Empaths and Belief in Catholicism

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LadyButterfly

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Hello out there,
I’m hoping this forum is an authentic place to air concerns about modern Catholic living. I am a practicing Catholic who has gone through all of the sacraments but the last and final one. I grew up in a seriously dedicated family of Catholics, many of whom were priests, nuns, or considered going into the convent or priesthood. So, there’s no way I will ever denounce my faith - it is solidly entrenched. I also regularly pray.
My issue is one that seems to have been closed for discussion but I’d like to see if anyone else wants to discuss it again. It is the topic of being an empath. I’ve done a lot of research about it lately and have tried to dispute it concerning my personality and experiences but everything I read only seeks to prove it even more. My experience as an empath started as a child, and as I apply what I’ve researched to my whole life so far, being an empath explains it all. My thought is that God made us all unique, including our abilities. I know that being psychic is against Catholicism, but I’m wondering if believing you are an empath is as well. To me, being an empath means that you have a heightened awareness of the energy fields of people, animals, and plants. And by this I mean you get a feeling of calm or stress, or some other type of emotion. Obviously, in the case of plants, I know it sounds silly, but it’s a sense of calm. There are other types of empaths as well, according to empath articles in which people have even stronger senses. I’m thinking it’s possible this is God-given ability and maybe we all even have it, but some of us are more sensitive to these abilities.
Does any other Catholic out there believe they have heightened awareness to energy fields and get a particular feeling about places or living things? Can anyone else sometimes guess what someone is feeling or thinking just by how they seem to you? Does anyone else get a feeling I call “jangly” which is just a general feeling that something is very wrong, to later find out on the news something terrible happened somewhere? I know how strange all this sounds, however, since it happens to me over and over again, I have to address it. But, I don’t want to go against my beloved religion.
 
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I honestly feel I’m an empath too. A lot of people don’t believe in that. Rational thought rules.
 
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I think there are people who have a very heightened awareness of others’ emotional states, just as there are people who have a gift for artistic expression, musical talent, athletic abilities, intellectual power, etc.
 
I have to ask, you say you have received all the sacraments 'except the last one" (which I presume is the Sacrament of the Sick, what in my youth we called Extreme Unction, AKA the Last Rites).

So then you must be either a priest who has been laicized and who then married, or else a married man, now a widower, who has become a priest, or a married man who was married before he became a priest according to an Eastern rite, or a former non-Catholic Christian who was married, ordained as a preacher, converted, and (perhaps from the Lutheran or Episcopalian church) was then ordained as a priest. . .

Because since two of the seven sacraments involve usually (in the Latin Church) mutually disparate things (one Matrimony, and the second Holy Orders), and to receive Holy Orders one must be male. . .

I can’t see any other way you could have received ‘all’ of the sacraments but the last.

Am I right?
 
People used to speak of certain confessors, such as St John Vianney.and St Padre Pio, having a gift of ‘reading souls’. Sounds very like being an empath to me.
 
Excuse me? My grandfather may have been a cop; I’m not.

After all, there are indeed plenty of people who have been through the scenarios I gave; you certainly could have been one of them.

Your empathy doesn’t seem to extend to me (that’s all right, though.)
 
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A deacon can receive the sacrament of Matrimony and then that of Holy Orders. But I digress.
 
Excellent, thank you. I knew I was missing something. Deacons being male, too. Poor deacons, they are always getting left out accidentally!
 
A Deacon may be in the state of marriage. But a Deacon may not marry.
 
A Deacon may not marry without permission from Rome.
But a deacon has had at least 6 sacraments, maybe seven if he has had annointing of the sick.
Most of us only get 5 or 6.
 
I feel the same way. My experiences are just a little bit different but yes. It seems to get stronger and more intense the more I develop my faith.
 
Lady butterfly. I have also been asking myself the same thing. I guess my thread was closed. Am I able to message you directly on this forum? I am new to it. Not sure.
 
LadyButterfly said:
Can anyone else sometimes guess what someone is feeling or thinking just by how they seem to you? Does anyone else get a feeling I call “jangly” which is just a general feeling that something is very wrong, to later find out on the news something terrible happened somewhere?
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No, and I thank God for it, that I don’t. It must be terrible for you.

Do take care.

God bless.
 
I don’t think it’s a bad thing… in a way you can use it as a gift (although it’s also hard to be an empath as people can more likely take advantage of you)
 
I am very empathetic and have had the idea that something bad is going to happen I am always relieved when it is something minor.
 
I have always been able to “read” people – sounds like what you are referring to as empathy.

I avoid using terms associated with New Age philosophy. I don’t say I “have a heightened awareness of energy fields.” I say, “sometimes God allows me to know what another person is experiencing.”

I also have learned not to be cocky about this gift. I do not always know what someone else is feeling. Believing my feelings are always right is super dangerous and closes off relationships rather than building them.

I’m a public school music teacher with 500+ students. Listening to their words is far more important than relying on empathy. They need to be heard!
 
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