What do "Holy People" confess & how do I become one?

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I’m not sure how to phrase this, but what does one have to do to become holy? I go to Mass & Communion on a daily basis and say the rosary with my husband everyday. During Confession one day I asked our priest how often I should receive the Sacrament of Penance. He didn’t think I should go once a week or every 2 weeks since that was for very holy people, so he suggested once a month. I have been doing just that for about a year now, but I still feel a bit confused and wonder what the “Holy People” confess and how ‘I get there’.
 
I am not a holy person, but I have a couple of thoughts that might help you. You are clearly laying the foundations of a strong prayer life with daily Mass and Rosary. When you pray the Rosary do you meditate upon the Mysteries? Do you feel that your meditation is “successful”? That could be the next steps in your growth in holiness. Do you read spiritual books? There are several books that will help you grow in holiness, Imitation of Christ comes to mind as does Francis de Sales Introduction to the Devout Life. The latter book will also help you develop a stronger prayer life. You may also want to find yourself a Spiritual Director to journey with you as you pursue a life of holiness.

By the way, I should mention that you will never “get there”. You will never say, “Oh, now I know what holy people confess, because I have achieved holiness.” From what I have read and heard, the holier a person becomes the more aware he is of his short comings and sins.
 
FWIW-

I think a “holy person” will end up going to confession often. I think a sinner who is truly repentant will also go quite often. They will probably end up confessing different things. The “holy person” may confess mainly venial sins but still things that separate him/her from the Lord. The sinner will probably have bigger sins (possibly mortal) to confess. Both are guided to confess out of love of God.

I would like to second what Marsha wrote. You won’t know if you are a “holy person” until God tells you. Absent Gabriel coming down and letting you know, you won’t ever really know. But you know how to get there - love the Lord with all your heart, mind, body, and soul. Treat your neighbor as yourself. Ask for help (i.e. Confession) when you need it.

Chris
 
To be holy, you must will it. But that dosen’t mean just willing holiness into existence. It means living by the Holy Will of the Thrice-Holy Lord, who alone can make men holy. It means being persistant in living by God’s Will, getting right up every time you fall back down in sin. It means relying entirely on God, who in spite of all your sins, can make holy. And it means sacrificing your will, offering it to God, in exchange for His Own Holy Will, so that no longer do you live by or upon yourself but live exclusively by and upon the Lord. And you might even say, “I rely on God and I make Him my all, but, how do I live in Him?” You abide in God, and God in you, by love, for God is Love itself. He who loves, has God. Love is the source of holiness and the summit of holiness. With God, you can live in love.
 
By willing to be holy, you have already started to be holy, you have taken the first step. Now, if you will something, you are determined to make it come true. So you are determined to be holy, by God’s grace. And since you know only God can make you holy, you are not afraid; for you know He, too, wants you to be holy and He will make you holy with His Almighty Power, the same Power by which He created the world and by which He conqured evil and redeemed mankind. If He can create all good things, He can create you anew; if He can conquer evil, He can conquer the evil in you; and if He can redeem mankind, He can sanctify you. By Confession and Holy Communion, He annihilates your sins and gives you sanctifying grace. You can receive these sacraments by His grace, so rely on Him. Will to be holy, at every moment, and God will make you a holy creature!
 
Thank you, Marsha, Chris, and Eucharisted for all of your comments and advice! I appreciate your words more than you’ll ever know.
Marsha, I have been meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary but sometimes my mind wanders and (sigh) I’m not always as successful as I’d like to be. I did read Thomas A Kempis’ Imitation of Christ several years ago as an effort to take my faith more seriously. I have picked up and put down St Francis deSalle’s Introduction to the Devout Life more times than I’d like to admit, but you have just inspired me to make another attempt at it! I’ve read several of Henry Nouwen’s books, and find most of my reading to be spiritual but not too heavy duty…I’ll try and have a better mix of materials. I’ve desired to have a spiritual director for some time now, so I suppose it’s time to take that off the back burner too…just hope I can find a good one!
Chris, when I go to Confession, I’m usually reciting the same (mostly boring) sins…not usually mortal but things that are certainly offensive to God. But this still begs the question of how often I should go. Is once a month enough? Sometimes I wish I could go more often, but am trying to listen to the advice of the priest.
Eucharisted, thanks for letting me know that the mere will to be holy is at least a start! I say the Morning Offering daily giving my day to Jesus through Mary…but I always wonder by nighttime…why I wasn’t much better than the day before! Are you saying that if I just keep up this desire for holiness and keep going to daily Mass & Communion, and frequenting Confession (still not sure of how often), that God will eventually make ME holy?
 
suemar said:
Chris, when I go to Confession, I’m usually reciting the same (mostly boring) sins…not usually mortal but things that are certainly offensive to God. But this still begs the question of how often I should go. Is once a month enough? Sometimes I wish I could go more often, but am trying to listen to the advice of the priest.
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Listening to the advice of your priest is a very good step. If you can it may be helpful to go to the same priest every time. That way you will get consistent advice. Just be careful not to use the confessional as a therapy session. If you feel you would benefit from direct spiritual advice, you should as your priest to recommend a spiritual director. That person doesn’t have to be a priest and won’t be hearing your confession as part of spiritual direction anyway. (Even if your regular confessor is your spiritual director, they are still two separate things.)

You may also get a lot from reading St Teresa’s writings on her “little way”. Itsthe way to holiness for those of us who aren’t called to great action.
 
