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FWIW, I twas smited about ten years ago and three years later found myself that Easter being confirmed in the Church.

My avowed affiliation line runs: Lutheran - Methodist - Baptist - Agnostic - Atheist - Smitten - Buddhist - Catholic.

There is a Compassion that suffuses the cosmos and we can experience this as connected to our being. (The latin "religio" mean "re-bind.") It pursued itself within me all my life. But I don't think that, for everyone, it means "choosing to believe." Some, like me, are hard-headed, and it takes time and much Grace 'til we surrender and come home again for the first time.

Thanks very much for the discussion.

What a beautiful post, D-fendr. I can relate to what you say, for you describe a process that I myself have experienced. Indeed, there is a Compassion that suffuses the cosmos, and it is connected with our individual being. Though it might sound somewhat mystical to put it in these terms, I've come to understand the living process you describe as God in search of us, to "bring us home" into His love, peace, truth, and grace, in fulfillment of His desire to be reunited with His sons, the sons of man. From the human standpoint, this is a "re-binding" to Him in the fullness of His Truth, which is what is meant by salvation. IMHO FWIW.

Thank you so much for your gracious and beautiful post.