A Grave Sin

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Prior to my first confession after 30 plus years, I searched my mind and soul for all the sins I committed. I really thought I covered them all. I spent like 15-20 minutes in the confession with the Priest. He went through all the Commandments with me. I felt so relieved afterwards. I have been to 5 more confessions since the first and received Communion every Sunday but one.

Even though I confessed all my sins and go to confession weekly, I regularly search for sins daily that I may have committed in the past. Today I found one over 30 years ago that I never even thought of all those times in Confession.

I am devastated. I committed the worst sin that can be committed, well murder is the worst, never did that. I am sure this sin I committed, no one here has come close to it.

Please give me your thoughts on this. I feel so bad that I received the Eucharist all those times and still had this sin on my soul.

Story:
I was 21 years old and in the Navy. My roomate came to me one day and asked me if I went to Church. I said no, but I am a Catholic. He then brought me some books on this Religion that went against everything I was taught.

It was complete freedom to basically do what you wanted to do and be rewarded in the afterlife. The leader of this Church was a guy named Anton LaVey. I bought books and books of this and I practiced this for around 2 months. What was really wierd was, I always felt sick, like I had the flue or something. I do remember that.

My friend and I went to a tattoo place and he got the inverted pentagram tatooed on his left arm, I was next.
The artist prepared my arm and just when the needle was about to start, I stopped him and refused to get it.

I went home on leave after my schooling and on the long drive from Chicago to Syracuse, the thought of denouncing God was eating away at me. I got home and burned every one of those books and never looked back.
All these memories just surfaced today. For some reason, my mind buried it years ago.

I am really sick about this. Please, please dont yell at me and condemn me. I was young and stupid.

Will something terrible happen to me, receiving the Eucharist all those times with this horrendous sin? If I die tomorrow, is it instant hell?
 
outfctrl said:
Prior to my first confession after 30 plus years, I searched my mind and soul for all the sins I committed. I really thought I covered them all. I spent like 15-20 minutes in the confession with the Priest. He went through all the Commandments with me. I felt so relieved afterwards. I have been to 5 more confessions since the first and received Communion every Sunday but one
…
Will something terrible happen to me, receiving the Eucharist all those times with this horrendous sin? If I die tomorrow, is it instant hell?
Click to expand...
You had a valid confession and didn’t willingly leave anything out of the confession so, all your sins are forgiven. If you feel this bad, go back to confession and talk to the priest about it. What matters is that you are sorry about what happened in the past and you have shown that you wanted to change.

Nothing will happen to you (I hope), but it won’t happen because of the times you received the Eucharist, because you were doing your best. You went to confession before receiving and so you are fine. It isn’t instant hell if you die tmmw, because its up to what God decides. But like I wrote earlier because you are sorry, then God understands that you are seeking forgiveness.

I am so happy that you came back to the faith, and so reverent for the reception of Jesus. God Bless, and thanks for staying faithfull to Catholicism and God.

Gabe
 
AHHHHHHHHH! By the way, that was me yelling.😉 You made a horrible mistake (as have I, though not the same one), are fully contrite about what you had done, omitted the sin in confession innocently (you didn’t leave it out purposely) and have changed your ways. Your sins have been forgiven. Mention the sin in your next confession. It will make you feel better. You’re most certainly not stupid. You are a child of God. Be at peace. God has forgiven you; not it is your turn.

Kelly
outfctrl said:
Prior to my first confession after 30 plus years, I searched my mind and soul for all the sins I committed. I really thought I covered them all. I spent like 15-20 minutes in the confession with the Priest. He went through all the Commandments with me. I felt so relieved afterwards. I have been to 5 more confessions since the first and received Communion every Sunday but one.

Even though I confessed all my sins and go to confession weekly, I regularly search for sins daily that I may have committed in the past. Today I found one over 30 years ago that I never even thought of all those times in Confession.

I am devastated. I committed the worst sin that can be committed, well murder is the worst, never did that. I am sure this sin I committed, no one here has come close to it.

Please give me your thoughts on this. I feel so bad that I received the Eucharist all those times and still had this sin on my soul.

Story:
I was 21 years old and in the Navy. My roomate came to me one day and asked me if I went to Church. I said no, but I am a Catholic. He then brought me some books on this Religion that went against everything I was taught.

