S T. A L E X I U S - O U R L A D Y O F T H E A N G E L S - S T. PA U L ’S
Meet Parishioner
O
CHRIS RIZER
Discovering God’s Mercy Through the Alpha Ministry
ver the past few years, God’s mercy touched Chris Rizer ’s heart in amazing ways and led him back home to the Catholic Church, his spiritual mother on earth. “The Catholic faith caught my interest because when I was young I had family members who were good Catholics, and they made a huge difference in my development as a person,” he says. “Later in life, this made me want to practice a religion and rebuild my faith. I also noticed that some of the people who influenced me the most — outside of my own family — were also Catholics, and this gave me a reason to want to know more about the Catholic faith.” As a young man, Chris used his intuitive and intelligent mind to search out the Truth, and God enlightened him each step of the way. “Here’s where I’m coming from, philosophically — I once fell for the relativism trap,” he says. “I thought if one culture could naturally not have a specific moral, then the moral wasn’t universal and could be thrown away. I also thought, in error, that it was better not to have a moral than to have it and break the moral all the time. Then I fell into a sort of legalism and thought I’d just agree with the morals of my culture — the law. But then I realized Over the past few years, God’s mercy touched Chris some laws were absurd, others were politically motivated, and Rizer’s heart in amazing ways, and led him back home to the Catholic Church, his spiritual mother on earth. they didn’t always cover everything.” As Chris rigorously searched for an accurate moral compass, he finally found what he had been looking for. “I came to understand that knowing right and wrong is an intuitive process and that Catholicism provides a framework to guide someone on a path to living a moral life,” he says. “My personal and philosophical development regarding morality finally led me to Catholicism, especially since the most moral people I knew were Catholic and not hypocritical — they saw themselves as recovering sinners.” In the midst of his “soul searching,” Chris found the Alpha Ministry, which provided the opportunity
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