My "spiritual life" is completely gone

[joyfulseraph]

I can’t even describe all of this adequately enough, and I do not expect anyone to understand much or to have or give me answers, but sometimes I just need to express this to someone because I am alone.

I became Catholic in 2011, after 3 years of thinking about it (I was a Protestant) And it meant everything to me!

My health got in my way of getting to Mass. I’d try to go when I could and once I made it there about 5-7 weeks in a row even. And then something always happens, no ride, I get sick and then I wonder if I need to go to confession about it (which I know there’s no need to go for being sick - but then sometimes when you are dealing with chronic illness, it’s not always clear it’s like, well, maybe I could have gone or I should go no matter what unless I’m bedbound, which I’m not. I know there are people out there way worse than me too!) But then I go to confession about it anyways sometimes if I can. And then I give up going to Mass, not going for weeks, months, or years. I think I’ve been to Mass 3 times this year, and usually if I get the chance it’s only once a year. Other than the few times months ago, I hadn’t been to Mass in 3 years, and other than going to confession once this year months ago, it had been 3 years for that too.

I could keep trying to go to Mass, even if it’s once a month, but I know I can’t receive communion. I will never be able to get to Mass every week, and I never will be able to make a good enough confession. (I know about scrupulosity but don’t think that’s what I’m dealing with) And this has made my spiritual life, my faith nearly nonexistent. Which is not at all like me!! I wanted to live for God, to grow more and more in faith and love. To live to be more like a saint. But I can’t pray, I can’t think of doing anything for God - because anything I say or do, doesn’t matter at all.

Sometimes I think I shouldn’t even be called a Catholic.

I don’t know why this had to happen, it is so distressing and I have an emptiness inside that no one can even understand. Or understand my whole situation and why I can’t seem to pray - I don’t feel like I am allowed to do so, when I especially never go to Mass. When I feel so blank. When I never do more than seek after my “own interests” at home with what I am able to do with my time and health issues. It’s not like I can really strive after the life I wanted, one where I could do more for others, live for others. I can’t even do what I want or should do for my family. I am forever stuck, and can’t see how my faith will ever come back, or how I could ever be acceptable enough to be a real Catholic.

I have tried to talk to a priest about some of this a few times, but it never helps and I can’t keep bothering them about myself. No one can change my life or who I am. Maybe I will just be forever “lost.” It just doesn’t make sense to me that I had to get into this situation, after all that I had learned, and desired, to end up like this. Why would God want that? It can’t be God’s will.

I recently read this in My Daily Bread, I pick it up once in a while to read a random page.
*
Satan suggests evil thoughts to cause weariness or despair in you. He would like to draw you away from all prayer, holy reading, or any good work. He dreads seeing anyone make a humble confession. If he could he would stop you from receiving Me in Holy communion. And yet, in spite of his frantic and constant efforts against you, he is helpless if you decide to stand by Me, with faith, hope and love. *

I feel as if this is probably what has happened to me, and I don’t see how it could ever end.

 

[tawny]

Don’t give up. Remember Jesus loves you. Everyone goes through a period of spiritual dryness. I’ll be praying to the Holy Spirit to give you guidance, direction, strength, fortitude & wisdom in your time of need. God bless.

 

[1Lord1Faith]

That sounds tough. I said a prayer for you. Seek out groups in your community to help lift you up.

I don’t think God wants to break someone who wishes to follow Him. Sometimes it can help to give yourself permission to take a breather. God’s aim is not to fill your life with obligations that you cannot fulfill. God surely gives us plenty of opportunity for growth through trials. Like your* Daily Bread* reading said, Satan will surely try to take advantage of those trials.

When someone who is running a long distance gets tired a coach will tell them not to stop running, but to walk. It’s ok to walk, however slow.

It’s worth pointing out again that your community is obligated to help lift you up when you reach out for help. Provided your willing to accept help. I know you can find peace in God, God Bless.

 

[Jennifer132]

I read the following in a book called My Other Self recently. I highly recommend you get a copy if you can.