It was complete freedom to basically do what you wanted to do and be rewarded in the afterlife. The leader of this Church was a guy named Anton LaVey. I bought books and books of this and I practiced this for around 2 months. What was really wierd was, I always felt sick, like I had the flue or something. I do remember that.

My friend and I went to a tattoo place and he got the inverted pentagram tatooed on his left arm, I was next.
The artist prepared my arm and just when the needle was about to start, I stopped him and refused to get it.

I went home on leave after my schooling and on the long drive from Chicago to Syracuse, the thought of denouncing God was eating away at me. I got home and burned every one of those books and never looked back.
All these memories just surfaced today. For some reason, my mind buried it years ago.

I am really sick about this. Please, please dont yell at me and condemn me. I was young and stupid.

Will something terrible happen to me, receiving the Eucharist all those times with this horrendous sin? If I die tomorrow, is it instant hell?
Click to expand...
 
Maybe at the time you weren’t sure exactly who Anton LaVey was. Or didn’t appreciate what he was all about. Who knows. Only you do. I’ll just say that if you didn’t think about that for 30 years, you must have buried it pretty deep. The human mind is a funny thing. It’s like a basement full of boxes and stuff can get lost in dark corners for a long time.

Maybe your mind was protecting you from that until your faith was strong enough to bring it up and examine it and repent without totally despairing. Even a doctor won’t do necessary surgery if the patient is too weak.

Go to confession quickly. Examine your conscience about why and what reasons would have caused you to stuff this so deeply in the back of your mind. (the horror! the horror! comes to mind…)

My friend, you have escaped some very nasty fates. There was enough abiding grace in your soul to keep you from taking that final step to your damnation. Talk it over with a priest. People like you can be very powerful witnesses to our youth about the dangers of flirting with any of that stuff.

God didn’t strike you down dead for all those communions. He has brought you this far. He won’t abandon you now.
 
Don’t sweat it. You didn’t wilfully leave this out, so your confession was valid. You did not sin in receiving the eucharist.

My advice is what I give all the people I instruct in RCIA when they ask about confession, “Talk about what bothers you.” Confession is a gift, a healing sacrament.

Since you are obviously bothered by this – go to confession again. Talk it out with the priest.
 
One of the wonderful blessings of being Catholic is the gift of grace and forgiveness that is yours - just one confession away.

As others said, you didn’t purposefully leave it out, and who would remember something stupid we did for 2 months 30 years ago - don’t worry. Confess it at your next opportunity and be glad.

Your legitimately forgetful omission does not make your taking of the eucharist sinful. Once you confess, you will be fine.

God bless you on your continuing faith journey. You are a fine example for many.
 
I dont think all of you understand what I did. I am not proud of it.
Maybe thats why I forgot about it.

I denounced God. I put satan before him. I actually called on demons for help!! I am not making this up.
I really wish I didnt remember this. Now it is eating at me.

No wonder I wont go into the Eucharist Room and always sit in the back. Never realized this till today. I have to be the lowest form of life.

I really hope you all dont hold this against me. When I open my hearts to all of you, its a feeling of peace for me. You always give me hope. You are always praying for me. Its like I found a Spiritual Family here.

I cant talk to anyone like I can talk with all of you. Thank you for your guidance. You have no idea what this means to me.
 
outfctrl said:
I dont think all of you understand what I did. I am not proud of it.
Maybe thats why I forgot about it.

I denounced God. I put satan before him. I actually called on demons for help!! I am not making this up.
I really wish I didnt remember this. Now it is eating at me.

No wonder I wont go into the Eucharist Room and always sit in the back. Never realized this till today. I have to be the lowest form of life.

I really hope you all dont hold this against me. When I open my hearts to all of you, its a feeling of peace for me. You always give me hope. You are always praying for me. Its like I found a Spiritual Family here.

I cant talk to anyone like I can talk with all of you. Thank you for your guidance. You have no idea what this means to me.
Click to expand...
Take a break. Take your shoes off, put your feet up, and have a tall cold one. You don’t know what the rest of us have done – we’re probably done worse than you. But we have found forgiveness, and it’s there for you, too.

