Conversion

The term “conversion” can be defined in a variety of secular and religious ways. What is common to all definitions of the term is the notion of change. [Page 92]Conversion can refer to anything that is changed from one use or function to another. In economic terms, it can refer to the exchange of one type of currency for another. It identifies a process in mathematics, and is also a word used to define the extra point or points scored after a touchdown during the game of football. Conversion also refers to the change that takes place when one adopts a new religion, faith expression, or belief system. This type of conversion is referred to as religious conversion.

The notion of conversion in terms of religion or religious cult may carry with it negative overtones when used in relation to a religious recruitment that manipulates people, especially the vulnerable, or “brainwashes” them as part of a conversion process. More positively, the word conversion is also used when referring to the sudden or dramatic or, most often, the gradual and developmental change of mind, heart, and behavior that is the substance of spiritual conversion. It is a deeply subjective change in the center of one's values that leads to a change in loyalties, life patterns, and the refocus of one's energies. It is quite possible to live a full life span with a spiritual sense of life and/or involvement in a religious tradition without necessarily personally claiming an experience of conversion. The issue of conversion in religious or spiritual terms can be a controversial topic precisely because the dynamics of conversion can be disruptive to people's lives. Change invariably disrupts the status quo.

The meaning of the term conversion from its Hebrew or Greek roots means to turn, turn again, and return. From the scriptural and spiritual point of view, conversion refers to the change—metanoia—that takes place in a person's thoughts, feelings, attitudes, and actions in connection to their personal spiritual self-awareness, relationship with the Divine, and sense of responsibility to others, even creation itself. For example, conversion points to the turning away from injustice toward justice, from inhumanity toward compassion, from contemporary forms of being in bondage toward false idols—such as money or power—to being embraced by a spiritual presence and/or spiritual community. Therefore, conversion involves the whole person in a radical reorientation to life, which includes a change in thinking, affect, attitudes, and, importantly, the actual way one chooses to live one's life as a member of the world community.

The disruption and disorientation that is often involved in conversion typically results in positive new self-perceptions, empowerment, and sense of redirection in life. In this regard, the ideas connected to the term conversion highlight a radical “turning around” of the whole person and a “return” to a more authentic self, which, in spiritual or religious terms, means a homecoming in God or the divine life. The story in the Christian Testament of the prodigal son found in the Gospel of Luke (15:11–32) is a good example of the process of conversion.

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