“Do not doubt me, my friend. Do not be irritated by your pain, your losses, your sickness, your enemies. View them as the means by which I guide you to myself. A wise parent does not forbid the child ever to run, for fear it may fall or ever to leave the yard for fear it may be lost. The parent acts thus in love, and I act in much more perfect love. If opposition and affliction we not the food of your spiritual growth, I would never allow them to approach you, much less touch you…if I offered you joy in one hand and sorrow in the other, do you know what I would wish you to say to me? “Lord, I choose neither. Whichever is your will, let it be done”. …give me yourself continually and forever. Frequently renew your abandonment to my will…just as the Father loves me, so I love you.”

 

[frizzgrig]

My health got in my way of getting to Mass. I’d try to go when I could and once I made it there about 5-7 weeks in a row even. And then something always happens, no ride, I get sick and then I wonder if I need to go to confession about it (which I know there’s no need to go for being sick - but then sometimes when you are dealing with chronic illness, it’s not always clear it’s like, well, maybe I could have gone or I should go no matter what unless I’m bedbound, which I’m not. I know there are people out there way worse than me too!) But then I go to confession about it anyways sometimes if I can. And then I give up going to Mass, not going for weeks, months, or years. I think I’ve been to Mass 3 times this year, and usually if I get the chance it’s only once a year. Other than the few times months ago, I hadn’t been to Mass in 3 years, and other than going to confession once this year months ago, it had been 3 years for that too.

Call your parish and ask for a priest to come to you and hear your confession and give you the anointing of the sick. People frequently are much harder judges on themselves than they need be. You need not be “bedbound” to be too ill to leave your house. If your illness makes it difficult to walk, stand, or otherwise move about (including vertigo/dizziness for instance) and you are in danger of falling you have a legitimate fear of injury if you don’t have someone to assist you. Your pastor would probably tell you to stay home, watch Mass on television if it is available in your area and do prayerful reading of scripture. You also should ask to be placed on the list of people who receive home visits from parishioners (or clergy) to receive the Eucharist.

I could keep trying to go to Mass, even if it’s once a month, but I know I can’t receive communion. I will never be able to get to Mass every week, and I never will be able to make a good enough confession. (I know about scrupulosity but don’t think that’s what I’m dealing with) And this has made my spiritual life, my faith nearly nonexistent. Which is not at all like me!! I wanted to live for God, to grow more and more in faith and love. To live to be more like a saint. But I can’t pray, I can’t think of doing anything for God - because anything I say or do, doesn’t matter at all.

You need to speak with a priest about this. This is not about being able to make a “good enough” confession. If you desire forgiveness for your sins, those you remembered to tell the priest and those you legitimately forgot to mention then you receive forgiveness for all your sins.

Sometimes I think I shouldn’t even be called a Catholic.

I don’t know why this had to happen, it is so distressing and I have an emptiness inside that no one can even understand. Or understand my whole situation and why I can’t seem to pray - I don’t feel like I am allowed to do so, when I especially never go to Mass. When I feel so blank. When I never do more than seek after my “own interests” at home with what I am able to do with my time and health issues. It’s not like I can really strive after the life I wanted, one where I could do more for others, live for others. I can’t even do what I want or should do for my family. I am forever stuck, and can’t see how my faith will ever come back, or how I could ever be acceptable enough to be a real Catholic.

Despair and hopelessness are tools of the evil one.

I have tried to talk to a priest about some of this a few times, but it never helps and I can’t keep bothering them about myself. No one can change my life or who I am. Maybe I will just be forever “lost.” It just doesn’t make sense to me that I had to get into this situation, after all that I had learned, and desired, to end up like this. Why would God want that? It can’t be God’s will.

You misunderstand the vocation of the priest. You are not bothering them, their vocation is sharing the love of Christ with each of us.

