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Conor7
Guest
Well that’s an interesting little aside where I learned something. I’ve never heard the term before. I thought you guys were bad spellers and instead referring potpourri.
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Sufjon
Guest
Perhaps that’s because you’ve been exceptionally good. Happy chance that Santa is coming in just a few weeks!This thread reminds me that I haven’t been feeling guilty enough in the past few months.
Your friend
Sufjon
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JustaServant
Guest
Having Eastern European relatives I know all about the word ‘guilt’.
po18guy
Well-known member
Apparently, I completely misunderstood your entire post.
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hn160
Guest
I was sort of agreeing with you.
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MorningSong51
Guest
Hmmm…Radar!Well that’s an interesting little aside where I learned something. I’ve never heard the term before. I thought you guys were bad spellers and instead referring potpourri.
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Bob_Crowley
Guest
I think it’s more a case of personality types. It would be interesting to do a survey of the types of personality who get onto these forums in the first place. Are there more introverts than extroverts? Is there a higher proportion of people suffering scrupulosity issues than in the general Catholic population at large.I apologize for making a blanket statement, but it’s impossible not to in order to ask my question.
Reading the Apologetics section and Ask an Apologist on this forum it seems that Catholics are obsessed with sin. Is X a sin? Is Y a sin? I did X by accident, am I going to hell? It’s so prevalent that there are other threads devoted to scrupulosity.
One often hears about “Catholic guilt,” but I always dismissed it. Now, I’m starting to take it a bit more seriously.
The questions run the gamut from accidental nocturnal emissions to missing Mass due to a headache to smoking a cigarette before communion. These are things I never worry about, yet you go to confession for discretely spitting piece of chicken in your napkin at a dinner party.
What gives? Why so guilty?
I haven’t struck these scrupulosity issues in everyday church circles to the same extent I see them posted on this forum. That’s why I wonder if the personality profiles of forum posters are a bit skewed towards people who have trouble relating in normal life, and use the forum as a social outlet to some extent.
I know what you mean - I’ve been struck by it too. I see some people making mountains out of molehills in my opinion. But then I suppose we’re all different.
I do remember one story though, told by a priest. He went to quite a well-known Catholic school as a boarder when he was young enough. Back then the system was more legalistic of course. Anyway he and his mates had hollow legs like most young blokes, and they found a tin of camp pie. Being Friday, they weren’t supposed to eat meat, so they went to the priest and asked him how much meat could be eaten on Friday without it being a mortal sin?
The priest probably guessed why they wanted to know, appeared to think about it for a few minutes, and said, “Two ounces”.
They duly went back to the dormitory and cut up the camp pie into pieces just less than two ounces!
That’s legalism for you. As a former Protestant, that would have been laughable. But Protestants sometimes have their own legalisms - no decorations in church whatsoever, no alcohol whatsoever with grape juice instead of wine, literal interpretations, restrictions on what music instruments you can use, insistence on wearing hats to church, enforcing the Sabbath on Saturday even after Christ ushered in the New Covenant etc.
It’s good old human nature. I think I read somewhere that GK Chesterton was of the opinion that sometimes when Christ went away to pray by himself, he was laughing his head off at the silly human foibles of his disciples, but He didn’t want them to see Him. So He took off for prayers by Himself.
We carry on with a lot of nonsense at times. We really do.
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MorningSong51
Guest
Po18guy, maybe it was good that you did because I liked both your posts. You brought up a good point, that is, our priests need our prayers to strengthen them. John Paul II showed us that our priests need the confessional just as much as the lay people do because they have to face many community issues on a everyday bases. When we come to church, we view the priest from the altar as he is giving a blessing to the community to commence the starting of the mass, as a priest - he is the one who enters us into that unity with Christ and toward the end of the mass - he blesses our week but that’s not all he does - as we know. However, he is the most active person in our community, much like John Paul II and within our own community, He is the head of our community and we are the members (body) in a sense of the entire Catholic community as a whole. So again, you brought up a good point.
