Mortal Sin and Spiritual Progress

  • Thread starter Thread starter pillarofsalt
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
P

pillarofsalt

Guest
Lets say a person is taking her spiritual life seriously and is progressing in the spiritual life. God gives her many consolations and perhaps even mystical experiences of some sort. She is then deeply tempted by all sorts of mortal sin, and because she is incredibly weak she falls into several of them multiple times, does this person have to “start over” in the spiritual life?

I see the spiritual life as a journey, with bumps and opportunities to get lost along the way. Not as climbing a tower and if you go astray you fall off and have to start over from the bottom. But after falling very deeply into sin it really does feel like starting over. I like St Teresa of Avila’s analogy, that it is like an interior castle. You progress further and further into this castle, and at a certain point God starts drawing you deeper inside. But if you sin, are you then kicked out of the castle to suffer among the lizards and you just have to start over?

I highly doubt God’s plans for me include the spiritual gifts the great mystics experienced but is it possible that if God had originally planned to give a person certain gifts and had begun giving them, that if she were to fall deeply into sin He would (justly…) change his mind and never give these gifts again, remaining distant until the day I day.

I miss him. He feels so far away from me. What have I done? 😦
 
God is merciful and just.

I don’t think we have to explore too deeply into how He is forming us spiritually.

We all have different personalities, and there are great spiritual books and holy priests out there to help us.

When we miss (the consolation of His Presence), we need to continue to pray in faith, and offer our daily work to Him. Wait on the Lord, and at His discretion he will comfort you.

Our Blessed Mother is a great intercessor for us.

May our Lord Jesus Christ and His Blessed Mother be with you on your journey!
 
I have heard people say, the closer you become to God, the more the devil will try to pull you away. Which probably explains sinning after feeling so close to Him.
 
Even though we sin, God never discards us. You are still in the palm of his hand and at the very center of his heart. God corrects us and disciplines us, yes, but that is a sign that you are his child and that he loves you very much.

As long as we turn away from our sins and strive to move forward, we remain in God’s grace. Just because you cannot ‘feel’ his presence doesn’t mean that he is not with you. He promised that he would never leave or forsake us.

When I first came to Christ, I felt his presence almost constantly. Then one day I could no longer feel presence. Because of this I lived in near-despair for several years and thought it was because I had done something wrong. Then someone told me that this happens to most people–it’s like New Love. At first it’s so exciting, but after a while it mellows out, and even though the relationship has not changed, it just ‘feels’ different. Maybe this is what’s happening to you. I don’t know.

But know that God is faithful. Trust in Him, that he is with you, and keep moving forward.
 
In the words of Saint Vincent Ferrer:

"The first remedy against the spiritual temptations which the devil plants in the hearts of many persons in these unhappy times is to have no desire to procure by prayer, meditation or any other good work, what are called revelations, or spiritual experiences, beyond what happens in the ordinary course of things. Such a desire of things which surpass the common order can have no other root or foundation but pride, presumption , a vain curiosity in what regards the things of God, and, in short, an exceedingly weak faith.

It is to punish this evil desire that God abandons the soul and permits it to fall into the illusions and temptations of the devil, who seduces it, and represents to it false visions and delusive revelations."
 
When you sin you are closer to God you ever can be, He know you will fail, and is therefor with you and will help you continue on your spiritual road.
 
Yes, it can seem like constantly “starting over” after a fall, and I suppose it will be so if we do not take the opportunity to learn and grow - even from the experience of a fall, and even after repeated falls. We grow in humility as we continue to seek reconciliation through the sacrament of confession, and we are reminded of our total dependence on God. We can examine and try to determine just what led to this sin, and so by experience grow in grace, and then perhaps it will not always seem like starting over.
 
At some point after the purgative way, mortal sin is very unlikely. If we’re still falling into mortal sin with any regularity (even once or twice a year), that might be a sign that we’re still in the initial stage of purification, a place we can be even after years and years of praying. We can receive great consolations in this stage, so the gifts God gives us don’t necessarily mean we’re at an advanced level.

