How to confess and permanently change ways

  • Thread starter Thread starter Catholic_97
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
C

Catholic_97

Guest
Well, I am a 13 year old FEMALE and I’m going to confession this Saturday. My only concern is how to confess violating chastity, or in other words “masturbating, looking at porn, thinking sexual thoughts about others, reading erotic stories, having plain sexual thoughts and cravings, etc”. I really need help with this, this has been a problem for me for so many years, I don’t know why. I think it may be hormones involved, but this has been going on for so long. I just started to look at porn/ erotic stories, and masturbate 2-3 years ago. I just found out how these were MORTAL sins yesterday, when reading this forum. Please I need all advice on how to confess my “addictions” and how to “stop my addictions”. Also does this mean I will be going to hell? I’ve been living in fear because of the wrong things I do, I cry when I pray, I don’t sleep, etc. May god bless you all, my thanks in advance.

NOTE: I have been a catholic my entire life. I did NOT know that these were sins.

Please no rude people, this is a serious matter for me. I’m still young and want to change my wrong ways , I know many of the things I’ve been doing are illegal, that’s why I’m trying to redeem myself. Please pray for me.
 
There are three criteria for mortal sin. The first criteria is that it is grave matter, breaking one of the 10 Commandments. Certainly, any sexual sins outside of marriage (and even some in marriage) are considered violations of the sixth commandment-“Thou shall not commit adultery.” The second criteria for mortal sin is that you have to KNOW it is wrong. Since you did not know that it was wrong, you did not commit a mortal sin, however, you still need to confess these sins to the priest. Be sure to let him know that you did not know it was wrong until you did the examination of conscience. The third criteria is that you committed the sin with full consent.

It will be hard but you should just tell your priest everything you have told us on this forum. Believe it or not, he has heard it all before. We live in a sex saturated society. And our Church does a really poor job on teaching about chastity and sex.

Is this your First Confession?

The best way to stop your addiction is to start praying the minute you are tempted to read or look at something that is impure. If praying doesn’t work, distract yourself with something else such as writing a journal or reading a Bible so on. AND start cutting back on the amount of television, youtube and pop culture you expose yourself to. You are at an age where you are very susceptable to it (honeslty, most adults are susceptable to it,too.) -spend your free time trying to help others.
 
I myself have recently had to confess much worse than you and as someone much older I understand what you are going through so I hope that some of my errors can help you from falling into the traps I fell into.
  1. do not feel that somehow this is something unique to you; or that this is some class of sin away above the normal. You are a normal wonderfull young person who is facing the first seious attempts by satan to create division between you and Christ using the first real opportunity that has been created by this behaviour pattern that i’m sure he pushed and in your weakness you gave in.
  2. The Priest will have heard much worse than anything a 13 yr old Girl can say and the words you use will not be an embarrassment to him.
  3. You need to start praying for help in making a good confession now. I find the Rosary very powerfull. remember in the Hail Mary " PRAY FOR US SINNERS" so Mary is there for all us sinners.
  4. you need to make a serious attempt to end the pattern of behaviour that leads to the masturbation. Get rid of the porn, why feed the problem. Offer up the angst associated with the craving to masturbate as a prayer. Suffering is such a powerfull prayer. Fill your time with other activities to reduce thinking about it.
  5. Don’t expect confession to be a magic wand its not but it is a great help and start. You will still need to pray and work hard at developing a new pattern of behaviour. Im guessing you are most at risk at bedtime so why not make the nightime routine that you say the Rosary till you fall asleep. If the computer is the source of porn why not get it out of your bedroom. Make some excuse too your parents like concentrate better on homework if not in bedroom.
  6. This is not permission to give in but remember Peter denied Christ 3 times but he is a saint. So even if saints can fail so can we. But we must never allow satan to convice us that because we failed we should give up. No we get up ; dust ourselves off and try again in sincerity.
  7. You sound like a wonderfull person who is suffering because you are at heart a good christian and the Church needs people like you. You are our Future. Remember everyone in this forum loves you and wants you to suceed. Why not drop a thread in the prayer intention forum; you needn’t be so discriptive about your issue just that you are 13 years old and having a crises of conscience and need help to make a good confession and recovery.
I hope this hasn’t been too long winded but I really wanted to help a kindred spirit 👍
 
Thank you both for your advice. It was not long, but instead indeed very helpful, and will help me when I go to confession. I have web to confession many times b/c of Catechism. I was confirmed last year but sadly my nun didn’t go over what things fall into the categories of the 10 commandments and 7 deadly sins. My other questions are- once I’ve heard at a mass a priest say looking at porn was a sin, but yet I still did. Does that make it a mortal sin, and does that mean I’ve commuted a mortal sin, can’t be forgiven, and am going to hell? Also, what would be the right words to say to confess this to a priest?
 