On the side, you are correct - the one thing that separates us from God is when we offend him and when we don’t listen and don’t do. However, the importance of reconciliation is that, and not out of guilt but out of wanting to return back because we left out of being anger, bitterness or feeling disconnected to the community as a whole, is that we were lost but now found. (But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’”) Remembering that sin causes death and when we are absolved from our sins, we are once again reconciled back to God (we are made alive in Christ, by his grace and mercy!)- remember that verse that Jesus said to the woman who sinned, Jesus straightened up and asked her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you? She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “I do not condemn you, either. Go. From now on sin no more.”
There is more information about reconciliation that is very much an act of love from God through Christ, his son. Realizing the importance of scripture and taking or grasping something (from knowledge) is way different than taking it into the soul. I can understand the concept, for example, but the invitation to return is the equivalency of the verse in Song of Songs or Song of Solomon, "In the words of the Song, “I was asleep but my heart was awake. Listen! My lover is knocking.” The apostle Paul tells us the same thing in the books of the New Testament, "But everything exposed by the light becomes visible,for it is light that makes everything visible. This is why it is said: “Wake up, O sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”
One of favorites verses was the one I quoted - because it describes what God internally touches in us (by His Holy Spirit) as the verses states, Luke 13:6 Then he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree growing in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it but did not find any. 7 So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, ‘For three years now I’ve been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil? 8 “‘Sir,’ the man replied, ‘leave it alone for one more year, and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it. 9 If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.’”
Reading from this parable again, two people (let’s say God and his son, for example) are discussing (symbolically) a fig tree that’s not producing any fruit. The man in the story, who owns the vineyard, is telling the care taker that he will cut the fig tree down because its not producing any fruit, but the care taker is saying No! “I’ll dig around it and fertilize it” What symbolically is the fig tree and what is the care taker digging around the tree with? Also, what is care taker going to fertilize it with, to make the tree produce fruit - one of the aspect is reconciliation and absolution from our sins, but there is one other that is needed to produce much fruit - I read this while studying the Exodus:
Exodus 8:2 Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the desert these forty years, to humble you and to test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands. 3 He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your fathers had known,*** to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.*** 4Your clothes did not wear out and your feet did not swell during these forty years. ***5 Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son, so the Lord your God disciplines you.
I sin everyday - Po18guy, I must admire those who are well trained and hold onto the faith during the times of trial and suffering, but there is (also) joy… As God has produced the seasons - so he creates emotions inside of us, as there are many aspects to us. Remember said to Cain, when he sinned against his own brother, "“Why are you angry? Why is your face downcast? 7 If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it.”
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sallybutler
Guest
To the Original Poster
I am not only Catholic, I Irish Catholic. I often joke that I could only marry another Catholic or a Jew because who understands guilt.
However, I think why Catholics are aware of guilt goes back to the Cross. While we know that Christ died for us, we do not believe we really earned it. Yes, no one deserved or earned what Jesus did for us. However, many feel that since Jesus made the ultimate sacrifice, they are absolved. Catholics do believe in absolution. However, we always remember that we did not earn or deserve it.
Plus we had moms who were always there to remind us of our failings:yyeess:
I am not only Catholic, I Irish Catholic. I often joke that I could only marry another Catholic or a Jew because who understands guilt.
However, I think why Catholics are aware of guilt goes back to the Cross. While we know that Christ died for us, we do not believe we really earned it. Yes, no one deserved or earned what Jesus did for us. However, many feel that since Jesus made the ultimate sacrifice, they are absolved. Catholics do believe in absolution. However, we always remember that we did not earn or deserve it.
Plus we had moms who were always there to remind us of our failings:yyeess:
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MorningSong51
Guest
:bighanky: LoL… A question that I heard: Did Jewish guilt originate with Judaism, or was it a gift by the Irish to the Jewish people?