I recently read this in My Daily Bread, I pick it up once in a while to read a random page.
*
Satan suggests evil thoughts to cause weariness or despair in you. He would like to draw you away from all prayer, holy reading, or any good work. He dreads seeing anyone make a humble confession. If he could he would stop you from receiving Me in Holy communion. And yet, in spite of his frantic and constant efforts against you, he is helpless if you decide to stand by Me, with faith, hope and love. *

I feel as if this is probably what has happened to me, and I don’t see how it could ever end.

You are in my prayers. I strongly encourage you to call you local parish and tell them you are ill, mostly home bound and you need a priest to visit you for anointing of the sick and confession. Don’t be discouraged if it takes a few days for the priest to be able to schedule you - they are busy, but not too busy to visit you because you are important and God loves you. Allow the priest of God to share God’s love with you.

Peace,

Deacon Patrick

 

[Lea101]

I wish I have advice for you, I’m going through crazy fluctuations and it’s hard too.

Praying for you!!

 

[po18guy]

Get before your Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. Just sit there, looking at Him. Allow much time for His radiance to soak in.

 

[Windmill]

You are a parish priest’s joy to minister to. You already see the value of your faith, but there are just some things that are getting in the way of you making these hopes a reality. listen to what he has to say and you will find the peace you long for. They’re trained for this type of thing.

So excited for you! Prayers going out your way.

 

[Katherine438]

Chronic illness is difficult on our spirituality … I know … I understand … I live it … you are not alone … keep trying … keep up your prayer life … don’t concentrate so much on not being able to make mass … concentrate on having a relationship with Jesus … Jesus sees and hears everything … He knows why you can’t make mass … He understands … go to Him in prayer … don’t give up … Jesus loves you.

Also when you pray, don’t be dry about it and recite prayers like the Our Father … that’s a good start to prayer, but it is not all there is to prayer … speak to Jesus like He is your friend … start a relationship with Him … you will get much further doing this than saying a hundred Our Fathers. After missing mass because I haven’t been well enough to attend, I always find that going to Jesus and talking to Him is what gives me the strength to find ways to get back to Mass … have faith … He knows you … He loves you.

 

[Convert_in_99]

Call your parish and ask for a priest to come to you and hear your confession and give you the anointing of the sick. People frequently are much harder judges on themselves than they need be. You need not be “bedbound” to be too ill to leave your house. If your illness makes it difficult to walk, stand, or otherwise move about (including vertigo/dizziness for instance) and you are in danger of falling you have a legitimate fear of injury if you don’t have someone to assist you. Your pastor would probably tell you to stay home, watch Mass on television if it is available in your area and do prayerful reading of scripture. You also should ask to be placed on the list of people who receive home visits from parishioners (or clergy) to receive the Eucharist.

You need to speak with a priest about this. This is not about being able to make a “good enough” confession. If you desire forgiveness for your sins, those you remembered to tell the priest and those you legitimately forgot to mention then you receive forgiveness for all your sins.

Despair and hopelessness are tools of the evil one.

You misunderstand the vocation of the priest. You are not bothering them, their vocation is sharing the love of Christ with each of us.

You are in my prayers. I strongly encourage you to call you local parish and tell them you are ill, mostly home bound and you need a priest to visit you for anointing of the sick and confession. Don’t be discouraged if it takes a few days for the priest to be able to schedule you - they are busy, but not too busy to visit you because you are important and God loves you. Allow the priest of God to share God’s love with you.

Peace,

Deacon Patrick

Chronic illness is difficult on our spirituality … I know … I understand … I live it … you are not alone … keep trying … keep up your prayer life … don’t concentrate so much on not being able to make mass … concentrate on having a relationship with Jesus … Jesus sees and hears everything … He knows why you can’t make mass … He understands … go to Him in prayer … don’t give up … Jesus loves you.

Also when you pray, don’t be dry about it and recite prayers like the Our Father … that’s a good start to prayer, but it is not all there is to prayer … speak to Jesus like He is your friend … start a relationship with Him … you will get much further doing this than saying a hundred Our Fathers. After missing mass because I haven’t been well enough to attend, I always find that going to Jesus and talking to Him is what gives me the strength to find ways to get back to Mass … have faith … He knows you … He loves you.

