Offering up all future joy

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DL82

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I had this thought the other day at mass, and it’s something that’s been with me since then.

I had the urge to offer up all future joys the Lord God might have had in store for me, to offer them up in reparation for the cycle of disrespect between disillusioned laity and disengaged or sinful priests. I am lucky to go to a parish with a wonderful priest, joyful liturgy and active congregation, but I know this is not true for all Catholics.

Besides, I’ve always been uncomfortable being happy. My ex girlfriend said as much, I feel guilty whenever happiness comes my way.

So, yeah, offering up all future joy, natural and supernatural, and accepting sorrow instead. Is that a sacrifice too far?
 
Besides, I’ve always been uncomfortable being happy. My ex girlfriend said as much, I feel guilty whenever happiness comes my way.

**But God WANTS you to be happy! Jesus said to His disciples the very night He was betrayed, “These things I tell you that your joy might be full!”

I think you need to discuss this issue with a counsellor or spiritual director–or both.**
 
bpbasilphx said:
Besides, I’ve always been uncomfortable being happy. My ex girlfriend said as much, I feel guilty whenever happiness comes my way.

**But God WANTS you to be happy! Jesus said to His disciples the very night He was betrayed, “These things I tell you that your joy might be full!”

I think you need to discuss this issue with a counsellor or spiritual director–or both.**
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Perhaps I should qualify that. I WAS always uncomfortable being happy, but more recently I’ve had a real sense of the joy that God wants me to experience.

It’s precisely BECAUSE I now know that joy is good and wholesome that I want to offer it back to Him for the sake of eternal joys in the life to come, not so much for me but for the conversion of others.
 
While I’m glad you clarified what you meant, my suggestion still stands.
 
Offering one‘s sorrows to the Lord entails openness to His will and solidarity with the travails of His Church on earth and in Purgatory.

Offering one‘s future merits to Jesus through Mary (Montfort consecration) entails openness to the Blessed Mother‘s use of whatever she finds usable in us.

Offering others‘ sacrifices or merits to God (e.g. St. Gertrude offering Him the precious Blood of our Lord in union with all the Masses said throughout the world) means joining one‘s own desire to give with the others‘ gifts.

So if God gives us joys so that we may enjoy them, draw on them to sustain our lives, render Him thanks for them and „give them forward“, how can we offer them to Him except by doing just that – not by expecting to exchange them for sorrows, but by uniting our wills to what He willed in giving them to us?
 
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