Having trouble being convinced that the Saints were "just like us."

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BenSinner

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As as way to bring up our spirits, many in the faith will say that the Saints were not superhuman. They were just as vulnerable and imperfect as us.

They’ll cites examples like Moses, Peter, King David, St. Augustine etc. etc.

The thing is, with most of those cases, it usually either:

A) Brings up maybe one or two bad examples of the person’s behavior, and then the rest of their life is pretty spotless. (Peter, St. Francis, St. Theresa, etc.)

B) The examples given are such a dramatic shift, that it’s almost impossible for one not to be a saint given the circumstances (Paul, St. Augustine, the people who lived HORRIBLE HORRIBLE lives and later converted)

I’m talking about someone like me that doesn’t fit either of these extremes. I’m generally just a worldly person who seems to want to get by on the bare minimum and will find a way to weasel out of taking my spirituality to the next level. I am often committing the same sin over and over and have all kinds of pride and vanity issues.

When I look at both of the above examples (A,B), they both look very far fetched to achieve and are those once in an aeon type of situations.

I’ve never come across a saint that was similar to me.
 
You’re not at the end of your life yet.

We believe that there are more people in Heaven than just the named and canonized saints.

Would you be okay with simply being ordinary, normal BenSinner in Heaven --without a fancy title and Churches named after you? 🙂🙂🙂

Because that’s probably what you’ll find when you get there! Ordinary but faithful people.

We only know the names of three Holy Angels, but we know there were more…

Peace!
 
Check out St Teresa of Avila. She was not serious about her faith for some time, but she wasn’t a huge sinner, either.

Well, it’s hard to get serious about one’s faith, but in terms of improving, God will do the heavy lifting, so to speak. The difficult thing we have to do is to let go of the worldly things that weigh us down 😦
 
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BenSinner said:
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“I’m talking about someone like me that doesn’t fit either of these extremes. I’m generally just a worldly person who seems to want to get by on the bare minimum and will find a way to weasel out of taking my spirituality to the next level. I am often committing the same sin over and over and have all kinds of pride and vanity issues.”
There you are 🙂 Recognising your weaknesses is a wonderful beginning ,a big step towards heaven.
 
Yes, saints are like us. They are not super humsns but ordinary mortals like us. Therefore, we all have that potential to be saints.

It is actually not us that can live and do all the saintly life but God who works in us. We call that grace. By ourselves, we are nothing but with God, nothing is impossible. That is what Jesus said, abide in the Father for He is the vine and we are the branches and without Him we are nothing.

The difference with saints was that they decided to follow and love God with all their hearts, their mind, their strangth and their souls.

It is difficult for us but it is not impossible. It is a matter of making a decision and allowing ourselves to trust God that He is real.
 
St. Peter actually bumbled a lot. About every time he has an interaction with Jesus, he fails to understand some important point or he messes up. He loses faith and starts sinking when Jesus calls him to walk on water. When Jesus says to cast fishing nets, Peter is the guy saying, “well, we just worked all night and caught nothing, though I’ll cast the net because you said to.” At the Transfiguration, Peter doesn’t grasp what happened and wants to build 3 booths. At the Last Supper, he doesn’t want Jesus washing his feet. At Gethsemane, first Peter falls asleep, then he cuts off a guy’s ear against Jesus’ wishes, then he runs away and repeatedly denies knowing Jesus. There is also an apocryphal book called “Acts of Peter” in which Peter tries to run away from his duties after Pentecost and Jesus appears and talks him out of it.

This is more than just one incident of a saint getting stuff wrong.
 
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I have had your exact same dilemma. I liked St. Augustine, somewhat like me, but I felt St. Teresa was maybe a bit closer to my faults. I suggest reading her autobiography. Many times I would exclaim, “wow, she was just like me!”

At one point in her life she didn’t pray for an entire year. I have definitely struggled with prayer as well. Sometimes the demon of acedia likes to pervade our lives when we most want to grow in the faith…only to hit a wall.
 
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Annie said:
Check out St Teresa of Avila. She was not serious about her faith for some time, but she wasn’t a huge sinner, either.
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St Teresa of Avila is a great example. She was lukewarm about her faith for a long time, even though she was in a convent. The nuns in her convent were lacking in discipline and spent a lot of time hanging out with guests in the visitors’ parlor. Some brought their personal belongings with them – fine furniture and rugs and tapestries – and even a servant or two.

Teresa fit right in there. She had an exuberant personality and could be the life of the party. Like St Augustine, she wanted holiness, but not yet.

She began her “conversion” at the age of 39.

God’s still waiting for me to fully commit. But for most of us, it’s just a lifelong process, rather than some grand moment of conversion. Not that we couldn’t do that, but most of us don’t.

Hang in there and keep moving forward.
 
Agustine left us a good amount of writings, one can get a feel for him as a real human man.

You might also read of some modern Servants of God/Beati/Saints

Blessed Bartolo Longo is one Satanic priest turned saint, Bartolo Longo is proof that no one is too lost to be found

Servant of God Dorothy Day also left us a great treasure of writings, a new biography written by her granddaughter is a good place to start “Dorothy Day: The World Will Be Saved By Beauty”.
 
Well Moses was a profit and David was a King. The Church usually says that a canonized saint is from the New Testament.

A saint is one that is not prideful, gives everything to God.
St. Elizabeth Ann Seton was born in 1774, of a wealthy Episcopalian family, and was very faithful, to her Episcopal Church until her conversion to Catholicism. She married in 1794 a William Seton and had five kids. Her husband got sick and died. Later she profest her faith to the Catholic Church.
She established her first Catholic school in Baltimore in 1808; in 1809 she established a religious community in Emmitsburg, Maryland.
She saw her community of sisters grow in Emmitsburg, New York, Cincinnati Halifax, New Jersey, Greenuary and St. Louis.
She died January 4,1821. She was beatified in 1963 and canonized on September,14, ,1975 by Pope Paul 6.

They have a special Grace bestowed opon them.

There are many more that have given everything just for the glory of our Lord. Not asking for anything. A saint is a sinner but gives his or her life to God as humble people. God bless
 
We used to take the Youth Group to our Catholic Cemetery on All Saints Day. We’d encourage the teens to walk around and read the tombstones and to realize that some of these people are now Saints in Heaven. That while we can’t buy a medal or holy card that commemorates their life, the vast majority of Saints were people who lived their lives and died in friendship with God without anyone taking much notice except their family and friends.
 
They were all like us. God’s grace works in time; it makes the sinner the saint.

The grace received by the Holy Spirit is a witness.
 
Saint Augustine of Hippo had a life much like mine. Or, other way around since he’s older. It’s not a problem I have at all seeing. You know, when people say that every saint has a past and every sinner has a future, they’re not lying.
 
So, you have experienced conversion. The Holy Spirit is a witness to that conversion.

God, doesn’t forget.
 
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