How to regain the desire to pray and seek God?

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ethereality

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God has been silent and absent so long that I no longer have the desire to go to church or pray. It seems whatever will happen will happen, that whatever will happen depends entirely on our own efforts, that God doesn’t care to ease our suffering, that there is no evil that God won’t allow, that God does not intervene, that prayer has no effect except to change our mental state depending on our disposition, that relationship with God must be instigated on His end, so I might as well quit bothering with “an empty Eucharist”, archaic texts, and incompetent liturgy.

My Japanese is not sufficient to “speak with a priest”. My plan is to continue working on my PhD to return to America. It does not seem good to try to consult any more with priests – I have already done so in Tennessee and Florida, and they have not given me any new ideas, and have only confirmed that the Bible is the only thing “God” will “say” to me. They also discouraged the expectation of healing.

Do you have any advice?
 
Ask Mary to intercede for you.

"O Mother of Perpetual Help, grant that I may ever invoke thy most powerful name, which is the safeguard of the living and the salvation of the dying. O Purest Mary, O Sweetest Mary, let thy name henceforth be ever on my lips. Delay not, O Blessed Lady, to help me whenever I call on thee, for, in all my needs, in all my temptations I shall never cease to call on thee, ever repeating thy sacred name, Mary, Mary."
 
Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta

I Thirst for You - A Prayer based on words by Our Lord Jesus Christ to Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta

It is true. I stand at the door of your heart, day and night. Even when you are not listening, even when you doubt it could be Me, I am there: waiting for even the smallest signal of your response, even the smallest suggestion of an invitation that will permit Me to enter.
I want you to know that each time you invite Me, I do come always, without fail. Silent and invisible I come, yet with a power and a love most infinite, bringing the many gifts of My Spirit. I come with My mercy, with My desire to forgive and heal you, with a love for you that goes beyond your comprehension. A love in each detail, so grand like the love I have received from My Father “I have loved all of you as the Father has loved me…” John 15:10
I come longing to console you and give you strength, to lift you up and bind all your wounds. I bring you My light, to dispel your darkness and all your doubts. I come with My power, that allows me to carry you: with My grace, to touch your heart and transform your life. I come with My peace, to calm your soul.
I know you like the palm of my hand. I know everything about you. Even the hairs of your head I have counted. Nothing in your life is unimportant to Me. I have followed you through the years and I have always loved you even when you have strayed. I know every one of your problems. I know your needs and your worries and yes, I know all your sins. But I tell you again that I love you, not for what you have or ceased to do, I love you for you, for the beauty and the dignity My Father gave you by creating you in His own image. It is a dignity you have often forgotten, a beauty you have tarnished by sin. But I love you as you are, and I have shed My Blood to rescue you.
If you only ask Me with faith, My grace will touch all that needs changing in your life: I will give you the strength to free yourself from sin and from all its destructive power. I know what is in your heart, I know your loneliness and all your wounds, the rejections, the judgments, the humiliations, I carried it all before you. And I carried it all for you, so you could share My strength and My victory.
I know, above all, your need for love, how much you are thirsting for love and tenderness. Yet, how many times have you desired to satisfy your thirst in vain, seeking that love with selfishness, trying to fill the void within you with passing pleasures, with the even greater emptiness of sin. Do you thirst for love? "Come to Me all you who thirst …” (John 7:37). I will satisfy you and fill you. Do you thirst to be loved? I love you more than you can imagine … to the point of dying on a cross for you.
I THIRST FOR YOU. Yes, that is the only way to even begin to describe My love for you. I THIRST FOR YOU. I thirst to love you and to be loved by you. So precious are you to Me that I THIRST FOR YOU.
Come to Me, and I will fill your heart and heal your wounds. I will make you a new creation and give you peace even in your trials.
I THIRST FOR YOU.
You must never doubt My mercy, My desire to forgive, My longing to bless you and live My life in you, and that I accept you no matter what you have done.
I THIRST FOR YOU.
If you feel of little value before the eyes of the world, it doesn’t matter. There is no one that interests me in the whole world than you.
I THIRST FOR YOU.
Open up to Me, come to Me, thirst for Me, give me your life. I will prove to you how important you are for My Heart. Don’t you realize that My Father already has a perfect plan to transform your life, beginning from this moment? Trust in Me. Ask Me every day to enter and take charge of your life and I will. I promise you before My Father in Heaven that I will work miracles in your life. Why would I do this?
Because I THIRST FOR YOU.
 
