True Charity?

[jonathanw]

Right now in my spiritual life I am struggling with a really hard problem. I can’t seem to fathom how to truly love those around me. It’s hard. I don’t know how to love people. I have always had this problem but now I can’t seem to get over it. I know it’s wrong, but how does one obtain true charity? Is it possible to love all people even though people seem to do nothing but irritate me? I want nothing more but to love Jesus and imitate Him, but I realize that I am still in the flesh and am thus human in nature. Please help, and God bless.

 

[Elizium23]

[BIBLEDRB]Matthew 22:37-39[/BIBLEDRB]

I know that this is a hard problem for many people. I have largely ignored it for most of my life, and in my shirking of this commandment, I think I have found the solution: follow Jesus’s words as well as you can. Love God, and love yourself. Try not to judge others harshly. If you truly love God and you truly love yourself, you will eventually come to love others just the same way.

Personally I struggle with judging others. Psychologically, I can understand that this is based on my own low self-esteem. When I see others breaking the rules, I see an image of myself breaking the rules, and my conscience is rebelling against that self-image saying “No! You must not sin!” and then the thought and words come to me: what a jerk he is. For me, this is deeply ingrained, a habitual sin that is no longer mortal, but out of control.

I took the first step away from this behavior by recognizing the fact that I do it. You cannot be healed of sin if you are unaware of it.

The second step was confessing it at every opportunity. This reinforced the fact that it is a sin, and every time I committed it, I was aware that I’d have to bring it up in Confession.

The third step is some kind of aversion. This is up to your discretion. You can start a savings account like a “swear jar” where you pay for each sin. You can choose a penance to impose upon yourself. You can make prayer intentions. I chose to say a Hail Mary every time I judge someone, and this is gradually building up in my conscience, as I do it several times a day, soon my subconscious will realize that this is something to be avoided (I’m not really a prayerful person - I have to force myself to pray privately)

Once your conscience is trained in this manner, it will be easier and easier for you to stop judging others. When you go to Confession regularly and enjoy a state of grace and frequent reception of the Eucharist, you will be preserved from committing sin. As you grow in personal holiness and love for the Lord, you will begin to love others as yourself. Trust in Him!

 

[MidnightSun12]

Right now in my spiritual life I am struggling with a really hard problem. I can’t seem to fathom how to truly love those around me. It’s hard. I don’t know how to love people. I have always had this problem but now I can’t seem to get over it. I know it’s wrong, but how does one obtain true charity? Is it possible to love all people even though people seem to do nothing but irritate me? I want nothing more but to love Jesus and imitate Him, but I realize that I am still in the flesh and am thus human in nature. Please help, and God bless.

For a long time (before I found God in my life) I really struggled with the concept of love. I always believed that love had to be this physical outpoor of affection (in the way that a mother would embrace her child). Being a man who doesn’t often outwardly express his emotions, I actually thought that this somehow made me deficient in love and that it would be this really difficult thing that I would have to “force” myself to develop if I ever wanted to be a good christian.

The issue here was that I didn’t truly understand what love is. Ever since I found Christ in my life, I have learned that love is simply the full-giving of yourself to another person or to God. Love is naturally what you do when you DO NOT hold anything back from another person. Loving somebody doesn’t have to involve any massive outpoor of affection and men do often express their love differently then women. If you would jump out in front of a bus to save somebody’s life then that’s love and it doesn’t matter whether you are an affectionate person or a stone-cold robot-type (God just wants us to be the best version of ourselves ).

So when you put it in this light, love is actually one of the simplest things to do in life and it is what we all do naturally as human beings. It’s when we give into sin that we lose our natural inherent ability to love. So if you want to be a more loving person, then you have to turn yourself more fully away from sin. And the only way to turn yourself more completely away from sin is to give yourself to God more fully (and that starts with praying the rosary every day, frequenting the sacraments, etc…).

I hope this helps! God bless

 

[Lady_Love]

Love: Seeking the good of the other for the sake of the other. (even if it comes at great cost to yourself.)

