From BBC World Service Fb page: Lithuanian singer Rūgilė Daujotaitė spent years searching for peace through New Age spirituality. Little by little, she was falling apart. When Rūgilė Daujotaitė competed to represent her country in the Eurovision Song Contest, her life seemed great. She was dressed as a Thunder Goddess on TV, with a white tunic and red cape, famous and successful - but inside she was struggling deeply. "I felt tortured emotionally," she says. "I felt a kind of depression. I felt strange influences in my physical and spiritual body, like maybe I was possessed." Lithuania is a predominantly Catholic country, but Rūgilė's mother and grandmother were drawn to New Age practices - a set of beliefs combining Eastern religions, alternative healing, meditation, astrology, and mysticism. Surrounded by these ideas from a young age, Rūgilė began searching for answers. "New Age is make your own truth. Make your own God. People believe that they can themselves determine what is truth," she says. As an adult, Rūgilė moved to Amsterdam in The Netherlands to study jazz. She became involved in shamanic practices and began taking ayahuasca, a powerful psychedelic drug. Back in Lithuania, her fame grew - but she was living two lives, performing in public during the day and taking part in intense rituals at night. All dressed in white, she would stand in a circle with fellow practitioners, dancing and singing for 10 hours or more while taking the drug – which is illegal in Lithuania, and can lead to vomiting and convulsions. "I was getting worse and worse. Inside, I was tortured emotionally, spiritually, mentally. I had hysteria sometimes. I felt terrible. I could not control my emotions," she says. She teamed up with another shamanic leader in Lithuania and began offering retreats teaching others how to find happiness. She felt like a liar – a spiritual leader falling apart on the inside. Rūgilė she says that most New Age practitioners are gentle and peaceful, but she couldn't understand why the same people came back to her year after year - and seemed worse each time. She started to read the Bible, and questioning her beliefs. At a retreat in Tenerife, Spain, she told her group not to drink ayahuasca - there was something really wrong with it. Now, she says becoming Catholic has transformed her life. She says she feels a deep trust in God – and rather than believing she is on the road to enlightenment, she accepts herself as the imperfect human she is. Hear more on Heart and Soul: https://bbc.in/4chOafy
'I was Buddhist, then I saw a Lady in Blue Light - How Mary Led Me to Jesus." Sebastian Perez tells his amazing story of being led by Mary to Jesus and His Church.
From Totus Tuus Fb page: "At 98 years old, World War II veteran Raymond “Ray” Martin Sr. finally came home to the Catholic Church. Ray served in the U.S. Army in Okinawa and the Philippines. After the war he spent 27 years as a police officer in Illinois. For decades he attended Mass and prayed the Rosary with his late wife, Ann Marie. He believed in Christ, he prayed the Act of Contrition, but he had never been baptized. In December 2025 he met Deacon Jack Trevino, a hospice chaplain and fellow law-enforcement veteran. They talked about the job, they laughed, and then they talked about faith. After a stroke in May 2026 nearly took Ray’s life, he told the deacon he wanted the sacraments. The Church moved quickly. On July 16, 2026, in the living room of his assisted-living home in Marana, Arizona — decorated with simple banners and a small altar — Ray received Baptism, Confirmation, and First Holy Communion in one beautiful celebration. When Father Edson Elizarraras asked him, “Dear brother Raymond, you have asked to be baptized because you wish, as Christians do, to have eternal life. This is the faith of Christians. Do you know this?” Ray looked up, tears in his eyes, and answered firmly: “I do, yes.” He crossed his arms over his chest as the water was poured. Throughout the rite he smiled, sometimes closing his eyes in prayer. Afterward his first question was simple and beautiful: “How do I receive Communion again from here?” A lifetime of quiet faith. A late, glorious yes. God’s timing is never late. If this story touched your heart, share it. Someone you know may need to hear that it’s never too late. Mary, Mother of the Church, pray for us. Amen!"
Japanese sculptor Etsuro Sotoo has spent decades shaping the stone of Barcelona’s Sagrada Família. His long collaboration with Antoni Gaudí’s unfinished masterpiece ultimately led him to the Catholic faith. Born in Japan in 1953, Sotoo arrived in Spain in 1978 seeking artistic direction. He was drawn to the Sagrada Família and eventually became one of its chief sculptors, creating hundreds of works that interpret Gaudí’s organic, nature-inspired designs. As he studied the architect’s vision more deeply, Sotoo realized something decisive: “The only way to see what Gaudí saw was to stand where he stood—and that’s when I realized Gaudí was looking at God.” That insight became the turning point. To understand Gaudí’s art, Sotoo had to encounter the faith that animated it. He later entered the Catholic Church through baptism, taking the names Luke and Michelangelo—patrons of artists. Sotoo has said that working with stone taught him humility: the material does not yield unless approached with reverence. He also found unexpected harmony between Gaudí’s respect for nature and elements of Japanese cultural sensibility. In 2024 he received the Ratzinger Prize for his contribution to sacred art. Today Sotoo continues his work at the basilica, viewing the Sagrada Família as a place meant to help people live in harmony and draw closer to God—the true “owner” of the church, in Gaudí’s spirit. Source: Katarzyna Szalajko of OSV News Main Photo: Gustau Nacarino
