felt that the only way that He remembered me was the way I am now. Now I understood why Jesus instituted the Sacrament of confession. To hear the words of absolution was one of the greatest gifts I’ve been given. Now I could begin to forgive myself. I truly was a new creation walking out of that room.
"Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow...."
God had made a promise to my mother all those years ago......and He always keeps His word.
Quite often, people will open up to me about their personal struggles and ask me questions about the faith. I can see God using me to draw others to Himself and to the Sacraments. This brings me such joy.
I always say, “If you knew me before, and know me now, you could come to no other conclusion other than the Sacraments are real. Everything the Catholic Church proclaims must be true. The Church is truth itself."
My life is filled with a peace I cannot explain. After witnessing the transformation in my life, my father went back to confession after being away from the Church for forty years. I had the incredible honor of walking my dad to the priest and watching him go inside with Father with his confession on a list in his hand. He now attends mass every Sunday, with my mom and my daughter. I sponsored my mother through RCIA and she was accepted into the Church this Easter Vigil. She took the name Monica as was so fitting for surely, "it was impossible that a daughter of so many tears should perish." After so many years of trying many different treatments and doctors, with little success, my mom became convinced that the Sacraments of the Church had healed me. Once she witnessed the fullness of my transformation, she said to me, “I want what you have.”
I knew exactly how she felt....
The ripple effect had begun.....
Life is still hard at times, but looking back, the contrast is astounding. My sufferings now make sense to me, united to the cross of Christ. Without this understanding, my suffering seemed meaningless. God wanted a relationship with me for so long, and now I was starting to get to know Him. I know He loves me. I also know that He saved me for a reason, and I have a lot of work to do. My story is proof that miracles do happen; that no one is "too far gone" for God to reach.
I remember how it felt to be invisible and to feel almost subhuman and abandoned by everyone when I was homeless. I have a special love in my heart for people the world scorns and throws away. I’m involved with three different ministries in Portland that involve street evangelization. It is such a joy to be able to share my story of conversion with others and to show them how much they are loved and cherished by God. I tell people to not be afraid of confession. I tell them that no sin they have ever committed is too big for God to forgive..... He is just waiting for them to ask.
Addiction is a real problem in our society and it must be reckoned with. There are so many different treatments available for addiction, all of them miss the mark. Trying to fill the void within us with the pleasures of the world will never satisfy. What all of us are searching for is Him, and we will never be satisfied until we find Him. Jesus preserved my life to be a living witness of this.....
"It's real.....It's all real....."
I now live in my own house and I drive a car. I go to college and I pay taxes. These “little things” were a big accomplishment for someone who was homeless and destitute. I moved to Virginia to attend a Catholic liberal arts college called Christendom. They are allowing me to pursue my BA and MA at the same time. I am set to graduate with my Bachelor of Arts in History in May 2021 and my Masters in Theology in August 2021. After I graduate, I plan on attending the Dominican House of Studies in Washington DC to pursue the ecclesiastical degree, ultimately ending in the Sacred Theology Doctorate. I want to teach theology at the college level and my area of concentration will be in Moral Theology and Ethics. Teaching at a Seminary and being of service to forming future priests would be my dream job.
My parents finally could help me and my children as they had wanted to for so many years. They support me while I’m going to college and it is such a great gift. I have such a deep appreciation for these things that I took for granted before I became homeless. A shower every day, food to eat, a bed to sleep in. Clean clothes to wear. Safety, away from the rain and cold.
The daughter who was taken away and went to go live with my parents has been reconciled with me. Even though she still lives with them, we have a relationship now. Her five-year-old brother, the little baby who I was pregnant with in San Francisco, is with me and is a thriving, beautiful little boy. My first son was adopted by a loving family and I hope to one day get to meet him. Giving him life and then giving him up for adoption was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.
I also was blessed to find a nonprofit in Portland that helped me remove all my tattoos with a laser. Little by little, they are disappearing.
One of the best jobs I ever had was to work for the Dominican Friars at the parish in Portland, volunteering as a caregiver for our 102 year old priest. He was such a blessing to me and really helped form me spiritually. I was very involved in the pro-life movement in Portland and was one of the local 40 days for life leaders. To stand and pray at these abortion clinics, and to share my story with some of the women going in for an abortion, especially regarding the adoption of my first son, has been such an incredible experience. The goodness of God can shine through us if we just let it happen.
I not only believe this, I know it. I know it because I’ve lived a transformation that cannot be explained away.
Jesus saved me, through His Church, from a life of torment and surely an eternity in hell. I want to be like the leper who came back to thank Him. I so much relate to St. Mary Magdalene, the sinful women who loved our Lord so much for His mercy shown toward her. I am the servant who was forgiven the much higher debt by the master, and in turn burns with love for Him.
"Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted....."
Now, the work begins. With a grateful heart, I look forward to the joys and sorrows in this life as well as hope in the life to come. Most of all, I’m waiting for the day, if I persevere to the end, when I will get to meet Jesus face to face and hopefully hear the words.......
“Well done, good and faithful servant.......well done.”
The day I had waited for all my life, the Easter Vigil. I am accepted into the Church along side my godmother and my fellow catechumens. My life would never be the same.