Yes to both!

 

[Convert_in_99]

Get before your Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. Just sit there, looking at Him. Allow much time for His radiance to soak in.

She is homebound. Maybe a link to a web cam of perpetual adoration would be good if you have a link? Also EWTN is a most valuable resource for the homebound and those wishing to grow in faith. Many of there programs are online now if you don’t get cable. Also if it oh have a Roku streaming device they have free EWTN!

 

[Convert_in_99]

Just a quick personal note.

I also am going through most every trial you are experiencing right now. Physical, mental and spiritual anguish is my daily bread these days. It’s indescribably hard for those of us enduring it. I often feel almost literally nailed to the cross with Christ. Every time I make any progress towards healing, I’m given more crosses to endure instead. I can’t escape. These nails are binding me and I feel totally abandoned by God and can do nothing but cry out with Jesus “My God why have you forsaken me?”

I don’t have advice as I am learning to endure this myself right now. Please know I will be thinking about you and saying what little prayers I’m able to for you. I really wish I could help you more but I can’t at this time. Feel free to private message me if you need an online friend or just someone to vent your pain and frustrations to. God bless you dear! :hug1:

 

[PureChaos]

Posting here has already helped you out greatly, simply because anyone who sees this thread will likely be praying for you, and that can help more than any words that we can give you.

You are actually reading one of my favorite books “My daily bread”, i read it a long time ago, but i’m always recommending it to people.
but another book i would recommend to you, unless you’ve already read it, is Saint Lydwine of Schiedam LINK, she was a victim soul, and i thought that maybe you could relate to her, even though you are not bed ridden like she was, however, before she accepted her sufferings, she went through alot of the things you described, and it’s just a good book all around, and i think you will find in it answers to at least some of your concerns.
another good one is Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, she was often bed ridden as well, and her angel even scolded her for complaining that there was nothing she could do in her miserable state, because there was a great deal she did do for others just by praying and suffering for them, and her angel showed her many of the ways her prayers and sufferings helped people, and it’s in so many ways we don’t realize.
so i would recommend reading her life as well.

It just doesn’t make sense to me that I had to get into this situation, after all that I had learned, and desired, to end up like this. Why would God want that? It can’t be God’s will.

God’s will is often opposed to what we want, and even more often unclear to us, but the situations we find ourselves in in this life, are His will…but that doesn’t mean we handle them in a way that He wants, not to say that He expects us to know exactly what He wants from us or why He sends us what He does, but we can always be certain that what He does want is that we accept His will in all things, in our thoughts and actions, with virtue.
but that is something we must learn to do, and many of the things God sends you is to help you learn, which in order to learn and practice we need prayer, spiritual guidance(from a good priest), and good spiritual reading to help us along the way.

One of the reasons we lose our peace amidst the daily struggles of our life, is because we have the wrong goal in sight, namely, our own comfort and ease, or own pleasure, our own enjoyments, etc. etc., the list goes on, however, if we have the right goal in sight(and truly want and desire it) then all can be, in a certain sense, easy, and not much can take away your peace…of course that’s something not easy to accomplish no matter how long you work at it…but all the same, we can have that kind of peace at least partly, and that makes a huge difference.
of course the goal i was speaking of which we should have, is God Himself, and what we need to focus on is learning to love Him, and also to know, love, and serve Him in all our thoughts, words, and deeds in this life, so we may be happy with Him in the next…
it is hard, but God has given us lots of time to learn and grow in this life, and He doesn’t expect you to be perfect all at once, all He wants is that you keep trying, just don’t give up, no matter how many times you fall, He is pleased to see that you keep getting back up, and He is always there helping you.

i know it’s also rather hard to move forward and preform your spiritual duties when you feel dry and don’t have much motivation, but God also tests us that way too, to see if it’s Him we love, or just the feelings He sends us, we need to love Him more than ourselves, more than anything, and we do that simply by doing what we know He wants, we know He wants us to follow His commandments, carry our cross daily, love our neighbor as our self for the love of Him, follow the laws and traditions of the Church, pray every day, frequent the sacraments often if we are able, God does not ask what is not possible, nor is He displeased with you when you cannot attend mass due to the illness He has permitted you to have.
so if you do those things despite how you feel, then you are pleasing God and telling Him you love Him, even if sometimes we fall, it is a learning process after all, and you must be patient with yourself.

i’d like to write more but i need to get going, so i hope this helps, and maybe i’ll come back on later.