Agree with the others above.

What I would add to the above:

Go to Mass as often as you can would be the one suggestion I’d give along with the others. You didn’t say whether you went to Catholic school or public school. If you go to Catholic school, chances are that your parish has a Mass every day before school starts.

Frequent reception of the Blessed Sacrament (after you’ve been to confession) also has a tremendous power for healing and strengthening, as well. While you may not be able to go on school days, you could probably work it out to go on weekdays when school is out and on Saturdays.

Four other things that I would suggest on a spiritual basis:
  1. If you don’t know it, learn the prayer to St Michael the Archangel. Pray it when you get up in the morning, during the day, when you feel tempted, and before you go to bed at night.
  2. Get a St Benedict’s Medal or St Benedict’s Crucifix, have it blessed by your priest, and wear it always.
  3. Get some holy water from your church. Bless yourself with it often. As you learn about your faith, you will find out that sacramentals like holy water and medals like the St Benedict medal have real spiritual benefit.
  4. Somebody earlier made a suggestion that you limit your tv, youtube, and so on. I’ll go one step further: eliminate it completely for a month. I mean everything. TV (yes, including cartoons), secular music, movies, media, and so on. Replace that with good Catholic music, Catholic movies, Catholic TV, Catholic reading, and so on.
Here’s the reason why: your brain gets programmed with everything that you feed it. Unfortunately, much of what is out there in the world is designed to move you in the direction of porn, sex, masturbation, etc., etc., etc. If you eliminate it for a while, replacing it with spiritual material, your brain will start to reprogram itself to line up with the replacement stuff you’re feeding it.

BTW, just because you heard about it once does not necessarily make it a mortal sin. You need to KNOW that it is gravely wrong. But it doesn’t hurt at all to confess even if there is any doubt in the world. The biggest thing is to be contrite (which, per your postings, you are) and to make a firm effort to amend your life (which it sounds like you’re going to do)
 
If you confess that you committed ‘impure acts by yourself’ this is considered that sin, of self-abuse. One confesses it and the looking at impure magazines, and the giving into the thoughts.

One confesses how long one has had the habit, and how frequently the sin is committed, and basically unburdens oneself entirely.

Explain it’s your first time confessing these so the priest can help.

One of the keys after you confess is to avoid ‘the near occasion of sin’ that is persons, places or things that tempt you to the sin, so that you normally fall into the sin in such encounters. Recognizing and admitting what these are, and sacrificing them no matter how hard that is – Doing this will be key to overcoming the problem.

Also, developing the mental habit of treating any temptation like a spark of fire landing in your hand – painful and shaking it off immediately, will be key. Practice the opposing virtue of chastity, by meditating upon its beauty and praying for purity and modesty and admiring it in Christ, the Blessed Virgin, and the saints.

As time goes by you will develop an orientation where sensual things are not what you want, but rather, you desire virtuous things and the spiritual happiness one gains from practicing virtue, and this will give you the positive strength to conquer the habit entirely.

However you may have to give up a good deal of entertainment people make use of normally everyday to do so. Whether it’s books, television, certain websites, etc. Step by step. To clean living. And a happier more virtuous and healthy life. 🙂

Ave Maria.
 
Ditto. The St. Benedict medal, properly and fully blessed with the ritual blessing, and the holy water, so too, is good. Very helpful to overcoming temptations. 🙂
 
Thank you markomalley, all the things you’ve said have been so helpful. I went to a public school, which was most likely a factor of how I discovered these things. Thank you again for the advice, I will make an effort in permanently changing my ways.

Shin, thank you also for your help on how to tell a priest about the sin. My question though is: I’ve never confessed this sin before, because I didn’t know, as stated above. And since I have been commiting it for a period of time, what would I tell the priest? Would I say that I’ve commited it “many” times? Or is there a better word to use. Thank you for your advice also, I wear a saints bracelet, a rosary bracelet, on my right hand, and wear a scapulae that I never remove, in hopes of trying to help change myself. I might pick up another bracelet for my left hand too, to help remove the temptation. My question is, where would I get a St. Benedict medal? Thank you

God bless.
 