continued…

All I ask of you is that you entrust yourself to Me completely. I will do all the rest. From this moment, now, I behold the place My Father has prepared for you in My Kingdom. Remember that you are a pilgrim in this life travelling back home. Sin can never satisfy you, or bring the peace you seek. All that you have sought outside of Me has only left you more empty, so do not tie yourself to the things of this world; above all, do not run from Me when you fall.
Come to Me without delay because, when you give Me your sins, you give Me the joy of being your Savior. There is nothing I cannot forgive and heal; so come now, and unburden your soul. No matter how far you have strayed without a destination, no matter how often you have forgotten Me, no matter how many crosses you bear in this life; I want you to always remember, one thing that will never change.
I THIRST FOR YOU - just you, as you are.
You don’t need to change to believe in My love, for it will be your confidence in that love that will make you change. You forget Me, and yet I am seeking you every moment of the day – standing before the doors of your heart and calling. Do you find this difficult to believe?
If so, look at the Cross, look at My Heart that was pierced for you. Have you not understood My Cross? Then listen again to the words I spoke there, for they tell you clearly why I endured all this for you:
“…I THIRST” (John 19: 28)

YES, I THIRST FOR YOU.
As the rest of the psalm I was praying says of Me: “… I waited uselessly for compassion, I waited for someone to console me and I did not find it.” (Psalm 69: 20). All your life I have been desiring your love. I’ve never ceased searching for your love and longing to be loved by you in return. You have tried many things in your goal to be happy. Why not try opening up for Me you heart, right now, more than you ever have before?
When you finally open the doors of your heart and you finally come close enough, you will then hear Me say again and again, not in mere human words but in spirit: "No matter what you have done, I love you for your own sake. Come to Me with your misery and your sins, with your problems and needs, and with all your desire to be loved. I stand at the door of your heart and call… Open to Me, for I THIRST FOR YOU… "
"Jesus is God, therefore His Love and His Thirst are infinite. He, the Creator of the universe, asked for the love of his creatures. He has thirst for our love … These words: “I THIRST” … Do they echo in our soul?

Peace
 
I don’t think God has been silent; I think you haven’t been listening.
 
We are fast approaching Great Lent, a most wonderful time for reflection as we prepare ourselves for the Feast of the Glorious Ressurection of Our Lord. I personally hold to an Orthodox fast of no meat or dairy products for Lent. Our Eastern Catholic Church abstains from meat on all Fridays and Ash Monday.

Do not give up on God, He does not give up on us. I am sorry you have not been able to talk to a priest. I am over half a century old and have only found three priests I could ever talk to. One of those was Eastern Orthodox. Another was a Latin Mass exorcist. So yeah , it’s rare to find a good priest. I talk to God, a lot, and pray to various saints. They hear our prayers.

I will say a prayer for your intentions of finishing school and getting back to the states, and that God comfort you.
 
ethereality said:
God has been silent and absent so long that I no longer have the desire to go to church or pray.
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I’m sorry it’s been so hard for you and that life has been so full of suffering. Sounds like you’ve had a difficult year, to believe God has forsaken you. Christ also had a time when he cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” So, you’re in good company. Christ prayed, 3 times, for this cup of suffering to be taken away, but the answer was “no”.

It wasn’t clear to us why Christ had to suffer until after the fact. I think that may be the case with us, as well. We are to unite our suffering to Christ’s and offer it up to God in reparation for our own sins and those of the whole world.

Sometimes, we suffer because we are being tested, like was the case with Job. Now would be a good time for you to reread the Book of Job, which is only a few pages long.