 

[mVitus]

But I can’t pray, I can’t think of doing anything for God - because anything I say or do, doesn’t matter at all.

Sometimes I think I shouldn’t even be called a Catholic.

I don’t know why this had to happen, it is so distressing and I have an emptiness inside that no one can even understand. Or understand my whole situation and why I can’t seem to pray - I don’t feel like I am allowed to do so

If you’re feeling as dry as you are, I’m not sure how much this may mean to you, but it’s helping me keep hope: The Prodigal Son.

We all know the story so I won’t bore you with the minutia and just skip to the end. After all the son had done, leave his family, waste the money, tend to pigs [not a good place for a Jewish boy], and basically be a miserable failure, he decided he had to go home. As he was walking down the road he kept thinking about how bad he was and that after all he’d done, he felt he didn’t deserve to be treated like the man’s son anymore, but to take a position as a servant. Yet despite all that son had done, when the man saw him coming, he went running.

So even though you feel like you’re horrible and nothing you can do is good (Though I’ll agree with others that I think you have a valid reason for missing Mass considering it’s medical as opposed to just blowing it off) God still loves you. I know that might sound really cheesy, but just think about it. We sin yet God loves us. We do horrible things, yet God loves us. And as soon as we’re ready to turn to Him, he’s willing to forgive all those sins we’ve committed and help us do better.

The part I quoted from your OP was the part where you said you didn’t feel like you were allowed to pray. But you can. God WANTS us to pray. He WANTS to help us. Praying would be exactly what God wants. No matter how badly you think you’ve done you are always welcome to pray.

And as for not feeling like you can do anything that matters, you can pray for others. All it costs is some time and you’d be doing service to God.

I know I’m just a stranger on the internet and I have a feeling some of my post sounds really canned and impersonal, but I’m not sure how to say it. God loves you. Ask and you shall receive. And if you can fathom it right now, keep telling it to yourself. Eventually you’ll hit that Eureka moment where you’re thinking, “God loves me. God loves me. God lo–, wait a minute, God loves me.” You’re in my prayers.

 

[joyfulseraph]

I’m surprised at the amount of people who have replied. I appreciate everyone who has said something so far and took the time to read my post. This is all a lot to think about, and I hope to respond more to some of your replies when I get the chance. Thank you for the book suggestions. I was able to buy a copy of the one about St. Lydwine and I’ll be getting that soon.

 

[MaryEllen1951]

I read the following in a book called My Other Self recently. I highly recommend you get a copy if you can.

“Do not doubt me, my friend. Do not be irritated by your pain, your losses, your sickness, your enemies. View them as the means by which I guide you to myself. A wise parent does not forbid the child ever to run, for fear it may fall or ever to leave the yard for fear it may be lost. The parent acts thus in love, and I act in much more perfect love. If opposition and affliction we not the food of your spiritual growth, I would never allow them to approach you, much less touch you…if I offered you joy in one hand and sorrow in the other, do you know what I would wish you to say to me? “Lord, I choose neither. Whichever is your will, let it be done”. …give me yourself continually and forever. Frequently renew your abandonment to my will…just as the Father loves me, so I love you.”

Thank-you for this post. When my mother passed away, I inherited her book “My Daily Bread”. At the time I had fallen away and had no idea how important it was to become to me 17 years later. She had underlined certain sentences and it gave me insight into how deeply her faith was. I had our priest bless the book and I read it regularly.

“My Other Self” sounds like a similar book. I found it on amazon and am going to get it.