G
Gblat
Guest
That’ll do as well.I would say its more along the lines of “Think, Mcfly, think” in this case.
It's been 2000 years............how about another revelation or something?
- Status
C
CatholicTrekkie
Guest
I’m not quite sure what you’re getting at there, friend.
K
Kathryn_Ann
Guest
:heaven:
St. Catherine of Sienna, Doctor of the Church
Lourdes,(Saint Bernadette) the continuing miracles
St Therese of Lisieux, Doctor of the Church
St. Thomas More
Blessed Mother Teresa
Miracles of healing
Gift of life itself
Each time a baby is born
All the Saints
The Holy Spirit within us
Jesus in our Hearts
Divine Mercy
The Church, The Bride of Christ, Liturgy, Teachers, Priests,
The Resurrection
Our hope of Heaven…
…countless mercies, miracles…
God speaks to us every day! Rejoice!:angel1:
Kathryn Ann
St. Catherine of Sienna, Doctor of the Church
Lourdes,(Saint Bernadette) the continuing miracles
St Therese of Lisieux, Doctor of the Church
St. Thomas More
Blessed Mother Teresa
Miracles of healing
Gift of life itself
Each time a baby is born
All the Saints
The Holy Spirit within us
Jesus in our Hearts
Divine Mercy
The Church, The Bride of Christ, Liturgy, Teachers, Priests,
The Resurrection
Our hope of Heaven…
…countless mercies, miracles…
God speaks to us every day! Rejoice!:angel1:
Kathryn Ann
I
itullian
Guest
i love all your posts,thank you
i was a safety consultant and thus a very logical thinking person.i really need God to reach out to me.
i really can’t cope/accept all the pat answers and platitudes any more. if he’s real he needs to show me. i think my soul is worth it.
he’s shown others, right? or is that illusion. not sure anymore.
can’t believe in a shadow anymore. i hope He wants me.
like the one sheep that strayed, i need him to come get me.
love
i was a safety consultant and thus a very logical thinking person.i really need God to reach out to me.
i really can’t cope/accept all the pat answers and platitudes any more. if he’s real he needs to show me. i think my soul is worth it.
he’s shown others, right? or is that illusion. not sure anymore.
can’t believe in a shadow anymore. i hope He wants me.
like the one sheep that strayed, i need him to come get me.
love
L
LittleDavid
Guest
Have you read the book,“Disappointment with God” by Philip Yancey?
Just give this book a try. Let me know what you think.
T
TryingToLearn
Guest
Have you taken the time to really read about the documented Eucharistic miracles?
Or the miracles that have occurred in response to intercessory prayers to the beatified that then were declared Saints?
Or maybe the lives of some recent Saints like Padre Pio, Don Bosco, or John Vianney?
Or step back and really look at the world around you and contemplate it. We’re so constantly immersed in the enormous, intricate complexity of the Universe we take it for granted, but to an open heart and mind, it is a constant revelation of God’s existence.
And, I’ll never forget the day my first child was born… talk about God revealing Himself to me…
I went through periods of doubt… I now see how like the Pharisees and Sadducees I was… Jesus was performing miracles right in front of their eyes and they kept demanding a sign… God is showing Himself every day, you just have to have an open mind and heart…
I
itullian
Guest
seems like He should quickly embrace someone that reaches out…
C
Credo_in_Deum
Guest
Doubting Thomas didn’t ask for a mass miracle. My guess is you wouldn’t even accept -if it happened to you- the doubting Thomas treatment as being legit.
Why should God give a sign you wouldn’t accept anyway? 
I
itullian
Guest
i will accept Jesus coming to me and putting my finger in his side.Doubting Thomas didn’t ask for a mass miracle. My guess is you wouldn’t even accept -if it happened to you- the doubting Thomas treatment as being legit.
in fact i’ll even skip the finger thing. just the appearance would do.
i’d probably have a heart attack,but it’d be worth it…
S
SMA_12
Guest
Christ himself told us He was sending us the the Spirit, who is within us always. It seems you are looking for an external sign. Maybe you need to quiet your heart and look internally for the Holy Spirit.