I’d go into the confessional and start just as you have outlined the problem here – tell the priest you can’t bear to tell him. Let him counsel and guide you. Believe me, he can handle it and you’ll feel a lot better.
 
I don’t think you understand either. (Sorry). We aren’t all saints. Heck, what makes a saint different from a sinner, is that the saint after falling and struggling deeply with sin, gets up and fights like they have never fought before. I am not proud of who I am or what I have done. I still struggle with masturbation and pornography, and whenever I do it, I want to hurt myself because I am hurting myself and all the holy girls around me that I love so dearly.

We all denounce God at one time or another. For you, it was just a more dramatic and worse moment, but that doesn’t make it any more worse. There have been times where I was in fear in bringing up God when I was wanting to convert someone. There have been times I haven’t spoken up. There have been times where I have gotten tired of doing good. But through it all, God calls me back to him because he has his plan for me.

What makes God so great, and what we all strive for, is unconditional love, which is the ultimate love. It doesn’t matter who you are or what you have done. We care about you about you and are rejoicing because you are back in the Church. If someone does hold it against you, its their fault for judging you, and you can just smile at them and turn the other cheek. Or say something like “Jesus loves you.” I guess, to summarize this long post, I want to say, whatever you have done doesn’t matter anymore.
 
outfctrl said:
I dont think all of you understand what I did. I am not proud of it.
Maybe thats why I forgot about it.

I denounced God. I put satan before him. I actually called on demons for help!! I am not making this up.
I really wish I didnt remember this. Now it is eating at me.

No wonder I wont go into the Eucharist Room and always sit in the back. Never realized this till today. I have to be the lowest form of life.

I really hope you all dont hold this against me. When I open my hearts to all of you, its a feeling of peace for me. You always give me hope. You are always praying for me. Its like I found a Spiritual Family here.

I cant talk to anyone like I can talk with all of you. Thank you for your guidance. You have no idea what this means to me.
Click to expand...
If you simply forgot and did not intentionally withhold this during confession it does not matter what you did. The incredible awesome compassion and mercy of our God has blotted out this sin and your reception of the Eucharist was not and is not sinful in any way.

You can still, and probably should, confess this in your next confession. It will probably make you feel better. But do not doubt our Lord’s ability to forgive you and sanctify you. I believe despair can be a sin as well, you must trust in God.
 
outfctrl said:
I dont think all of you understand what I did. I am not proud of it.
Maybe thats why I forgot about it.

I denounced God. I put satan before him. I actually called on demons for help!! I am not making this up.
I really wish I didnt remember this. Now it is eating at me.

No wonder I wont go into the Eucharist Room and always sit in the back. Never realized this till today. I have to be the lowest form of life.

I really hope you all dont hold this against me. When I open my hearts to all of you, its a feeling of peace for me. You always give me hope. You are always praying for me. Its like I found a Spiritual Family here.

I cant talk to anyone like I can talk with all of you. Thank you for your guidance. You have no idea what this means to me.
Click to expand...
I think it’s pretty awesome that you’ve come back to the Church, despite the full force of Hell fighting against you. (That just shows how strong God is and how weak Satan is!) Seriously, your story is awesome.

Remember this-- any sin which one honestly and truly forgets to confess is forgiven. End of story. The grace of the Sacrament of Penance is that awesome. Only willfully witholding a serious sin invalidates a confession, which you didn’t do.

That being said, being contrite is a great thing, and always be sorry for ones sins is an excellent path to learn humility, and thereby to open oneself to God. Feel free to mention this in a future confession if you want to, but realize that you are NOT mentioning it to be forgiven, because IT IS ALREADY FORGIVEN. Sometimes we like to entertain delusions about how sinful we are because it feels right to do so before God-- but the buck stops at denying that the sacrament works-- it does, and make sure you don’t ever get tempted to deny the efficacy of a sacrament in the future in case you honestly forget to confess a sin. The Divine Mercy is something we all have to learn to trust-- and I know I don’t trust it nearly enough.

God bless you.