I am, without a doubt, still in the purgative way, and probably will be for a while. I think it sounds like you might be in the first stage as well, and I would encourage you to let this humble you. Keep praying for daily conversion, hate sin, and don’t get discouraged. 🙂

(Someone please correct me if there is anything deficient in my understanding.)
 
I think the idea that my pride needed to be dealt with is spot on. There was a period of about nine months where I didn’t commit mortal sin, and a big chunk of that time I had trouble identifying venial sins and didn’t know what to bring to confession. I distinctly remember saying to myself that not sinning was easy, and that I didn’t know how people have trouble obeying God. I remember patting myself on the back on my success in keeping from sin – my success alone. I left God out of it, and ignored the fact that it is only by His goodness and help that I am not wallowing in a pool of sin all day everyday. (And now my pride has been cured. I’m finally perfect! :p) No, the work on my pride has just begun and I’ve also introduced myself to the venomous sweetness of certain forbidden actions and will have to deal with that temptation for, well probably until I die.

I really did think I was somewhere around the end of the second stage of the three stages of prayer, and my spiritual director confirmed my experiences in prayer. But now I’m in the dog house, and rightfully so. I do believe that because of my sin, God isn’t going to give me certain blessings he originally intended to. And I don’t dare ask for them because I don’t deserve them and Satan can certainly make himself appear as an angel of light.
 
Pride is a terribly powerful (and subtle) enemy, don’t you agree? :o The fact that you realize this, is a great advantage. In the past I’ve also fallen into the error of thinking I didn’t have anything to bring to confession. Plain blindness.

I might try not to imagine what God will or won’t give in the future, but focus humbly on the present. God bless you in every step! :gopray:
 
It humbles us when we go to the Sacrament of Reconciliation where we meet Jesus our Lord in the person of the priest.
 
JaredR said:
Pride is a terribly powerful (and subtle) enemy, don’t you agree? :o The fact that you realize this, is a great advantage. In the past I’ve also fallen into the error of thinking I didn’t have anything to bring to confession. Plain blindness.

I might try not to imagine what God will or won’t give in the future, but focus humbly on the present. God bless you in every step! :gopray:
Click to expand...
Yes, I do agree. In hind sight, it seems obvious to me that when I thought I had nothing to bring to confession I should have asked the Lord to let me see myself as he sees me, for him to show me my sin. I wonder what else a person with that mentality can do.
 
In terms of spiritual progress and sin, I like to look at it as being on a roller coaster. We have our ups and downs. And, as of lately, I’ve been going through a low point in my spiritual journey. I have fallen back in some of my habitual sins (masturbation and anger for example) , and haven’t been praying as much and as fervently as I used to, though I still read daily scripture. One of the excuses I keep making is “Oh, I’m too busy to pray for 10 to 15 minutes.” In addition, whenever I fall back into these habitual sins, I feel too ashamed to continue doing what I promised myself I would do-praying more often and so forth- because I have broken one of Gods commandments (masturbation for example). Because of this, I find it hard to get back into groove of things so to speak. Maybe it’s because I’ve relied so much on myself and not so much on God and others. Additionally, like some of the other posters have stated, I tend to get very prideful and say to myself in my head “Wow! Look at what I’m doing. I am certainly on the right track and doing the right things. Not unlike these other people who are doing x,y,and z.”
 
Many years ago when I first began to pray no more than two minutes in the morning and two minutes at night, I read a spiritual book called “Introduction to the Devout Life” by St. Francis de Sales. I really was quite ignorant as to how I should be praying as a Catholic.

In the book St. Francis told about the importance of prayer, and that to begin with five minutes with the Lord. Well, in that five minutes I think I looked at the clock about a dozen times to see if the five minutes was up yet. My mind could hardly focus.