There never was a saint who didn’t suffer. All of them, without a single exception, suffered. The way to heaven is hard! It’s blocked with obstacle after obstacle. Only the way to hell is wide, paved, easy, without obstacles, because Satan doesn’t want us turning to God.
ethereality said:
It seems whatever will happen will happen, that whatever will happen depends entirely on our own efforts, that God doesn’t care to ease our suffering, that there is no evil that God won’t allow, that God does not intervene, that prayer has no effect except to change our mental state depending on our disposition, that relationship with God must be instigated on His end, so I might as well quit bothering with “an empty Eucharist”, archaic texts, and incompetent liturgy.
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So, right now, prayer seems useless to you, that God is indifferent to our suffering that he just stands by, does nothing. Right now, even the Eucharist can seem empty, and that we just refer to a bunch of meaningless ancient scribblings, right?

Wow, you are in a low place, now. Prayer is very powerful. We may, or may not, get our way, but it’s still important to keep the connection to God open. We can even have a heart-to-heart talk with God and say what you’re saying to us, “God, why won’t you answer me? Why are you silent?” Had you tried that, just talking to God like you are talking to us?

Also, if you pray without faith, that’s not effective. The prerequisite is believing, which it sounds like you don’t right now. Pray with faith.
ethereality said:
My Japanese is not sufficient to “speak with a priest”. My plan is to continue working on my PhD to return to America. It does not seem good to try to consult any more with priests – I have already done so in Tennessee and Florida, and they have not given me any new ideas, and have only confirmed that the Bible is the only thing “God” will “say” to me. They also discouraged the expectation of healing.

Do you have any advice?
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Sorry you can’t talk to any priests, locally. That must be hard.

God can speak through people, circumstances, scripture, a bunch of things. Maybe God is already speaking to you without your realizing it.

I’ll pray for you.
 
Start praying a decade of the rosary. Forget your troubles. Pray for someone you know could use a prayer.
 
ethereality. Sometimes God withdraws Himself in ways known only to Him to help us in spiritual growth.

I will pray for you.

God bless.

Cathoholic
Dark Night of the Soul (Dover Thrift Editions)
by St. John of the Cross

From the USA:
amazon.com/Dark-Night-Dover-Thrift-Editions/dp/0486426939

From Japan:
amazon.co.jp/Dark-Night-Soul-Cross-English-ebook/dp/B01ACSSYE8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1487130249&sr=8-1&keywords=Dark+Night+of+the+Soul+in+books

Article from Our Sunday Visitor:
**Understanding the ‘dark night of the soul’ **
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**The feeling of spiritual emptiness, or being abandoned by God, is natural in the process of growing closer to Christ **
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Emily Stimpson Chapman OSV Newsweekly 5/20/2015
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When the world looked at the face of Blessed Teresa of Kolkata, it saw pure, simple joy. Then, in 2007, 10 years after Blessed Teresa’s death, a collection of her private letters was published. Suddenly, the joy that the tiny sister from Albania once radiated seemed anything but simple.
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As the letters revealed, for the entirety of her public ministry, the founder of the Missionaries of Charity endured unceasing feelings of desolation and abandonment by God.
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“I am told God lives in me,” she wrote in 1957, “and yet the reality of darkness and coldness and emptiness is so great that nothing touches my soul.”
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For some, the letters became a source of scandal. But for those familiar with the stages of spiritual growth, they served as a profound testimony to Blessed Teresa’s sanctity. In those decades of desolation, she lived what St. John of the Cross termed, the “dark night of the soul,” which was the title of a poem he wrote. . . . .
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osv.com/OSVNewsweekly/ByIssue/Article/TabId/735/ArtMID/13636/ArticleID/17512/Understanding-the-%E2%80%98dark-night-of-the-soul%E2%80%99-.aspx

