Here is an edited excerpt from a response I posted on a forum that I participate in.
I am a convert to the Catholic Church after being an evangelical Protestant for 36 years. I was a lay Bible teacher and preacher for many of those years. I was received into the Church in 2010. One of the reasons I became a Catholic was I was looking for a "roadmap" into the heart of God, the Holy Trinity. And I found the roadmap in the Catholic Church. I was looking for results in the form of a growing relationship with the living God and I am finding it happening in me by grace as I follow the roadmap provided by and in the Catholic Church as intended by her founder, Jesus Christ, who loves us and gives Himself for us. Now the journey is a life-long one but now I have the map to keep me close to Jesus along the way.
So what is this map? Well, you are already discovering some of it, the Mass, instruction and encouragement via EWTN and books (including the Bible), sharing with the people on this forum. But there is more, so much more, the rest of the Sacraments, the sacramentals such as prayer cards, paintings, statues, holy water, prayer books, the communion of the saints and more.
Where I really needed help was in the area of prayer. I knew a lot about God through knowing the Bible but I really didn't know how to pray well or for very long. My spiritual imagination was stunted. I was distracted easily. Much of my prayer was unformed and uninformed.
But the disciples had to ask Jesus to teach them to pray and He didn’t seem to think it was a dumb question and so He gave them the “Our Father” ("The Lord’s Prayer" in Protestant circles). Prayer is vital and essential to our spiritual well-being.
In paragraph 2558 of the Catechism, it says, “Great is the mystery of the faith!” The Church professes this mystery in the Apostles’ Creed (Part One) and celebrates it in the sacramental liturgy (Part Two). so that the life of the faithful may be conformed to Christ in the Holy Spirit to the glory of God the Father (Part Three). This mystery, then, requires that the faithful believe in it, that they celebrate it, and that they live from it in a vital and personal relationship with the living and true God. This relationship is prayer.
My search led me to the Catholic Church and I have not been disappointed. In the prayers of the Church, I found a roadmap to a rich prayer life which has centered on the rosary but also includes many other prayers as well.
