PROVIDENCE – When Kimberly Grubb moved to Rhode Island from Texas she felt like she had entered another world, and a snowy one at that. "When I moved to the state I kind of felt like I was in a world of my own," she said. She found comfort in church.
So, she decided to do something that she had been meaning to do for a long time – she began the process of being initiated into the Catholic Church. "I just felt like God has always been with me," she said. "I felt like I should've done it a long time ago."
Grubb attends St. Lucy Church in Middletown, a parish that she chose because it "felt like home."
Last Sunday afternoon, she and nearly 300 others participated in the Rite of Election at the Cathedral of SS. Peter and Paul, bringing them one step closer to being full members of the Church. Eighty-six of those were catechumens who are preparing to be baptized, receive the Eucharist and be confirmed during Easter Vigil Masses. More than 200 others, like Grubb, are candidates who have been baptized already and are preparing to receive the Eucharist and be confirmed.
The Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults, RCIA, is an ancient rite, according to Dr. Joseph Sinwell, diocesan director of religious education. But after changes made during Vatican II, it was reestablished in 1988. Adults who decide to convert to Catholicism or return to the Church after having fallen away receive religious education before receiving the sacraments and being welcomed into the Church. The program, which is offered at the parish level, takes about ten months to complete and culminates with Easter vigil rites of initiation in each parish. Each catechumen or candidate has a sponsor who helps them along their journey.
Last weekend's ceremony was a diocese-wide event, but much of the RCIA process occurs in the parish. Prior to the rite of election and the call to continuing conversion ceremonies that were celebrated at the Cathedral, the catechumens and candidates attended Masses at their home parishes, where they were called in front of the parish in a ceremony called the Sending Forth.
"When you bring somebody into the community... it's the responsibility of the community to welcome that person," Sinwell said. "It takes a community to initiate someone," he added.
During the Rite of Election those converts to Catholicism who will be baptized on Easter and their godparents were called to the altar by Bishop Thomas J. Tobin. Each catechumen signed the Book of the Elect, a document that will be kept in the Cathedral and records the names of all converts in the Diocese of Providence. For those candidates who have already been baptized but will receive the Eucharist and confirmation on Easter, the ceremony involved their sponsors putting a hand on their shoulder and affirming to the Assembly that the candidates have participated in the religious education of the RCIA process and that their faith has advanced.
After the Sunday afternoon ceremony Grubb was excited about her upcoming confirmation. "It really hit me that what I'm doing is important and the Church is supporting me," she said.
Jason Coppa is a 20-year-old student at the University of Rhode Island and is preparing to receive the Eucharist and to be confirmed on Easter at Christ the King parish in Kingston. He was baptized in a Catholic ceremony but raised in a Unitarian household. When he was drawn back to the Church recently, he said he has received a lot of support from his family. His aunt is his godmother and accompanied him to the Cathedral ceremony. Coppa said that his parents had wanted him to have options when he was an adult, which is why they chose to baptize him in the Catholic Church. "It turned out that I wanted a closer relationship with God," he said, adding, "I found a faith community that I really, really like."
For Coppa, last weekend's ceremony was one stop on what he hopes will be a lifelong faith journey. "It's always going to be about the journey," he said. "I'm still obviously trying to figure out what it's going to mean to me."
Grubb echoed his sentiment; she said that with her upcoming initiation on Easter the RCIA leaders at St. Lucy will be "releasing me into the world... but it's always going to be a continuing journey."