BTW, '97, thank you for bringing this up.

I teach 7th grade CCD (Catechism) and sometimes get horrified responses when I teach my kids about some unpleasant realities in this life. Like the fact that porn is out there and is addictive and is a grave matter that will trap them. Like the fact that, yes, masturbation is a sin. And so on.

Reading that you never learned about this in your years of catechism class tells me that I’m doing the right thing teaching about it.
 
I agree with everything that has been said so far. I find the St. Michael prayer is the test in time of temptation.

I also find that going to confession with the same priest helps the best. Yes, we fall over and over. May end up maturbating again and then go to confession. The nice thing about going to the same priest, is the fact that you have to face him again and are embarrased with tha will also help with changing behavior. Most priests are very caring with this matter. I said to my priest one time that it seems like I keep coming back with the same sin. And he told me, “but you are coming back less often” That means you are starting to handle the temptation. A behavior that is done everyday is tough. If you can go a week without, then a month, then two months, you are making progress.

I would also suggest reading “Theology of the Body for Teens”. I teach this to 8th graders in my church and it is very helpful. Pope John Paul II gave talks at the general audiences for several years, and this is the teen version of his teachings. Here is a link to where you can buy it. amazon.com/Theology-Body-Teens-Student-Workbook/dp/1932927867

I will be praying for you!
 
When you can remember how many times you committed a sin, you say that exact number. When you almost remember how many times you say, 'About this many times…"

This is what normally one does when one goes to Confession frequently. One neither exaggerates or minimizes, but gives one’s best estimate and honestly makes clear when that is an estimate.

But if you’ve been committing a sin regularly over a long period of time and there’s no hope of getting a simple number, then you say something like…

“I’ve been committing this sin since, to the best of my recall, this many months ago, or since I was this old, and generally this frequently per day/week…”

See the above also gives the priest the best idea he can have. He will understand. And ask if he needs to anything more.

Perhaps you might add, "Whenever this opportunity happened in my life, I committed this sin… " to help clarify matters if you think that is helpful. But you may not need to go that far. Whatever you think best communicates the truth without trying to make unreasonable demands of calculation.

You simply do your best to frankly, simply, and straightforwards tell the priest how often you committed the sin to the best of your knowedge, and make clear how fuzzy or not your memory is.

Simplicity and honesty are the real requirement. Not memory. You do what you can that way, not blocking stuff out, but simply responsibly and reasonably doing what you can to the best of your knowledge to relate.

That’s enough, and he’ll ask you if he has any need of clarification.

When you’ve made a simple and honest confession feel relieved and trust in God. 😃 That’s what he wants.

Hope that wasn’t too long winded.

Simple. Honest. Straightforwards. Unburdening and explaining when you don’t know, and when you do. Openly. That is what gets it done right.

Put yourself in the priest’s hands, explaining your situation.

And believe me it’s a great relief and happiness afterwards. 🙂
 
Catholic_97 said:
Thank you both for your advice. It was not long, but instead indeed very helpful, and will help me when I go to confession. I have web to confession many times b/c of Catechism. I was confirmed last year but sadly my nun didn’t go over what things fall into the categories of the 10 commandments and 7 deadly sins. My other questions are- once I’ve heard at a mass a priest say looking at porn was a sin, but yet I still did. Does that make it a mortal sin, and does that mean I’ve commuted a mortal sin,** can’t be forgiven, and am going to hell**? Also, what would be the right words to say to confess this to a priest?
Click to expand...
Dear catholic 97 perhaps you have committed a mortal sin by viewing the porn, but it can be forgiven…just confess this error as others suggested. no you are not going to hell…
 
Thank you markomalley, all the things you’ve said have been so helpful. I went to a public school, which was most likely a factor of how I discovered these things. Thank you again for the advice, I will make an effort in permanently changing my ways.

Shin, thank you also for your help on how to tell a priest about the sin. My question though is: I’ve never confessed this sin before, because I didn’t know, as stated above. And since I have been commiting it for a period of time, what would I tell the priest? Would I say that I’ve commited it “many” times? Or is there a better word to use. Thank you for your advice also, I wear a saints bracelet, a rosary bracelet, on my right hand, and wear a scapulae that I never remove, in hopes of trying to help change myself. I might pick up another bracelet for my left hand too, to help remove the temptation. My question is, where would I get a St. Benedict medal? Thank you

God bless.
 
