My struggle - anyone share it?

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This is exactly why I love this place you are all so inspiring and I stuggle with my doubts and than I come here and am refreshed. Still much work, but I thank God for all of you. My prayers are with all and one thing I have never waivered on was hope it is what keeps me going.

God Bless
Kathleen
 
Hi Mijoy2!

Doubt in the existence of God is a cross that I feel would be easy for me to handle. It seems, however, that such a happy fortune is not to be mine. Your intellect may lead you to doubt the existence of God, but mine leads me to an altogether different and more loathsome despair. To wake up and be able to truthfully deny the existence of God would be a sweet release from the anguished prison I find myself in whereby Christ’s sacrifice was not meant to apply to me. Instead I live each day feeling that I become more loathsome to Him. Prayers, including the rosary I say each night feel as though the words are screamed from my darkness only to meet the turned back of Christ or whatever saint they are directed to. Nothing in the writings of the saints, the Magisterium or Scripture can dissuade me from regarding an eternity of bitter torment as the only possible destiny ordained for me.

In sum: Don’t worry. Life does not suck just for you.
 
Man can I share it… I’m so glad I sat to read the “new posts” here briefly… which turned into about an hour…

I totally relate to the original person who wrote, and can appreciate what everyone else has said. Since I ‘reverted’ I can’t seem to get enough information. For a while, I was on kind of a “high” and worried it would all come to some sort of an end… a crashing down. But it hasn’t. What has happened is what you described… this somewhat unsettling feeling that the more I learn, the more there is to know… sometimes I feel like even going to work or doing anything else in life isn’t all that important because what is important is trying to grow in a relationship with God, and that takes time… I of course still go to work and do what I have to do, but I kind of feel guilty about it because it’s taking up valuable time…

I have tons of books that I haven’t even started reading, and tons of books I’m reading all at the same time; Dark Night of the Soul, CS Lewis books, the Bible, Witness to Hope, etc. Yes, etc. 🙂 I’ve gone to Adoration, try to get to Mass during the week when I can, and I’m currently looking for a spiritual advisor to help me organize all of this. At times I too wonder what this is all about…

We are following the true Church but that can lead to arrogance about it, how we deal with other people. It feels like a fine line to walk, and I feel like I’ll either teeter over to the arrogant side or kind of relax about my faith and how I relate to other people… It also bothered me tremendously to find out that not all “Catholic” churches are actually teaching the Truth and are following the Pope and the Magesterium. That I have to ask a LOT of questions and keep my eyes open in order to make sure I’m learning what I need to learn and know how to answer not only others, but myself…

Well, I did a little venting there, but this thread hit a nail on the head in my life right now! I’m glad we have the forum here to talk like this.
 
In short, yes, I share you struggle… Catholic - Protestant apologetics can absolutely de-value the Bible sometimes. Forces me to wonder, “Is this the best you could have done?” Then I recall the the depost of Faith is a 3 legged stool - Bible, Magestarium and Tradition and then I am usually OK. As bizzarre as it is, the only constant throughout Christian history is the teaching of the Catholic Church which has been incredibly consistant accross 2000 years, numerous societies and cultures and still not finished yet. Hopefully the best is yet to come.
 
I want to thank all that replied. The quantity of responses was heartwarming and the quality of response was enlightening and valued.

To those who suggested various readings I will pursue those suggestions. Contimplative, I have already read Imitation but your posting of chapter two encouraged me to read it again. I read it very early on in my journey. I was inspired to read it after reading 'Story of a Soul" where Saint Terese talked of Imitation being the only other book she desired to read, aside from scripture, at a late point in her short life.

There are other reading suggestions brought to my attention here I will pursue also, thank all.

To MamaGeek and all those who talked of praying for faith. This I have done and will continue to do so.

Lillth, I hope to someday have an experience such as yours. You gave me hope that I may.

Although I have to wonder if it is likely whether it is possible. Of course I know all is possible with God. But I’d think that with the exception of possibly a private revelation, doubts from the other half of my brain will continue to haunt me.

Having said all of this, I want to make the point that I do have Faith. It just waivers, sometimes substantially. I find that the proposed truth of Catholicism and redeemption story of Christ, makes sense in the respect that it I have this inner feeling that yells out to me that it is true.

The beauty of the teachings, Jesus’s very words in the Bible, Love, Charity, Humility all seem to feed an inner desire. Most especially Jesus’s teaching of our following Him and turning away from the desires of the world has saved my otherwise rapidly deteriorating life. I have first hand evidence that His words not only make sense, but actually produce fruir when actualized.

Thanks to all!
 