God surrounds everywhere. Eucharist. The Sacraments. The Mass. The poor. The hungry. The Saints. Children. Your neighbors. Your family. The sun, the moon, and the stars. Charities. Priests, Deacons, Nuns…
If you are having trouble seeing and hearing Him, open your eyes and quiet your heart.
He has never and will never leave us.
God bless.
C
Credo_in_Deum
Guest
My guess is God knows it wouldn’t help you much. Didn’t help the prideful pharisees or sadducees when Christ performed miracles in front of them. Maybe you should practice some humility for God resisteth the proud, but to the humble he giveth grace (1 Peter 5:5).
I
itullian
Guest
yes, an external sign. others may not need it,i really do…
all those others can have other explanations. i need something with no other explanations.
P
PennyinCanada
Guest
He did come soon, right after his resurrection. Many saw him alive after he died on the cross.
I
itullian
Guest
J
JReducation
Guest
Itullian, my friend, it seems that the problem may not be with God, but with you. I don’t mean to be rude or cruel, just logical. Observe what you’re doing here.
You’re alleging to be waiting on God and at the same time, you’re demanding that he perform according to your needs, within your parameters and on your schedule. If he were that easy for human beings to control, he wouldn’t be much of a god would he?
Second, you have not said what it would take to please you. Maybe what it would take to please you is outside of God’s parameter. God will not do anything that is against his nature. That’s one of the qualities of God, fidelity to his nature, something that we lack when we try to tell God what to do. If we were faithful to our human nature, we would accept that divine nature is outside of our control and not try to dictate to it. The fact that one tries to dictate to the divine, probably means that one does not understand what it means to be human or worse, one believes that human is above the divine.
You speak about rights. Let’s try to understand here. Rights exist only where there are duties. What do you consider to be God’s duties to you? How did those duties come into existence? Is it logically possible to be God and to be subject to duties and obligations to one’s creation? How does that work?
You mention mothers or parents. There is a major difference between the fatherhood of God and human parenting. Parents do not create their children. Parents have the anatomical and biochemical equipment to conceive a child, but the parent does not give life to the child. Even doctors in labs concede that they do not give life to the zygote in the Petri dish. They only manipulate the “stuff” that is necessary for life to take place. If life does not cooperate, then there will be no conception, whether inside a petri dish or in a womb.
God, on the other hand, creates life, the matter and the laws necessary for life to make progress. His relationship with his children is very different from that of a human parent. Parents do not create. They procreate, big difference. Children are given to parents. We are not given to God, by whom would we be given to God? You can’t assign parental duties to God when his relationship to man is very different from that of a biological parent.
Let’s look at your rant about 2,000 years. Theoretically, man has been on the earth for about one million years. Two thousand is not a very long time compared to one million. Now compare it to eternity.
Now let’s address your language. “I need. I want. I have a right to” This is the language of the great American Heresy . . . which is the culture of entitlement. We created this heresy and we exported it around the world too. Everything revolves around our entitlement and very little around our obligations.
Imagine a biological parent surrendering to a child who speaks to him or her with those statements. The child would become a tyrant and the parent would be abdicating authority. Sounds objectively sinful to me. You’re asking God to do something that is sinful. You’re asking him to abdicate authority. That’s the great American Heresy. “Everyone is his own authority and everyone must respond to my demands.” The atheist dismisses the existence of God, because he fails to comply with his demands. You on the flip side, want to fire him, because he’s not doing his job. What’s the difference between you and an atheist?
Your profile says that you’re Catholic, but your posts say otherwise. We go back to my opening statement. The real problem here is that there is an absence of consistency in you, not in God. One is either a person of faith or a non believer. To claim to be a person of faith and to think and speak like a non believer creates a schizophrenic spiritual life that only leads to agony and nihilism.
You may want to pray that God give you interior harmony so that you can act and speak as that which you claim to be.
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
You’re alleging to be waiting on God and at the same time, you’re demanding that he perform according to your needs, within your parameters and on your schedule. If he were that easy for human beings to control, he wouldn’t be much of a god would he?
Second, you have not said what it would take to please you. Maybe what it would take to please you is outside of God’s parameter. God will not do anything that is against his nature. That’s one of the qualities of God, fidelity to his nature, something that we lack when we try to tell God what to do. If we were faithful to our human nature, we would accept that divine nature is outside of our control and not try to dictate to it. The fact that one tries to dictate to the divine, probably means that one does not understand what it means to be human or worse, one believes that human is above the divine.
