What are exceptions to full consent?

[foolishmortal]

I heard that being half-awake can and that, according to the Catechism, so can certain anxiety. Ok Those are pretty vague. Can you think you know you are doing wrong and do it, but something like guilt, bad sleep, hoarding, repressed anger, insecurity, etc. is underwriting your judgment to such a degree you are not responsible enough for a serious sin? Does that factor in or does just thinking it could be very wrong is enough?

If you still suffer from scrupulosity, better not read more than the first sentence. I have all kinds of conflicting thoughts that may never have occured to you and could be stupid ones. These things I say are not illegal, so don’t feel responsible for knowing these things about me. Maybe a part of me wants to be scolded, to be exposed for the rotten sinner this angry and arrogant poster has been and/or to get attention.

I have tried not to be scrupulous or maybe I broke down and got lax about it. Fr. Jone said you can do something not in itself evil and ignore the feelings if you are scrupulous. He said not to do anything intrinsically evil either, but the result of compulsive looking and saving of non-porno images resulted in the obvious intrinsic evil (on a couple occasions, it just happened though I knew it was a possibilty). I don’t know if I was too tired to comprehend enough what I was doing or if I were OCD or if anxiety was underwriting my actions and I just felt like I was deciding to do wrong.

Due to multiple factors, I looked at images of Nat. Geo. magazine kind of images I thought I erased after my last purge (I was once racist and possibly I want to feel control so I look at someone who looks primitive, according to the Enlightenment period standards of advanced culture and looks and it could explain shouting in my car, but never at other drivers, or giving my opinions here while biting my lip in public unless I can’t contain myself any longer). I’m either doing that, watching youtube or arguing on CAF or a forum like it. It’s not that I would hate sinning, but that I would be happy if I died without a mortal sin on my soul. I worry about many things like this. I had anxiety and shyness as a kid and it found a new context when I became intellectually confirmed in my Faith (I was messy–can a messy person have the scrupulosity version of OCD?). I don’t know if I’m using scrupulosity as a defense against acknowledging laxity, but priests do tell me they think I’m scrupulous.

I went to S. Korea escaping my angry, fast driving that developed under my radar as did swearing when I dropped something (though a parent of mine did that often). It was stress. Bad habits followed me dormantly until trouble kids in the EFL class started up and insecurities, guilt (mostly due to not being around at the holidays to see the nephew who really enjoys my silliness with him as well as the big snow my dad had to clear on his own added to my class disrupting another teacher’s class 2 months later.

I’m afraid a priest to whom I’d go, could be too lax or too rigid.
I need to know what’s bugging me–not that I expect you to be able to tell me. I think my insecurities could be due to not feeling control and being criticized for unique thinking (not theologically speaking).

Maybe it’s Pride, but, if I have an ego trip, even a pleasurable near occasion of sin can make it, to my heart, time-consuming and unsatisfying. It can be fun, but not fun. I can resist buying stuff made from China or made by an abortion-funding or gay-agenda supporting company, but I can’t resist my anger, saving of websites and physical stuff and obsession over the object of those things as well as objects of eventual lust). I know my only happiness can be doing prayer to God (as I get glimpses of it when doing so, though never remaining happy after a totally innocent fun time), but I feel as incompetent as a pray-er as I am at school and in life. I really don’t know if I trust anyone, but yet I tell people my problems anyway. It’s really weird. I think I could be passive-aggressive, but probably as a defensive measure, though possibly unconsciously directed toward a parent–maybe even God.

I’m working out my thoughts here since I don’t have a pen with me under the stuff I’ve hoarded in case I need it. Sorry about unloading on you. Maybe you know something. I won’t hold it against you if you don’t.

Can you burn-out from scrupulosity and go nuts for something your subconscious really missed even though you were miserable then and got rid of (or thought so) the material of that recreation already?

Thank you and God bless you
Phil

 

[bilop]

To commit a mortal sin you must know what you are about to do is wrong, and do it anyway, intentionally…

Spontaneous anger is not sinful.

God Bless

 

[Newbie2]

To commit a mortal sin you must know what you are about to do is wrong, and do it anyway, intentionally…

Spontaneous anger is not sinful.