-Rob
 
I dont think all of you understand what I did. I am not proud of it.
Maybe thats why I forgot about it.
Click to expand...
The incredible awesome compassion and mercy of our God has blotted out this sin and your reception of the Eucharist was not and is not sinful in any way.
Click to expand...
Hey, I know exactly what you were saying. And my answer stands. I take a little bit of issue with the above quote, because I don’t think God blotted out this sin in your mind.

I think Satan has obscured it from you with his mental games. But as you draw closer to God’s light, it shines on those dark places in the basement of your mind that you were not looking.

I think this is one of those last chains Satan is trying to use to hold you fast.

You have identified it. Ahah! THERE YOU ARE!

Now go to the priest. He won’t hate you. He loves people like you! He’s a bolt cutter. That’s his job. Freeing you from any bonds of Satan.

And by the way, I don’t think your whole heart and soul was in it 30 years ago, because you wouldn’t be here now.

I’ll bet the next time you go to Adoration you won’t hide in the back. 😉

By the way, you aren’t the lowest form of life. People who try to drag others into that kind of thing are way lower on the totem pole than you. Try praying for the soul of that sailor who tried to drag you down with him.
 
I have already made up my mind. I have to go to confession on this.
I cant live with myself until I do.

I came back to the Church because of a need. A need that has been missing for so many years. I will not have this hanging ovwer my head. Period

I have to come clean.
 
outfctrl said:
Prior to my first confession after 30 plus years, I searched my mind and soul for all the sins I committed. I really thought I covered them all. I spent like 15-20 minutes in the confession with the Priest. He went through all the Commandments with me. I felt so relieved afterwards. I have been to 5 more confessions since the first and received Communion every Sunday but one.

Even though I confessed all my sins and go to confession weekly, I regularly search for sins daily that I may have committed in the past. Today I found one over 30 years ago that I never even thought of all those times in Confession.

I am devastated. I committed the worst sin that can be committed, well murder is the worst, never did that. I am sure this sin I committed, no one here has come close to it.

Please give me your thoughts on this. I feel so bad that I received the Eucharist all those times and still had this sin on my soul.

Story:
I was 21 years old and in the Navy. My roomate came to me one day and asked me if I went to Church. I said no, but I am a Catholic. He then brought me some books on this Religion that went against everything I was taught.

It was complete freedom to basically do what you wanted to do and be rewarded in the afterlife. The leader of this Church was a guy named Anton LaVey. I bought books and books of this and I practiced this for around 2 months. What was really wierd was, I always felt sick, like I had the flue or something. I do remember that.

My friend and I went to a tattoo place and he got the inverted pentagram tatooed on his left arm, I was next.
The artist prepared my arm and just when the needle was about to start, I stopped him and refused to get it.

I went home on leave after my schooling and on the long drive from Chicago to Syracuse, the thought of denouncing God was eating away at me. I got home and burned every one of those books and never looked back.
All these memories just surfaced today. For some reason, my mind buried it years ago.

I am really sick about this. Please, please dont yell at me and condemn me. I was young and stupid.

Will something terrible happen to me, receiving the Eucharist all those times with this horrendous sin? If I die tomorrow, is it instant hell?
Click to expand...
WEll, I’m a new Catholic, but I thought that when say our penance prayer and we confess to all our sins and any we may have forgotten, that it covered everything. I agree with the other posters…at your next confession, confess it then. God loves you and forgives you.
 
Like you, I was away from the Church for close to 30 years. When I made my general confession I was very nervous and I forgot several very serious sins.

I went back to confession two weeks later and explained this to the priest. As the other posters have said, so long as you didn’t deliberately withold a mortal sin in your confession, it’s ok. All you have to do is mention it next time you go to confession.

I have been back in the Church for a little over a year now and I still occasionally remember something stupid I did in my past. I just mention it the next time I go to confession and all is well.

Remember, God loves you and wants to forgive you. All you have to do is ask.🙂
 
(((((((((hugs)))))))))
I am sure you will feel much better after your confession.
Forgiveness, God’s grace, is so wonderful.

I do think, as some of the tohers have said, that if you didn’t intentionally withhold that sin you wouldn’t HAVE TO confess it again. (Actually, the fact that you forgot all about it, just shows how much you have changed your ways!!!)🙂

But I think you will feel better after talking about it with a priest.

best wishes!

Kathrin
 
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