Well, try to recall back to when you first started committing the sin, and say, you’ve been committing it since then, and try to get across how often as best your recall.

If you tended to commit the sin an average of about 5 times a week, and started committing it 10 months ago, you say that… If it’s even vaguer…

If you only remember vaguely how long ago it was, say that… and too say you’ve committed it many times…

You want to be as accurate as you can as to how often you committed the sin in the past, so he can forgive it all.

If you can’t quite get a handle on how to confess how often from the above…

Tell the priest that and ask him to advise you on how to determine the number of times you committed sins and properly relate it to him.

Basically how to do a proper examination of conscience.

Then he’ll teach you how to do it. 😃 Don’t worry about that, and don’t be afraid. That’s what he’s for, to instruct you how to do a good Confession too.

A regular Confessor is helpful. Especially in sins that become vices or habits.

Basically it’s important to try to give him the best information you can about how often you committed the sin so he can properly judge and forgive it all. 🙂

These kinds of sins are the sins priests hear most often in the Confessional. Unless the priest was just ordained the priest is quite used to helping people with it.
 
Hmm I might’ve responded twice. I might’ve read the same post twice thinking it was a new one.

In any cases… God keep you.

St. Charles Borromeo, ora pro nobis. St. Agnes, ora pro nobis. St. Philomena, ora pro nobis.

Good saints!
 
Catholic_97 said:
Well, I am a 13 year old FEMALE and I’m going to confession this Saturday. My only concern is how to confess violating chastity, or in other words “masturbating, looking at porn, thinking sexual thoughts about others, reading erotic stories, having plain sexual thoughts and cravings, etc”.
Click to expand...
Just say that, exactly like that. Also mention how long this has been going on, and how it got started. The priest will not be shocked - most people confess something like that, at some point in their lives, especially during the teen and young adult years, when we are surrounded by messages encouraging us to do these things.
Also does this mean I will be going to hell?
Click to expand...
Whenever we go to Confession and receive Holy Communion (in that order) Jesus washes away all of our sins and comes to live in our hearts to help us do better.

The more you go to Confession and the more you receive Holy Communion, the easier everything will become, for you, and you will no longer have any fear of Hell. 🙂
NOTE: I have been a catholic my entire life. I did NOT know that these were sins.
Click to expand...
They are awkward subjects to bring up in Catechism class, because some of the kids haven’t had “the talk” yet. Your parents might not have realized that it was already time to tell you, either.

When I was thirteen, I was still riding horses and making clothes for my dolls. Sex wasn’t anywhere near my radar - if someone had told me about masturbation, I’d have thought they were completely crazy. I had a vague idea of pornography, because I knew some older boys who bought it, but I couldn’t see the point of it. I was a lot older when I started to become interested in that kind of thing.

I expect that your parents and teachers were thinking that they still had a few years before they had to bring up the subject. 😊
 
If you want to be pure, read this book:
books.google.com/ebooks?id=3zSG5srzEbEC

There is a good preview there and you can buy it on that famous online bookstore among other places I am sure.

EDIT: The free preview is very good - check it out. It appears to contain the first 8 of 51 daily reflections.
 
Irish_Hare said:
If you want to be pure, read this book:
books.google.com/ebooks?id=3zSG5srzEbEC

There is a good preview there and you can buy it on that famous online bookstore among other places I am sure.

EDIT: The free preview is very good - check it out. It appears to contain the first 8 of 51 daily reflections.
Click to expand...
I say, I liked that preview, and its commitment to using respectful and modest rather explicit language. Something which this forum would benefit greatly in committing to as well if it ever could be moved to.
 
jmcrae, yes, it is completely understandable that you wouldn’t want to go near masturbation or porn when you were 13. Society has done so many things to our world that has such a big impact on people, especially to younger people. Temptations become much more severe, because of all the influence, on tv, the Internet, etc. Sadly people don’t find making dresses for dolls or horseback riding to their interest anymore. Sadly people seem to think the only way of relieving themselves of boredom would be to go on the Internet and watch TV. And they seem to stumble on types of things such as swearing, the influence of sex, alcohol, violence, and so many other things. Growing up, the hormones start to kick in, and with such a big probability of stumbling into one of these matters, the temptation rises. And being tempted becomes much easier then it was before. I will pray with my heart for myself, and all other people, that these temptations can finally be resolved, and that maybe, one day, people will resort to better ways of relieving themselves of boredom.
 
And thank you shin and Irish hare. I will read the preview of the book, and pray that it will help me.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top