130 How a Millennial Mormon Discovered the Catholic Church
The Art of Catholic with Matthew Leonard
Matthew Leonard
4.9 • 831 Ratings
🗓️ 1 June 2023
⏱️ 76 minutes
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Summary
When I asked my parish priest who the new guy with the blond ponytail in our parish was, I had no idea his conversion story would be so compelling that I'd end up asking him to be a guest on the Art of Catholic Podcast!
In fact, Stephen Johnson's entire life story is a fascinating journey, one that took him from the Mormon faith of his childhood through atheism, New Age beliefs, and Evangelical Protestantism, and finally home to the Catholic Church.
And all this while serving in the military as an Air Force Pararescueman, one of the most intense special mission units in the Armed Forces!
You've GOT to give this episode a listen.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is the art of Catholic. |
| 0:05.7 | You know how there are certain people when you see them at Mass? |
| 0:15.2 | You just kind of like, what's this guy's story? |
| 0:17.4 | I don't know, maybe it's just me, but close through about a year or so ago, I started |
| 0:21.0 | seeing this dude come to Mass at my parish. |
| 0:23.4 | Ooh, but it's just obviously a little bit of a different |
| 0:25.8 | hill. I live in Stubenville which is a very Italian area and he obviously was not. First of all his |
| 0:34.1 | vowel or his name did not end in a vowel it's Johnson and also we had this long blonde hair that |
| 0:39.5 | was naturally blonde so obviously this guy again was an Italian but there was something else about him that I just kind of couldn't I couldn't put my finger on. And I remember talking |
| 0:48.9 | to my parish priest about all the different families that were moving to our parish |
| 0:52.8 | because we're exploding in my church. And I said, well, what about the blonde guy with |
| 0:57.1 | the ponytail? Like what's his story? He said, oh, you got to meet him. He's got a great story. He's a convert for Mormonism. I thought, well, all right, that's different. And so my wife and I had, he and his family over for a Sunday brunch. We got to know them. |
| 1:10.5 | I love this story and I thought it would be great to share it with you guys. So let me just give you |
| 1:14.4 | the tale of tape real quickly. His name is Steven Johnson and he is a husband and father. He's a former Air Force Pararecumon. We're gonna hear what that is in a second. A former Mormon, former New Age, |
| 1:26.0 | or former Evangelical Protestant. |
| 1:28.2 | He got a bachelor's degree in theology |
| 1:30.0 | and biblical studies at Liberty University. |
| 1:32.2 | And for those of you who are cradle Catholics, |
| 1:33.8 | that's a Protestant school in Virginia |
| 1:35.2 | that was founded by Jerry Falwell. |
| 1:37.7 | He's now pursuing a Master's in theology |
| 1:40.7 | at Franciscan University of Stubenville and he came into the church just a couple of years ago. |
... |
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