April 6, 2018 at 1:53 p.m.
RCIA
New Catholic's faith journey
When the new Catholic emerged from the baptismal font at her parish's Easter vigil Mass in March, "I felt God inside of me," she told The Evangelist. "I feel like a weight's been lifted off my shoulders. I can accept me for me. I feel fulfilled."
Ms. Renzi has come a long way on her faith journey. The absence of religion from her childhood was palpable: "I knew at a young age [that] I wanted to go to church, and I knew I had faith. I envied my friends whose parents took them to church every Sunday."
Her family's secularism, plus the fact that they moved around the Capital Region frequently, meant she never found a faith community as a child. But for half a year when she was 11 and lived in Cohoes, she did manage to hitch a ride with a neighborhood adult who took a carload of children to a Christian church every week.
Longing for God
Ms. Renzi was "fascinated" and "really intrigued. I just knew that I really wanted to seek out more about who I was, and God."
Eventually, her family moved again, and Ms. Renzi said she became "lost" throughout her adolescence. She moved in with her future husband at the age of 18 and got married at 21. She had two children and didn't revisit Christianity until the age of 35, when a friend invited her to a community church in Guilderland.
She attended for a year until her mother died and her marriage started crumbling.
"I didn't know how to cope with it," said Ms. Renzi, who suffered from severe depression. "I prayed. I turned inward into myself and did a lot of reflection. I tried to change me."
In December 2011, she confided her struggles to her friend and Zumba instructor, Lisa Ruud, who is an extraordinary minister of the Eucharist at St. Vincent's. Ms. Ruud convinced her to visit the parish.
Good fit
She did, on Christmas Day.
"It was like my rebirth," Ms. Renzi said. "When I walked through the doors and sat down, I felt free [and] really at peace. [Lisa] has singlehandedly changed my life and I thank her every day."
Ms. Renzi, who is going through a divorce, said Mass has been "the only stable thing in my life for the last year and a half. I just knew every Sunday where I was going to be, who I was going to be with."
The parish's messages of community service and social justice, plus the traditions and culture of Catholicism, cemented Ms. Renzi's decision to become Catholic. She launched into the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults process at St. Vincent's and missed Mass just once the entire time.
"I was a stranger and [the RCIA team] took me in and really nurtured me," she said. "I am so grateful for them opening their lives to me. They gave me the biggest gift."
Ripple effect
Ms. Renzi also found her vocation after joining the Church: She wants to work with women and children in the areas of domestic violence or substance abuse. She's now earning her first college degree in chemical and substance abuse counseling at Hudson Valley Community College in Troy.
"Since my baptism, I've become more of a compassionate person," she said. "I just want to help people, because as a child I don't think I was helped. I feel like I'm exactly where I was always intended to be.
"You have to sometimes go through all the yucky stuff to get to where you are," she continued. "I'm reborn in so many different ways."
Ms. Renzi was a stay-at-home mother for a decade when her sons - Steven, now 18; and Sean, 21 - were young. She served on their school's PTO and yearbook committee and later worked as a lunch monitor at an East Greenbush elementary school for 12 years.
Today, she's excited to start volunteering at St. Vincent's: "I just want to jump right in."[[In-content Ad]]
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