You speak about rights. Let’s try to understand here. Rights exist only where there are duties. What do you consider to be God’s duties to you? How did those duties come into existence? Is it logically possible to be God and to be subject to duties and obligations to one’s creation? How does that work?
You mention mothers or parents. There is a major difference between the fatherhood of God and human parenting. Parents do not create their children. Parents have the anatomical and biochemical equipment to conceive a child, but the parent does not give life to the child. Even doctors in labs concede that they do not give life to the zygote in the Petri dish. They only manipulate the “stuff” that is necessary for life to take place. If life does not cooperate, then there will be no conception, whether inside a petri dish or in a womb.
God, on the other hand, creates life, the matter and the laws necessary for life to make progress. His relationship with his children is very different from that of a human parent. Parents do not create. They procreate, big difference. Children are given to parents. We are not given to God, by whom would we be given to God? You can’t assign parental duties to God when his relationship to man is very different from that of a biological parent.
Let’s look at your rant about 2,000 years. Theoretically, man has been on the earth for about one million years. Two thousand is not a very long time compared to one million. Now compare it to eternity.
Now let’s address your language. “I need. I want. I have a right to” This is the language of the great American Heresy . . . which is the culture of entitlement. We created this heresy and we exported it around the world too. Everything revolves around our entitlement and very little around our obligations.
Imagine a biological parent surrendering to a child who speaks to him or her with those statements. The child would become a tyrant and the parent would be abdicating authority. Sounds objectively sinful to me. You’re asking God to do something that is sinful. You’re asking him to abdicate authority. That’s the great American Heresy. “Everyone is his own authority and everyone must respond to my demands.” The atheist dismisses the existence of God, because he fails to comply with his demands. You on the flip side, want to fire him, because he’s not doing his job. What’s the difference between you and an atheist?
Your profile says that you’re Catholic, but your posts say otherwise. We go back to my opening statement. The real problem here is that there is an absence of consistency in you, not in God. One is either a person of faith or a non believer. To claim to be a person of faith and to think and speak like a non believer creates a schizophrenic spiritual life that only leads to agony and nihilism.
You may want to pray that God give you interior harmony so that you can act and speak as that which you claim to be.
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
I
itullian
Guest
thank you sir for the beautiful words.
sorry, but i’ve been a catholic for 50plus years and still had communion a month ago.
so your judgement is inaccurate.
my faith crisis is real.
i don’t think what i’ve been pleading and begging Him and His Mother for is against their nature. what they’ve supposedly done for others they could do for me, no?
i have loved them my whole life and need them now. need
i’m knocking and begging. instead of trying to explain why the answer doesn’t come, help me to get an answer.
just a desperate plea i guess.
love, I
sorry, but i’ve been a catholic for 50plus years and still had communion a month ago.
so your judgement is inaccurate.
my faith crisis is real.
i don’t think what i’ve been pleading and begging Him and His Mother for is against their nature. what they’ve supposedly done for others they could do for me, no?
i have loved them my whole life and need them now. need
i’m knocking and begging. instead of trying to explain why the answer doesn’t come, help me to get an answer.
just a desperate plea i guess.
love, I
J
JReducation
Guest
I’m not judging you. I’m judging you statements. I was hoping that you would look at them more closely.
Faith crises are very real and very painful. I would strongly suggest that you may want to read Come Be My Light, about Mother Teresa’s faith crisis and how in the end, it was never a crisis at all, but a share in Christ’s passion. Sometimes we have to travel on pure belief. There are not feelings, not miracles, not signs and wonders. In reality, the greatest saint is the one who travels on belief alone. If signs and wonders come, he regards them as consolations and pays little attention to them, because they are not important.
I can give you a simple example. Our Holy Father received the stigmata. He never spoke about it or mentioned it in his writings. Instead, his writings and his preaching focus on two themes, penance and obedience. The stigmata was not that important to him, other than the fact that it was quite painful. But it was not the thing that was going to get him to heaven. Penance and obedience would get him to heaven. All that the miracle did was to speak about God’s glory. It did not guarantee his salvation.