Didi said:
I would strongly suggest some time before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament if you are not already doing so.
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I have not yet done this. I’m not sure I can find a place to do this. I will certainly look into it. I have heard of other wonderful experiences with this in the past.
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Didi:
Imitate the father who cried to Jesus, asking for his son to be healed: **“I believe; help my unbelief!” ** (Mark 9:24)
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Yes, this is pretty much my opening and closing of every prayer.
 
…Very interesting and honest thread and responses.

I go by what my father told me when I was young. Sooner or later you just say “Ok, I believe.” - That’s it. No one has the answers, not even the pope.

I still remember the first time I heard an atheist on talk radio. It finally dawned on me, when I detected that she was uncertain of her own beliefs; and if an atheist is both honest and thoughtful, they are no more certain than you or I.

We can play the same game in every area of our life – how do I know I have the right career, spouse, and so on.

I know this thread is not about evolution but I will mention it anyhow. I really thought a lot about it, and debated it on the protestant forums before joining here. I just don’t believe it. But I also really thought about Jesus appearing about 67 generations ago, and decided He was EXACTLY who He said He was!! And I believe, in the way every one of us has had to take the word of a loved one, for sure, at some point in our lives.

PS I have no doubt, that 500 years from now, people will look at our science with that much more gathered data and say ‘they sure didn’t have a clue what they were talking about with their projections.” You can’t do that with religion though, except if you apply science to religion, or discount history, both of which Catholics don’t generally need to do.
 
Good job voicing that.

You know, I’m not Catholic yet, and I struggle with doubts… what I can say is that I am leaving behind the “isms” that I cannot believe in anymore. This forum is here for each of us to make that contrbution of faith, insight, doctrine. I can contribute rebuttals to the “isma” i left behind, although that doesn’t cancel out the ones that I still struggle with.

At the same time… you may be thinking deeper than the many people who appear confident intheir faith. Confidence does not mean that they are familiar with the arguments against the Catholic faith in detail, or that they have all the answers. So don;t let their confidence intimidate you… they may be in adifferent place spiritually.

But remember… apologetics will always be necessary and is present in every faith. If there were a true faith and the forces of evil were summoned against it, wouldn;t they amass an army of counterfeits to suit everyone’s taste? What then can we do to uncover the true faith? Defend, argue, expose weaknesses, etc. Apologetics… its a part of true religion on planet earth, and false religion for that matter.

Still, if you have real doubnts, I certainly offer my services in helping you answer at least a few of them. Specifically, do you struggle with anything in particular? Message me (for individual attention), or add anopther post to this thread… we’d love to help, its what we’re here for.

😉
Yours in questions, and yours to help find answers…
Hugo.
 
This is a great thread with everyone giving honest (name removed by moderator)ut. Everyone struggles in their walk with the Lord. We will never achieve a full intellectual understanding in this life. Discussions like this one always bring to mind the following quotes from the apostle Paul.

1 Corinthians 13:9-13
“For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect; but when the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood. So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”

Romans 11:33-34
"O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways! “For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?”

Our intellects are useful but relatively puny when it comes to knowing God. Thomas Aquinas wrote some pretty heady stuff, but after having been granted a vision he said that all that he had thought or written was “like straw” in comparison. God wants us to seek Him with our minds but what He really wants is our heart and soul. He gives us the spiritual gifts of faith, hope, and love. We make a choice to accept His grace and believe in Him and to follow Him no matter what the obstacles. We cannot fathom and work out intellectually the many things that lie before us. Instead by grace and faith we cling to the Lord and trust in His mercy. Without full knowledge there is always room for doubt. But with grace there is always faith and hope.

God is infinite and we are not. In this life we will never be satisfied in our pursuit of knowledge and understanding. That is part of God’s plan to keep us hungry so that we will grow in faith, hope, and love.
 
I can’t add much to what others have already said (great—and honest—responses), but what comes to mind is Newman’s famous quote, “Ten thousand difficulties do not make one doubt”—or words to that effect as I’m not sure I have that exactly correct (someone here will no doubt know).

My faith is unwavering and untroubled now (by the grace of God), but certainly it wasn’t always that way. I’m not sure that any particular approach (reading apologetics, mystics, etc) can guarantee that result, though it can certainly help. I have read a great deal about Catholicism for the last several years, but ultimately I have to say that I believe my certainty was simply a gift.

Someone suggested going before the Blessed Sacrament: that’s excellent advice.
 
Read the lives of the saints–very uplifting. Many of them suffered the way you suffer now. Yet they remained heroically Christian. Remember what Bl. John Henry Neuman said: a thousand questions does not equal a single doubt.
 
