ABSTRACT
Personal narratives of conversion written by nineteenth-century converts to Roman Catholicism shed light on what it meant to become and to be a Roman Catholic in America during the previous century. The narrative authors reveal their understanding of conversion and identify the motives which brought them to the Church. It is clear that they chose to portray conversion as a process of religious growth rather than as the single, isolable event that typically defined conversion among evangelical Protestants. The nineteenth century may aptly be described as the age of conversion. "Heart religion", which had flowered during the Great Awakening, established itself as a significant American religious style. Until recently, studies of American Roman Catholicism have concentrated on episcopal biographies, diocesan histories, and the histories of religious orders. The experiences of the people remained unexplored.49 The conversion narratives offer new insight into the nineteenth-century American Catholic experience, from the particular vantage point of the convert.