That was eye opening to me. I became aware that a lot of work needed to be done in me. Actually, it was the Rosary that helped me to pray and meditate as I ought.
I did my best to think of the mysteries and pray the Our Fathers and Hail Marys. The Lord accepts our best effort, and as time goes by He increases our desire to pray and we begin to the notice the difference in our attitude and the way we look at things.

Persevere, and make use of the Sacrament of Reconciliation and Holy Eucharist at Mass. Jesus is there for us, encouraging and loving us beyond our wildest imaginations! With a solid prayer life those sacraments will be even more beneficial to us.

Reading good, encouraging spiritual books can help also. There are many good ones. The one I mentioned above is one of the good ones.
 
There is a difference in sins other than mortal and venial. Sins are either done knowing what a person is doing beforehand, and sins that a person sort of slips into without giving much thought or because of strong passion. Obviously the very dangerous ones are those that a person knowingly does with some premeditation. They are dangerous since they are done by choosing them over God. The others we slip and slide into are rather due to our weakness and not with this deliberation.

When we knowingly choose something over God, that is an “ouch”. That is in a certain way felt by God, and falls into the category of an insult. This is what idolatry is.

We really shouldn’t ever select something knowlingly with premeditation over God, no matter how small it might be.

Which brings up the last point of misdemeanors which don’t exactly fall into the slot of sins. These are casual indifferent imperfections, which also can become big deals in the sense that they show how we feel toward God by preferring them. Just as an example, when we talk too much and then don’t have the time to reflect on who we “carry” within us or time for our prayers. Or the same for the phone or TV. Or it could be we don’t show the proper respect for everone who we come into contact with, but judge as to whether they are worth our time or not. These things we slip and slide into gradually without realizing what we are doing. These misdemeanors are many but we are blind to them because we have slipped into them and they are apart of ourselves so much that we do not even know they are there. But if we are quiet and give time to reflection, the Spirit will reveal them to us.

Why these are important is that all of these deliberate actions contrary to God’s will in our life hold us down and away from close intimacy with him. Even the very littlest things if deliberate.

The indeliberate actions or neglects God will frequently overlook. But we must take care with it all if we want to make progress. The real key is to keep working on them and asking God’s help and strength. But once we give up, then it is down hill again, until amends are made and the resolution once more to love him in even the little things.

We will always fall. But the deliberate actions of choosing something over God should be avoided.

May our Father love and bless us all.
 
pillarofsalt said:
Lets say a person is taking her spiritual life seriously and is progressing in the spiritual life. God gives her many consolations and perhaps even mystical experiences of some sort. She is then deeply tempted by all sorts of mortal sin, and because she is incredibly weak she falls into several of them multiple times, does this person have to “start over” in the spiritual life?

I see the spiritual life as a journey, with bumps and opportunities to get lost along the way. Not as climbing a tower and if you go astray you fall off and have to start over from the bottom. But after falling very deeply into sin it really does feel like starting over. I like St Teresa of Avila’s analogy, that it is like an interior castle. You progress further and further into this castle, and at a certain point God starts drawing you deeper inside. But if you sin, are you then kicked out of the castle to suffer among the lizards and you just have to start over?

I highly doubt God’s plans for me include the spiritual gifts the great mystics experienced but is it possible that if God had originally planned to give a person certain gifts and had begun giving them, that if she were to fall deeply into sin He would (justly…) change his mind and never give these gifts again, remaining distant until the day I day.

I miss him. He feels so far away from me. What have I done? 😦
Click to expand...
Go to confession every Saturday and get a fresh start. You have high standards for life (God’s standards) which is beautiful and perfect, but you fall short because you’re a sinner (welcome aboard) so maybe pray a daily rosary and ask Mary to keep temptations away from you, and weekly Confession and Mass is good. Trust me, I sometimes go weeks without purposefully sinning badly, and I feel great, and then I’ll have a period where I just can’t resist the sin and I do it knowing I’m offending God and I’ll be in the Confessional next weekend. Just try your best and keeping asking for help. You are definitely not alone in this. 😊:o
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top