Need help with a penance

[dcrowmik]

Seems a scary thing to do (very shy, here). Well, I clearly need to pray for more fortitude! (Also, it seems as if staring at people that way might be awfully off-putting to them. I know I’d wonder if there was something criminal intended.) But maybe I’m reading what you posted wrong.
:

When you are radiating Christ’s love outward to others, the best way to practice that is by looking into people’s eyes, not at their eyes. Looking into them does not mean staring. Even those short glances you give to others can be ones where you glance in that loving “into” sort of way.

Think of Jesus. He had that way of looking into the eyes of those around Him and seeing who they were, what they were, how they were. We, too, have that ability to connect and look into others. By little glances, by eye contact during normal conversation, etc. It isn’t staring.

Think about it. Try it. I have a feeling you will find a joy in it – a joy of life that I think your confessor was conveying to you.

 

[TLM08]

I’ve gotten the same kind of penance before, but mine was after confessing impure acts with no impure thoughts…

No details necessary… But how in the WORLD can a person commit an “impure” act without an impure thought driving it? It doesn’t seem to me that this act could have possibly been a sin.

 

[ForwardProgress]

Physical complusions stemming from a lifetime of an old habit. I’m not the only one, either.