David Bates

Who?

Hello! My name is David Bates and I’m an English Software Engineer living in the United States, currently based in San Diego, California. I wrote a post a while back where I share some random facts about me. Other things you should know about me are that I adore Mexican food, I occasionally have facial hair, I love puns and in the Myers-Briggs personality test I come out as an INFJ.

If you need to contact me directly, please send me an email or tweet me! Oh, and if you’re looking to buy me a lovely present, you might want to check out my Amazon Wishlist!

Why Catholic?

I was raised Catholic, but became rather disillusioned with the Church and visited Protestant congregations for several years before returning wholeheartedly to the Catholic Church.

Several years ago I fell in love with the Eastern Rites of the Church and I worshiped at a wonderful Byzantine Rite parish in San Diego before moving to Wisconsin.

Why “Restless Pilgrim”?

The title of this blog is “Restless Pilgrim” and it describes me pretty well, not least because I have travelled 5,489 miles away from home to live in the United States. Living a rather rootless life like this tends to teach you some important life lessons and the whole experience has left me with the feeling that they should be shared.  These are some of the things I will be sharing on this blog. The other thing I will be writing extensively about will be my faith and apologetics (as well as the theology of He-Man).  Over the last few years I have also found myself increasingly called upon to explain and defend Christianity in general and Catholicism in particular. I also host Pints With Jack, a podcast where my co-host and I work through the books of C.S. Lewis.

In my opinion, every good blog (and every bad one too) needs a Patron Saint. Ours is St. Drogo, which has led to some interesting results when googling this Saint.

“Travel writing can be much more revealing than we realise. Without our firm anchors and safe havens, authors can often find themselves reflecting with greater depth than they might normally achieve from their more secure bases” 

Michael Ford, A Restless Soul: Meditations from the Road