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Mijoy2:
I have not yet done this. I’m not sure I can find a place to do this. I will certainly look into it. I have heard of other wonderful experiences with this in the past.
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Mijoy2,

In regards to adoration, I try to do this at least one hour a week. I want to try to tell you this so that you don’t go through the same thing I did. … I had high expectations when I started doing this a few months ago. When I would go, and still not “feel” anything during or after adoration, I got very discouraged. I would literally cry on the way home - “I kneeled/sat with you for an hour, and you still ignore me!”

I still go - perhaps that is God’s grace pulling me back, but I don’t expect grand revelations, or ask for any signs.

I don’t want to discourage you, but I was reading the posts and thought I should tell you this.
 
Hi, Mijoy2.

You are just experiencing a years-long “crisis in faith.” There is a world beyond your doubts, and it’s not stupidity in motion.

I got through my faith crisis as follows.

When I was around 18, I read Hume’s Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, and I realized with a shock that Hume was right and Aquinas was wrong: God can’t be “proven” by apologetics, no matter how loudly the apologist argues, not matter how hard he stomps his feet, no matter how often he pronounces that you are an Hell-bound, excommunicated heretic in sheep’s clothing.

God
can’t
be
proven.

The reason is simple: God is “up”; we are “down.” Our minds can’t get to where He is from here. If our minds could do so, to that precise extent we would be either equal to God, or greater than God – God’s God.

That leaves us to stare into the darkness, and to pray to the Unknown, for the grace of Faith.

Voila! – in response to that prayer, the grace *always *comes. And then you can believe.

And that belief will be stronger than logic.
 
Dear BibleReader,

quote:BibleReader
When I was around 18, I read Hume’s Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, and I realized with a shock that Hume was right and Aquinas was wrong: God can’t be “proven” by apologetics, no matter how loudly the apologist argues, not matter how hard he stomps his feet, no matter how often he pronounces that you are an Hell-bound, excommunicated heretic in sheep’s clothing.
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God
can’t
be
proven.
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Finally. I’ve been posting away, mostly since February,
and now I find someone who states what needs to be
stated, above.

My understanding is, that in his late forties,
Aquinas… just… stopped…writing.
Did he come to understand what you wrote, above?

The things of God can be treated logically, with reason.
But those things are initially “revealed” and are accepted by
faith.

What I don’t get is:
-a person is told about the Faith
-if the person then says: I don’t accept that,
many wring their hands, talking about
“invincible ignorance” etc.
-Simultaneoulsy, people are told that faith is
a gift of God

Well, which is it?

I am in the hope that you will understand what I’m
talking about. It’s like a theological Catch-22.
Best,
reen12
 
reen - you are right.

St. Thomas stopped writing because he found in contemplation what can’t be grasped by the active intellect.

For what it’s worth, he said he stopped because what he apprehended in contemplation made all that he had written utterly inconsequential.

Imagine what he must have grasped in contemplation!

St. Thomas, some say, was deeply an existentialist. St. Edith Stein picked up on this strand in her commentary on St. Thomas: Finite and Infinite Being.

If an infant could ask one question, I can imagine it would be: who is carrying me?

It is the existential question.

I submit that everyone has their own personal answer to that question, but I think the most grotesque solution is to deny the question, which is what the darker existentialists of the 20th century do. They will say “nobody is carrying you, so get on with it.”

But St. Edith Stein says the infant’s confidence that it is being carried is more obvious and more rational than the delusion that no one is being carried.

In this context, one should read St. Thomas’ “proofs” of the existence of God as meditations on being, on the marvellous and obvious fact that things that exist are brought in and out of being.

My favorite proof is number 3 where he makes you admit that you are contingent, and everything around you is contingent; and yet the world still turns. How can a world made up of nothing except contingent things, things that come and go - how is it that such a world is even here after billions and billions of years?

Unless it were being sustained by something steadfast.

Unless it were in fact not insane to have a strong suspicion, with the infant, that someone is carrying you.

That’s my view anyway.
 
I’m with you on what you wrote, adnauseum.

Was on a thread, a couple of weeks ago, talking
about the existentialists. I took a course on
the Theater of the Absurb, years ago.
Whoa! what a dreary world-view that is.

I like to think that God holds me in existence, as
well as created me. Because He attends to me,
I remain in existence, now and in eternity.

Aquinas had a brilliant mind. How blessed for him
to have turned to contemplation.

Speaking of same, and parellel to your post, the
real “existential reality” is God saying in the Hebrew
Scriptures:

“Even if your mother and father forget you,
I will never forget you.
See, I have written your name on the palm of My hand.”