This is what Jesus means by “deny yourself.” There is often a denial of self whenever we seek the good of another. For example: Being quiet when you want to talk so that the “other” can talk., getting out of bed early so that you can serve someone coffee., giving up doing something you might like to do in exchange for doing what the “other” may want to do., or smiling when you feel awful so that the “other” doesn’t become depressed by your sadness.

This having been said, sometimes we have to subject ourselves to the “others” negative emotions and deprive the “other” of something they want for their greater growth. For instance, sometimes it may be more efficacious for the “other” to give to you so that they don’t become selfish. Holding your ground for what you need can also be the most loving thing for the “other.”

 

[mh2007]

To me, the golden rule is a good starting point. None of us want to feel used, or taken advantage of because we do things for others. And we shouldn’t always expect every favor we grant will be returned in kind. That’s a bit egocentric, and unrealistic.

I view charity as giving of self for the greater good. And there is nothing at all wrong with working in your trade / profession for just compensation while you are being charitable. For example, lawyers sometimes do legal work for foundations. A noble activity - but it doesn’t need to be pro-bono. Or an accountant working for a parish. He / she is entitled to be compensated, but the work is directed toward higher ends.

The epitome of charity I have observed (and greatly benefitted from) came from my mother. It is amazing the depth of a mother’s love ~ no matter if you’re an infant or a senior. Mothers are truly charitable. You can call your mother any time, and she is always there to listen, share a few experiences, empathy, etc. Thank God for moms.

 

[CompSciGuy]

I am not irritated by people around me, what I struggle with is how do you love people completely selflessly, that is, without any kind of self-motivation, i.e. being loved in return? How does one accomplish this?

 

[jonathanw]

I am not irritated by people around me, what I struggle with is how do you love people completely selflessly, that is, without any kind of self-motivation, i.e. being loved in return? How does one accomplish this?

That’s something I would really like to know too.

 

[Maracuya]

I can speak about myself experience.

In order to generate this caring feeling you have to interact and understand others, identified yourself with other people’s situation. Everything starts from that point…

I remember myself when I was 19 and wanted to conquer the world cause that was the way I was raised by my dad, to achieve my goals in any way or whatever it takes… Nothing wrong with that if you are not running or destroying people’s life… When I turned 27, things started to get hard for me… I realized that I knew many people but none of them really cared about me except those I almost cut communication with like my mom and others.

The first time we went to have lunch with my mom, after almost 9 years… When we came out a man approached me and asked for help, he was hungry and thirsty, Back then I would normally dont help these individuals, and much less with money… But something clicked at that moment inside me, I wanted to run a social experiment at that moment so I asked “how do you think I can help you?” he answered me, “Could you please give me some money for me to buy a coke or water” I said, “Let me make it better, would you like to have tasty lunch from this place” he said “Sir, nothing will make me more happy”, I went and got him a very good lunch and he thanked me and when he said God bless you, it was not the typical God bless you, you hear form the father at church or the TV pastors on their preaches… This was real and I really felt it! Then I asked him, why are you in this situation? He replied that drug addictions after he lost his family brought him to this estate.

After a month, I went and visit my mom again and I found the guy in the area, so I went to him and he recognized me immediately and he thanked me again for the last time. I said do you want to change your life? he replied, what do you mean? work, have a better living? he said, I pray to God everyday for this. I took him to a friend that he works with individuals with drug problems and similar, he was there for a month, after that I found him a job where I was working at the time as a security guy and now days he works in the finance department since he happens to be good with numbers analysing risks and projects.

I discovered that more than grow empty to my own benefit, it fills me up to help those in need and to change things that can be changed, that made me to start a nonprofit organization to build schools and help by providing basic needs. because remember… Good actions give hope to those in need, simple actions make it possible to achieve!

Find what will make you happy and dont forget to help, not because religion or cause you need to go to heaven but because of the simple fact that doing good things will make this a better place to live.