What they have done for others, they have done spontaneously, not because anyone expected it of them or demanded it of them. To submit to our expectations and to our demands is to abdicate authority. Such an act would be contrary to the divine nature of God.
That is where your prayer should be directed, not to asking God for signs, but asking him to give you whatever it is that you need. He knows better than you and I what we need and what is good for us. Sometimes, the things we ask for have consequences. Those consequences can be destructive, if not for us, for those around us. God will not give us a blessing that can turn out to be a curse for another person. God will only give us blessings that do not affect others or positively enhance their spiritual lives.
No one can help you get the answer, because you’re asking for something that is inappropriate for man to request. No one can help you get from God that which is inappropriate. If you ask for inner peace and harmony, that we can help you get, through prayer, spiritual guidance and fraternity.
One must be careful that despair does not make one unreasonable. When that happens, we only frustrate ourselves, because we will never get what we ask for. The only way out of despair is to be reasonable. We must ask God for what is within his power to give and within our ability to receive. This requires an openness in which we accept that God will give us what we need and take what he wants from us, even though it hurts.
There is no better time to think about this than Good Friday. Look at Jesus and Mary. They were open to receive whatever the Father gave and were willing to give whatever the Father took from them. By remaining so open, they never lost their peace.
There is a little prayer that I say each day. I did not write it. I don’t even remember where I learned it. I think it may have been from Mother Teresa.
“Lord, grant me the grace to accept what you give and give what you take.” Believe it or not, it has brought me great peace.
By the way, I’m Brother, not a Sir. But thank you for the title of honor.
Fraternally,
Br. JR, OSF
T
TryingToLearn
Guest
Obviously, none of us know what has precipitated this crisis of faith for you. But, what some are suggesting and I will state outright again is that you are expecting God to jump through your hoops. Recently my life has been ripe with opportunities for a crisis of faith. And at times I had similar thoughts of “Why isn’t He giving me what I asked for?”
It’s readily apparent to me now… I was asking for what I wanted, and that was not what I needed. He gave me something far better, he gave me what I needed.
In a nutshell, my wife cheated on me, moved out leaving me with my three kids, and we are separated her not knowing if she wants to file for divorce or not. Me in limbo, committed to my marital vows, hurt, confused, stuck…
For quite awhile I prayed that God would fix my marriage. Over night. Now. I trusted in Him and demanded He be faithful and answer my prayers exactly as I demanded on my schedule. I just knew that what I needed was my wife. She is my soulmate and I would pray daily that there was just no way I could live without her and her love. I was looking for Him to answer my prayer and give me what I knew I needed…
God knew better.
It took me quite awhile, but I finally started to see that He was trying to answer my prayer, I just wasn’t paying attention…
I sort of knew what I needed. I need to feel loved. Ya, I wanted that love to come from my wife. But, my need isn’t her love. My need is God’s love. He may show it to me through my wife. He was showing it to me through my kids. And He was also showing it to me in another way, always had been. And it took me stepping back, really thinking and recognizing I had been ignoring just how much He was answering my prayer…
First, my kids. When my wife left they became even more loving towards me and we grew much closer. When I’d stop demanding God give my wife back, I’d feel there was so much more love coming from my kids than before. They can light me up and warm my heart as much or more than a hug or smile from my wife, if I let them.
But that’s not all He was doing. This part took longer, but I would sit there contemplating what my wife was thinking, why she would leave me, etc… Thinking I am not a bad guy, I’m not perfect, but I love her, I sacrifice for her, I give her and our children everything they need and most of what they want, I’m faithful, honest, loyal, how can she not see how much I love her and care for her and want her in my life? How can she be so selfish, blind and disrespectful of the love I have shown her?
And one day it hit me. For over 40 years God has given me life and every single thing that I have. Every drop of water, ever breath I breathe, every morsel of food, there is not a single thing I have, not a moment of life that He did not give me. Yet, when He wanted me to spend one hour a week with Him at Mass. When He just wanted me to say, “I Love You” every morning and every night. When He just wanted me to be faithful to Him and not worship football, beer, or the girls in the commercials, I chose my selfish desires instead of being faithful to someone that had always been so good to me.