Kindest regards,
reen12
 
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Mijoy2:
As I read through the threads in these forums, I discover the majority of people who frequent here appear to be of a strong unwaivering faith. Either people here do not struggle as I do or they chose to keep thier doubts and doubtful moments to themselves.

My struggles are unceasing. I have come to believe that I will always suffer with them to the same degree I struggle with them today. The reasons for this, I feel, are intellectual ( I didn’t say intellient I said intellectual). It seems the more I study, the more questions I encounter. I feel answers to these questions
are never fully satisfying. They simply lead to the next round of questions.

I can state many specific examples of these troubles. However what would happen is a warm-herarted person may respond by
tackling the specific example. And, (hopefully this doesn’t sound arrogant) but I have heard most of the point/counter points already of these specifics already.

Let me attempt to state it this way. The simple fact that apologetics are necassary, or purhaps better put, exist at all, I find troubling. It is simply an infinitly long struggle of people trying to convince people they have the truth. We (Catholics, Evangelicals, Muslims, JW, Atheists…etc)
all use the same tools to make our point(s). It becomes a battle of wit and intellect. This alone is deeply disturbing to me.

I have to ask why would God give us such a confusing revelation that the entire world is in vast disagreement as to how to interpret this revelation. Or, for that matter, if there was a revelation at all.

This post doesn’t come from a person who is not trying to understand. In fact, it has become an obsession. While pondering what is Truth, I go to Mass twice a week, say the rosary fairly often, have brought my family to the church, and read the bible nightly, have read dozens of books by dozens of wonderful authors. . I’d do more if I wasn’t away from home 60+ hours a week making a living. Yet I ramain unsatified.

I find, when praying, I am always praying with a certain despondence. I pray with mixed emotion, wanting desperatly to believe someone is hearing me, yet feeling a bit the fool
for even hoping. When praying the rosary I am constantly interupting my prayer and asking forgiveness for not fully believing anyone is listening.

I don’t know how to bring this struggle to an end. I fear I never will.
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You can’t - God can…why not let Him?
 
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BibleReader:
Hi, Mijoy2.

You are just experiencing a years-long “crisis in faith.” There is a world beyond your doubts, and it’s not stupidity in motion.

I got through my faith crisis as follows.

When I was around 18, I read Hume’s Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, and I realized with a shock that Hume was right and Aquinas was wrong: God can’t be “proven” by apologetics, no matter how loudly the apologist argues, not matter how hard he stomps his feet, no matter how often he pronounces that you are an Hell-bound, excommunicated heretic in sheep’s clothing.

God
can’t
be
proven.

The reason is simple: God is “up”; we are “down.” Our minds can’t get to where He is from here. If our minds could do so, to that precise extent we would be either equal to God, or greater than God – God’s God.

That leaves us to stare into the darkness, and to pray to the Unknown, for the grace of Faith.

Voila! – in response to that prayer, the grace *always *comes. And then you can believe.

And that belief will be stronger than logic.
Click to expand...

I find it helps to think of God a bit like a novelist - the characters in the story cannot find the author, because they are within the story, and are not able to exist outside of it and within it.​

We cannot exist outside the world, and within it too - we cannot transcend it. For we are not God. God can, and is transcendent. And Jesus in His Incarnation is a dumbed-down version of God, made endurable to us, so that we are able to “see His Glory” - God, to live as one of His own characters, has to be endurable to them, otherwise they would be destroyed by the unbearable splendour of God as He is really Is.

So no proof of God is possible - if God is God is at all, He cannot be reduced to our feeble capacities. God is not man, but inexpressibly better. He can be known - but it must be by revelation. Reason merely gives knowledge about Him - it does not gives us Him in Person. And that revelation, is in the Person of Christ. That is how limited man can meet the limitless God.

So we have trouble believing in Him, not because He is a faint or ghostly thing, not really real, but because He is too real, too wonderful, for us to experience fully in a created world; just as the reality of a human author cannot be accommodated within a fictional tale - only even more so.

This may be no help at all. ##
 
Hi, Gottle of Geer

quote: Gottle of Geer
"And that revelation, is in the Person of Christ. That is how limited man can meet the limitless God.
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An interesting analogy, thinking of God as a novelist.

Of course, God revealed Himself at Sinai, formed the
Covenant with Israel, spoke to His people through the prophets.
Then, too, there was the Ark of the Covenant [the Shekinah?]
and the Holy of Holies in the Temple.

These, too, were ways in which “limited man can meet
the limitless God.”

Best,
reen12
 
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