WINNER: I went to talk to a Columbia chaplain, a Presbyterian minister. I said, I'm really thinking a lot about Jesus. I feel that I'm being called in some way, to move towards that. I don't really know what to do. And his response was, when you converted to Orthodox Judaism, you entered a marriage you can't get divorced from. So you're kind of stuck.

DUBNER: Were you surprised by that response?

WINNER: Yeah, I felt like I'd been punched in the stomach.

DUBNER: What did you do with that frustration?

WINNER: That was really sort of the, the moment when I began to understand that this was something I really had a personal stake in and I really had to ... do this with my life.

RAMBO: Many of the people I've talked to over the years have said that they have never been so happy, that they've found a home, or they've found a sense of roots or connection. In many cases, they will report, I'm no longer afraid. I'm not afraid of dying. I'm not afraid of what people think of me. I'm not afraid of guilt, because it can be transformed by God's forgiveness.

All these things just unleash the energy of people.

WINNER: I then received a fellowship to go to England for two years. And that was a real gift because it provided space in a place where almost no one knew me. I did land in the Episcopal Church, the Anglican tradition. It was in England where I was baptized. It was England where I was confirmed. It was in England where I was identifying publicly and consistently as a Christian, where I learned to pray and so forth.

DUBNER: When a person spends so much of her young life searching for God, it raises this question: for a true seeker, how do you know when to stop?

(to Winner) In the first quarter of your life you've gone from being born to a Jewish father and a Baptist mother and being raised as a nominal Jew and becoming an Orthodox Jew and then converting to Orthodox Christianity. Do you have any sense -- ?

WINNER: Is Hinduism next? I obviously don't -- I can't say anything that will convince anyone else of this. There are certainly people out there who I'm sure think, you know, five years from now I may be sitting Zen or something. It's evident to me that that will not be the case. It's evident to me that this is, this is where I've landed.

RAMBO: Taking on religion can be a way of burning bridges and establishing a sense of independence and distance. But, motivations change. Just as someone might fall in love with someone merely because they were good looking and there was a great sexual attraction. But then later on, if the marriage or the relationship lasts, it's because they come to know the person, trust the person, love in a way that's not just sexual and for the moment. So that romantic passion is transformed into something that is much more lasting. And I see that happening a lot in conversion.

WINNER: The primary thing that Christianity has given to me is a sense of a personal relationship with God, a sense of God's presence and involvement in my day-to-day life, in a way that Jews might certainly, theoretically affirm and, and many Jews might experience that. That is not something that I really lived, as an Orthodox Jew. So that, that to me is, is the key. It's hard to separate all this from the fact that I really do believe in Jesus. I really think that it's true. And I'm amazed and grateful that I know that.

DUBNER: For RELIGION & ETHICS NEWSWEEKLY, I'm Stephen Dubner.