Sacred Heart of Jesus Devotion
12 Promises
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Listed below are the “12 Promises” of the Sacred Heart of Jesus to St. Margaret Mary to encourage all Catholics to know and understand the benefit of practicing the Devotion and to encourage all to take up its immediate practice.
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I will give them all the graces necessary in their state of life.
I will give peace in their families and will unite families that are divided
I will console them in all their troubles.
I will be their refuge during life and above all in death.
I will bestow the blessings of Heaven on all their enterprises.
Sinners shall find in my Heart the source and infinite ocean of mercy.
Tepid souls shall become fervent.
Fervent souls shall rise quickly to great perfection.
I will bless those places wherein the image of My Heart shall be exposed and honored and will imprint My love on the hearts of those who would wear this image on their person. I will also destroy in them all disordered movements.
I will give to priests who are animated by a tender devotion to my Divine Heart the gift of touching the most hardened hearts.
Those who promote this devotion shall have their names written in my Heart, never to be effaced.
I promise you in the excessive mercy of my Heart that my all-powerful love will grant to all those who communicate on the First Friday in nine consecutive months, the grace of final penitence: they will not die in my disgrace, nor without receiving their Sacraments. My Divine Heart shall be their safe refuge in this last moment.
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(The Nine Fridays must be made in honor of His Sacred Heart, meaning, practicing the devotion and having a great love of His Sacred Heart. They must be on the first Friday of the month for nine consecutive months, and Communion must be received.)

sacredheartdevotion.com/12-promises/
 
PS Just one caveat to my last post concerning the Sacred Heart Devotion . . . .

You listed yourself as an “agnostic”.

Assuming you are an ex-Catholic, go to Confession first and see if you can be reconciled with the Church (the Priest in the Confessional will help you).

If you are not an ex-Catholic, but you are inclined to want to try the Sacred Heart Devotion that I linked to, just do the same except instead of going to Holy Communion, while at Mass just ask Jesus to spiritually unite Himself to you (instead of going up for Communion, or go up and just ask the Priest for a blessing without receiving Holy Communion).

If you want to know the “whys” on not receiving Holy Communion in a state of unbelief, your priest will gladly explain it to you I am sure.
 
Agnostic means you don’t think God can be known.
Yet you want to know God.
Sometimes people can way overthink things.
And you believe there is a Roman Rite that covers this?
If your Japanese is not good enough, speak to someone and ask if there is an American or English priest available to speak to.
Your confusion over terms is crippling your ability to actually “hear” God or feel His presence in your life.
Invite Him in. That simple, Honest.
I’ll pray for you.
 
Where in Japan? I find it surprising that they have no priests available that can speak English. If you are near Okinawa why not look up the local military chaplains phone number, see if you can give hI’m a call. He may know of a Catholic priest or even be a Catholic priest and thus they would speak English.

Remember there is always a way, if you give up it’s not Gods fault, sometimes our crosses are hard to bear, remember Jesus’s cross. His was a extremely hard but he did so…
 
I think sometimes you just have to make yourself go to mass and pray when you don’t feel like it, maybe especially because you don’t feel like it. This doesn’t get better by stopping completely so try to keep going even if it’s just a decade of the rosary or reading a prayer try to do it every day. You aren’t the only person going through this and I bet there are people in church alongside you with the same struggle.
 
Just download a PDF of “the believers authority” it will inspire you
 
Hey, OP. I understand what you are talking about, when you feel like God is indifferent to your plight. I wrote a similar post to yours not too long ago: you can read it here: forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=1037191

What seems to have worked for me was getting on this board and asking for prayers. I think that when you can’t pray for yourself, the prayer of others can fill in the gap for you. So I guess you are doing the right thing by reaching out. I would advise to make a post in the prayer intentions forum and benefit from the prayers of many who can at this moment stand stronger than you.

I wish you the comfort of knowing that God is with you at all times. I am often losing it but when I regain it, it always seems worth it. This is all I can offer for now, besides my prayers. God bless you.
 
If they have adoration where you are, go sit before the Blessed Sacrament. You don’t even have to say anything, just place yourself in the presence of God. Go a lot. See what happens.
 
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