“Conversion to God”

The title of this article enclosed in quotation marks refers to the so-called atheists who in the past did not believe in God but now have been converted and believe in God.

Without the quotation marks the expression, Conversion to God, generally refers to those who are in the processing of becoming more intimately united with God. These are the so-called Contemplatives and Mystics in our Church. They develop this intimacy through (1) more constant prayer, (2) more lengthy meditation and (3) more highly conscious contemplation.

Most of us are more or less successful practitioners of no. (1) and no. (2). There are very few among us who are successful in the area of no. 3. These are called contemplatives, or simply, mystics. Although the Church encourages those in no. 1 and no. 2 to move up to no. 3 but many experience a lot of difficulty due to the habit of thinking, which we need to pray and meditate, and the difficulty of not thinking which is the essence of contemplation.

Moreover, in prayer and meditation we can have mental images, thoughts, desires, feelings and aspirations. We believe we can know and experience God but only in an indirect way. Hence we can say the word “mental” refers to the various processes facilitated by our mind and intellect. In contemplation, we go to a higher experience of consciousness, in other words by “unknowing”, not thinking. This is the so-called area of the heart. The 17th century French philosopher Blaise Pascal put this truth in layman’s terms saying, “the heart has its reason which reason does not know.” Real, intimate, and personal knowledge and experience of God is made only by the human heart.