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adf417
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I think today’s 2nd reading ends with the perfect thought for this subject. 2 Pt 3:8-14 …Therefore, beloved, since you await these things, be eager to be found without spot or blemish before him, at peace.
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Telstar
Guest
Exactly! Most people that seem to complain about Catholics always feeling so guilty, have no concept of what it feels like to walk out of that confessional, knowing that their soul is now as pure as it was on the day they were Baptized, when all of that old guilt is turned into complete joy and heavenly peace! :heaven:
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Telstar
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catharina
Guest
First, apology accepted.I apologize for making a blanket statement, but it’s impossible not to in order to ask my question.
Reading the Apologetics section and Ask an Apologist on this forum it seems that Catholics are obsessed with sin. Is X a sin? Is Y a sin? I did X by accident, am I going to hell? It’s so prevalent that there are other threads devoted to scrupulosity.
One often hears about “Catholic guilt,” but I always dismissed it. Now, I’m starting to take it a bit more seriously.
The questions run the gamut from accidental nocturnal emissions to missing Mass due to a headache to smoking a cigarette before communion. These are things I never worry about, yet you go to confession for discretely spitting piece of chicken in your napkin at a dinner party.
What gives? Why so guilty?
My guess is that you’ve done some very selective reading on CA.
So many exchanges have to do with the Sacraments, grace, virtue, family, etc.,
that I must admit I see so little mentioned about sin. An obvious answer as to why
anyone addresses apologists about sin is that some people (NOT all Catholics) are very
burdened by scruples. They are free to ask whatever they wish - like all posters.
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catharina
Guest
Certainly not! The Irish were out-and-about total savages, in the early days.
In the manner of savages (pre-Patrick) they had no use for guilt about anything!
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catharina
Guest
Lovely. So true.
I had that experience two Saturdays ago.
An unusual gift of grace. It doesn’t happen that often - for me anyway.
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catharina
Guest
Legend says “Exactly like Jewish moms!”
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Conor7
Guest
You make an interesting point. I’m certainly willing to admit my reading may have been selective. Who doesn’t love the juicy threads? Perhaps it’s the voyeur in me.
If anything, my post was more of an observation on how Catholics and non-Catholics treat sin. It seems (here I go with blanket statements again
) that Catholics must know what is sinful and what is not in order to account for them in the confessional.The difference I see, at least personally, is that I confess the big ones - the ones that I can’t make sense of, or can’t make peace with - in order to truly unburden myself. As for the others, I ask for forgiveness from the individual I have offended, or if no offense was committed against another, I go over them in my nightly prayers. I find that God is typically very understanding.
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catharina
Guest
By definition, God is love.You make an interesting point. I’m certainly willing to admit my reading may have been selective. Who doesn’t love the juicy threads? Perhaps it’s the voyeur in me.
If anything, my post was more of an observation on how Catholics and non-Catholics treat sin. It seems (here I go with blanket statements again
The difference I see, at least personally, is that I confess the big ones - the ones that I can’t make sense of, or can’t make peace with - in order to truly unburden myself. As for the others, I ask for forgiveness from the individual I have offended, or if no offense was committed against another, I go over them in my nightly prayers. I find that God is typically very understanding.
Yes, you might describe that as “understanding.”
As to Confession, yes, Catholics are OBLIGED to confess all mortal sins -
maybe what you mean by “the big ones.” Catholics must also be sorry
for all of their sins, big ones or otherwise. Catholics also make an Act of Contrition
in the presence of the priest and perform the prescribed “penance” after confession.
I have no idea how the thousands of Protestant denominations treat sin. How could I?
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TheRealJuliane
Guest
:yup::clapping:It’s a great experience, to be able to let go of my past sins by absolution.
And as one PP said, the world could stand a little MORE Catholic guilt - too much libertine behavior.
I cringe when I hear someone say, “I was burdened with Catholic guilt…” No, honey, that’s the built-in guilt that God WANTS us to feel when we hurt him…
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