And unlike me the imperfect husband, He had been perfect. Not just good or great. But perfect.
I miss my wife. I still want her back. But, God has given me something much bigger than anything I prayed for. He has shown me that I am loved far more than I realized. He has shown me just how much He loved me to see all my sins in Gethsemane, take my lashes for me, die on the Cross to save me, with the full knowledge that 2000 years after He did that for me, I would reject Him the way similar to how my wife rejects me… I have never been so close in my relationship with God before and I can see that when I was praying for my wife to return so I could feel loved, He knew that what I really needed was to see that I was loved far more than I realized was even a possibility.
He was answering my prayers. I was just blinded by my own selfish demands, desires, and expectations instead of having an open mind, open eyes, and open heart to accept His answers which were what I really needed and were far better than anything I knew to ask for…
It’s readily apparent to me now… I was asking for what I wanted, and that was not what I needed. He gave me something far better, he gave me what I needed.
In a nutshell, my wife cheated on me, moved out leaving me with my three kids, and we are separated her not knowing if she wants to file for divorce or not. Me in limbo, committed to my marital vows, hurt, confused, stuck…
For quite awhile I prayed that God would fix my marriage. Over night. Now. I trusted in Him and demanded He be faithful and answer my prayers exactly as I demanded on my schedule. I just knew that what I needed was my wife. She is my soulmate and I would pray daily that there was just no way I could live without her and her love. I was looking for Him to answer my prayer and give me what I knew I needed…
God knew better.
It took me quite awhile, but I finally started to see that He was trying to answer my prayer, I just wasn’t paying attention…
I sort of knew what I needed. I need to feel loved. Ya, I wanted that love to come from my wife. But, my need isn’t her love. My need is God’s love. He may show it to me through my wife. He was showing it to me through my kids. And He was also showing it to me in another way, always had been. And it took me stepping back, really thinking and recognizing I had been ignoring just how much He was answering my prayer…
First, my kids. When my wife left they became even more loving towards me and we grew much closer. When I’d stop demanding God give my wife back, I’d feel there was so much more love coming from my kids than before. They can light me up and warm my heart as much or more than a hug or smile from my wife, if I let them.
But that’s not all He was doing. This part took longer, but I would sit there contemplating what my wife was thinking, why she would leave me, etc… Thinking I am not a bad guy, I’m not perfect, but I love her, I sacrifice for her, I give her and our children everything they need and most of what they want, I’m faithful, honest, loyal, how can she not see how much I love her and care for her and want her in my life? How can she be so selfish, blind and disrespectful of the love I have shown her?
And one day it hit me. For over 40 years God has given me life and every single thing that I have. Every drop of water, ever breath I breathe, every morsel of food, there is not a single thing I have, not a moment of life that He did not give me. Yet, when He wanted me to spend one hour a week with Him at Mass. When He just wanted me to say, “I Love You” every morning and every night. When He just wanted me to be faithful to Him and not worship football, beer, or the girls in the commercials, I chose my selfish desires instead of being faithful to someone that had always been so good to me.
And unlike me the imperfect husband, He had been perfect. Not just good or great. But perfect.
I miss my wife. I still want her back. But, God has given me something much bigger than anything I prayed for. He has shown me that I am loved far more than I realized. He has shown me just how much He loved me to see all my sins in Gethsemane, take my lashes for me, die on the Cross to save me, with the full knowledge that 2000 years after He did that for me, I would reject Him the way similar to how my wife rejects me… I have never been so close in my relationship with God before and I can see that when I was praying for my wife to return so I could feel loved, He knew that what I really needed was to see that I was loved far more than I realized was even a possibility.
He was answering my prayers. I was just blinded by my own selfish demands, desires, and expectations instead of having an open mind, open eyes, and open heart to accept His answers which were what I really needed and were far better than anything I knew to ask for…
V
VeritasLuxMea
Guest
Well, but I do think He should keep his promises to us. He is loyal to his word. And He did promise to return, but He hasn’t.
Now, I’m not sure why. But it is at the very least curious that He could be delayed for almost 2,000 years.
V
VeritasLuxMea
Guest
So you think that was the second coming?
If so, what makes us think there will be a third? Does it talk about a third coming in the Bible anywhere?
- Status