God Bless

As well, certain sins that are “habitual” may not carry the same culpability as others. For example, one may have masturbated for years and years before one learns that it is a sin. By then, it’s an ingrained habit…kind of like how we have our getting ready for work rituals; we dry off out of the shower in a certain way, we brush our hair and teeth a certain way, etc. It’s all habit.

When a certian sin becomes part of our regular behavior, it can become addicting and difficult to overcome. Look how difficult quitting smoking is for many…or losing weight that was put on through poor eating habits.

That’s not to say that it cannot or should not be overcome, but we’re hard-wired to be people of habit. By the same token, we can foster, with the help of the Holy Spirit, good habits too.

 

[foolishmortal]

Thank you for your concern and God bless you!

Yes, I am an idiot. I am in a foreign land wth mostly Korean-only speaking priests and I get myself into crazy soul-threatening stuff like this–even though some form of anxiety or depression from guilt sparked it and sustained it. Can you make a decision to do something you know is wrong, but not be fully culpable because your judgment may be impaired, yet not to the point where you feel disembodied and watching yourself do something?

I had an inspiration after writing this that seems to be useful.
I was looking up internet addiction and information addiction (I spent a lot of money on books, esp. Catholic ones, and can be up late reading those (though they are more constructive). I have a junky room with things I might use later. I’ve only recently heard of hoarding. I had to laugh at myself when I read case studies. Reading CVS health problem books and the DSM 4 usually results in me laughing at myself if something rings true (this self attention is Pride, I’m sure, but the post Vatican 2 confusion, feeling betrayed by politicians and by other authorities has made me an info. freak like “I’ll have to look into all this on my own”–fortunately, God kept me from joining other churches, covertly or overtly heretical groups on the left and right, respectively as the right is not the covert schismatic types). I think this is a not feeling any control over things situation or feeling weak and some part of me hating it (like I am drawn into a situation where friends and family will be having meat on a Friday in Lent or something and I don’t know how to get out of it and a part of me feels resentment towards them for putting me in this situation and possibly God, for allowing it–scary thought for one trying to be a good Catholic-Christian in a lax world).

Some would blame organized religion, but that’s just a context for issues before I found my birth religion as the True Faith. I was on a reading binge when I discovered EWTN shortly afterwards and then I had more (name removed by moderator)ut when I discovered the lost traditions traditionalists kept around. I had more (name removed by moderator)ut than I could process, probably. Still, I would be up all night watching movies before I rediscovered my Faith.

What I said 2 paragraphs before this could explain my interest in conspiracy theories or why I was racist at one time (though 2 bullies in school were Native American, but then a couple others weren’t). It could explain my passive-aggressive behavior when I can see the one(s) troubling me or aggressive behavior, when I can’t see the other in their car–things you don’t consider, but you do it and then feel guilty and that anger that knows not to whom to go flares up and then guilt, etc. .

There's a bit of the can't wait for later or tomorrow involved in information and/or internet addiction and it spilled into the pictures when I found a place that I did not see them before when I deleted all I could find a month ago.  It was totally no urge and stupid to see them again.

I wanted to wait and go to bed early on nights when I did any of the following, but could not bring myself to do it *. The image hunt usually just lasted 2-4 days both times I did it. I wanted to watch a DVD some nights, but couldn’t get around to it. This whole finding things was pleasurable in a way, but not in that it was wrong and I knew it and I was tired the next day and not enjoying healthy recreation and knew it but good intentions of just checking e-mail turned into an all-nighter of digressions. .

Now that I recognize it for what it is, I think I can get better. I knew getting the net could result in insomnia and hoarding at the least (BTW I’ve saved some websites about these things ), but it allowed me to videophone my family on the big holidays and other times, so I had to do it. It became a bad way to lick my wounds. In the future, I think I’ll use their PC rooms (they are cheap and it would be easy to be there too long, but it would require waking up at a normal time. There is a Korean man offering free counseling at the Catholic Center and he knows English as he goes to the English Mass.

Whether my problems are mostly Western cultural, I’m not sure. They don’t often get my humor. Puns elude them here in South Korea (and maybe most of Asia), it seems. I do have a silly light-side–but I digress. I should check with the place to find him.

Thanks for reading and God bless you all for listening to my narcissistic story. Maybe someone may relate. Maybe it is not that uncommon and someone will feel that way too, laugh, and then get their head and/or act straightened.*