After years of curiousity and study, 17-year-old Chase de Saint-Felix made his own decision to join the Catholic Church, asking his teacher at Catholic High School, Brother Richard Sanker, to serve as his sponsor.Through a personal search that began in junior high school, 17-year-old Chase de Saint-Felix decided to become Catholic entirely on his own. The Catholic High School junior will be baptized, confirmed and receive his first holy Communion at the Easter Vigil Mass at Christ the King Church in Little Rock. He calls it “getting the works.”
“My mom’s feeling was, ’don’t baptize them and force them into something, because later on, this may not be what they want,’” he said referring to himself and 12-year-old sister, Skye. “So now I’ve decided this is what I want.”
He always considered himself a Christian, but in the eighth grade he started asking himself what that meant. What did he really believe? The yearning to belong to a faith community began to tug at his heart, so his search began.
In a nondenominational religion class at a Little Rock private Christian school, he first heard the word, “Catholic.” But it wasn’t defined in a particularly positive light.
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The debate sparked between his religion teacher and two Catholic classmates brought up topics he had never heard before and it made him curious, so he listened intently.
“I started looking and trying to figure out, ’What is closely affiliated with what I believe?’” he said. “My family’s Christian, (but) they didn’t go to a church.”
He searched the Internet, visited two churches and he asked a lot of questions of people he would meet when he found out what church they attended.
“If (a church) said something I wasn’t sure of, I would just go to the Bible and look at the verse it was quoting,” he said.
Then de Saint-Felix decided to attend Catholic High School in ninth grade because he wanted to get into a good college. Little did he know then, his educational experience there would be about much more than academics.
He said his freshman religion class gave him the chance to get to know his teachers when they shared their personal faith stories.
“Slowly I started to pick up little tidbits and facts,” he said, like the Immaculate Conception, for example.
“I had no idea what that was.”
De Saint-Felix said he started to ask a lot of questions like, “What does this word, ’saint,’ mean?”
He discovered a whole new experience unlike any of the other religions he had encountered and began to think, “Maybe this is something I should look into.”
His first Mass was “a trip.”
“That was probably one of the scariest experiences of my life,” he said of the all-school Mass.
The entire student body was there and all he could think of was, “I’m going to mess it up and everyone’s going to know and everyone’s going to look at me.”
Through homilies, de Saint-Felix said he experienced the force known as Msgr. Lawrence A. Frederick, the school’s rector.
“Father Fred is the voice of God,” he said. “He is both vengeful and justice and loving at the same time. He can scare the pants off of you and be the most compassionate, loving person — all at the same time.”
But Brother Richard Sanker, CFP, made the biggest impression on de Saint-Felix from the first day they met during freshman registration.
Brother Richard was de Saint-Felix’s French teacher his freshman and sophomore years. He is also the school’s guidance counselor.
“He’s just such a great teacher,” de Saint-Felix said. “He’s slow, understanding and he really works with you on materials.”
And then there were the “lamp chats.”
Brother Richard turned off the lights and turned on a lamp and invited his students to ask questions about religion.
De Saint-Felix said these discussions really helped him learn about Catholicism.
“When the Catholics start asking questions they don’t know, that’s when you start really learning things,” he said.
Things like, Catholics don’t worship Mary, they honor her.
In his sophomore year de Saint-Felix said he “really got into it” when football coach, Ellis “Scooter” Register, taught religion class.
“He talked about going through these Catholics classes,” de Saint-Felix said. That’s when he first heard of the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults.
The same year he also learned about the sacraments from Dr. Chuck Ashburn. “That was a great help learning about the core beliefs of the Church.”
At that point he said he was “pretty sure” he was going to convert to Catholicism. Only one problem remained, the Eucharist.
De Saint-Felix said he knew the Eucharist was central to the faith so if he couldn’t “grasp” this belief then “there’s no way I could join the Church.”
A member of the physical fitness team, de Saint-Felix would be hot and tired after his workout just before lunch. So during lunch he would cool off in the one place that had air conditioning — the chapel.
From the back pew he read the words that lined both walls of the chapel. On one side it said, “This is my body.” On the other it said, “This is my blood.”
It was the word, “is” that kept jumping out at him. He read the sentences over and over each time he went to the chapel and before long they were the first thoughts he had when he entered the holy place.
He was so determined to grasp Christ’s presence in the Eucharist that he started attending morning Mass when it was offered three times a week during Lent in 2005.
“I went to every single Mass trying to grasp this Eucharist idea,” he said. “I was really going to have to hit it hard if I was going to get it.”
Eventually, he said it just “clicked” in his mind and he asked himself, “How could you not believe this?”
Then he was ready. He approached Brother Richard after Easter and told him he wanted to become Catholic. De Saint-Felix was directed to the Christ the King RCIA program because it was near his home. Brother Richard agreed to be his sponsor, making him his godfather.
Then he told parents, Kathy Johnson and Doug de Saint-Felix.
“My mom, she was OK with it,” de Saint-Felix said. “She said, ’Well, if that’s what you want to do then I’m happy for you.’”
It did come as a bit of a shock though. He had kept his search to himself and did not mention it to his family until after he had made his decision.
By June 2005 de Saint-Felix was enrolled in RCIA and has attended the weekly Wednesday night sessions on his own. He even came early for the evening Mass. Now he also attends the weekend Masses, particularly the 8 a.m. Sunday Mass.
“I’m really nervous and excited,” he said of his initiation. He is most anxious about receiving the Eucharist.
He said he may “freeze up” when he is given Jesus.
“I am not even worthy to be in the same room as this, so how am I supposed to eat this?” he said. “It’s really a huge thing and I don’t know if I can do this. But I’m going to try.”
The good news is he will not be alone. Brother Richard will be there.
De Saint-Felix said he chose Brother Richard because he feels comfortable with him and knows his former teacher can answer his questions and will be there for him.
“He’s a brother, he knows these things,” de Saint-Felix said. “You can ask him stuff. He knows.” Brother Richard said he is honored to be de Saint-Felix’s godfather.
“He is grown up for his age,” he said. “And that’s part of the reason why I am sponsoring him because I know that he knows what he wants for himself.”
“He handles everything so gently and yet matter of factly,” Brother Richard said. “Everything he does from his assignments to his extra-curricular activities … is done so coolly. It’s almost like it’s not pressured at all and that certainly is a sign of maturity.”
Make an appointment with your pastor so your friend can ask questions in a comfortable setting.