Usually listen to the priest’s advice. However, every two weeks for confession might not be too frequent if you are working on overcoming some particular sin, even if it isn’t mortal. (Unless you tend to be scrupulous) Perhaps you should ask the Holy Spirit to show you what He wants to change in your life. Then work on that one thing. Then your confession could focus on that area in your life. This could be your use of time or the way you relate to your children or whatever the Holy Spirit brings to your mind that is a block between you and God. That way your confession isn’t just a list. I think holy people are those who are trying to put God first in their lives and to live according to God’s will.
 
suemar said:
I’m not sure how to phrase this, but what does one have to do to become holy? I go to Mass & Communion on a daily basis and say the rosary with my husband everyday. During Confession one day I asked our priest how often I should receive the Sacrament of Penance. He didn’t think I should go once a week or every 2 weeks since that was for very holy people, so he suggested once a month. I have been doing just that for about a year now, but I still feel a bit confused and wonder what the “Holy People” confess and how ‘I get there’.
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thats wierd. even being a priest I don’t think of myself as holy.
I have some holy stuff, but am not holy myself.
priests confess to other priests, like doctors go to other doctors.
 
suemar said:
I’m not sure how to phrase this, but what does one have to do to become holy? I go to Mass & Communion on a daily basis and say the rosary with my husband everyday. During Confession one day I asked our priest how often I should receive the Sacrament of Penance. He didn’t think I should go once a week or every 2 weeks since that was for very holy people, so he suggested once a month. I have been doing just that for about a year now, but I still feel a bit confused and wonder what the “Holy People” confess and how ‘I get there’.
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There is a precious living saint of God, Fr. Thomas Dubay, who has written an easy book about that. Deep Prayer/Deeper Conversion.

In it he talks about three degrees of conversion.
“In the moral order we can speak of the basic conversion as a freedom from mortal sins. The advancing level is the giving up of willed venial sins. The consummate or perfect level is the totality of heroic goodness, going all the way with God, loving without limits.”
p. 29***

His sure-fire program for getting to the third level is outlined here:
  1. Be concerned
  2. be determined
  3. be motivated
  4. be committed to daily meditative/contemplative prayer
  5. be humble
  6. be specific
  7. be persevering
Fr. Dubay says that most people are satisfied with only the first level of conversion. Since we are fairly free of mortal sins, we’re good. It’s laziness and people’s acceptance of mediocrity in their lives that keep us steeped in our venial sins, and keep us from going all the way with God.

Get the book – don’t take my word for it. ignatius.com/ViewProduct.aspx?SID=1&Product_ID=2775&SKU=DCDP-P&Category_ID=204
 
I appreciate this paragraph in the book, “Deep Prayer/Deeper Conversion.”
We can speak of conversion not only as avoiding sins, mortal and venial, but also positively, as changes, improvements from evil to good: from lying to honesty… vanity to humility…gluttony to temperance…foolishness to prudence…timidity to courage…rage to patience…laziness to zeal…lust to love…cheating to justice…pettiness (small mindedness) to magnanimity (large mindedness) … egoism to altruism…mediocrity to totality…personal ugliness to personal beauty. Heroism in holiness occurs, wrote Benedict XIV, when these and the other virtues attain that peak of perfection by which a person vastly surpasses the goodness of ordinarily faithful people who aspire to holiness but at a slower pace and with less effort.
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Reading and meditating on holy works like “Imitation of Christ” and “Introduction to the Devout Life” can also help you in confession and growing toward heroic virtue.
 
When you read many of the lives of the Saints, you will see that they were really intuned to who they were as imperfect people. I learned a lot about my own weaknesses from learning about my temperament. Learning that my God-given temperament comes with both strengths and weaknesses, gives me a ready list of my imperfections to work on.

Still need another source??? Ask your children. Or co-workers. 😉
 
suemar said:
Are you saying that if I just keep up this desire for holiness and keep going to daily Mass & Communion, and frequenting Confession (still not sure of how often), that God will eventually make ME holy?
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My own personal gut feeling here:… I think you might need to focus less on the DOing and more on the BEing holy.

You have said yourself that you keep on confessing the same (boring) venial sins. Perhaps for you they aren’t so venial. If you keep on doing them, then it seems that they are more serious than you take them for. I think you should take them more seriously. See the “sure-fire” program above.
 
suemar said:
Thank you, Marsha, Chris, and Eucharisted for all of your comments and advice! I appreciate your words more than you’ll ever know.
Marsha, I have been meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary but sometimes my mind wanders and (sigh) I’m not always as successful as I’d like to be. I did read Thomas A Kempis’ Imitation of Christ several years ago as an effort to take my faith more seriously. I have picked up and put down St Francis deSalle’s Introduction to the Devout Life more times than I’d like to admit, but you have just inspired me to make another attempt at it! I’ve read several of Henry Nouwen’s books, and find most of my reading to be spiritual but not too heavy duty…I’ll try and have a better mix of materials. I’ve desired to have a spiritual director for some time now, so I suppose it’s time to take that off the back burner too…just hope I can find a good one!
Chris, when I go to Confession, I’m usually reciting the same (mostly boring) sins…not usually mortal but things that are certainly offensive to God. But this still begs the question of how often I should go. Is once a month enough? Sometimes I wish I could go more often, but am trying to listen to the advice of the priest.
Eucharisted, thanks for letting me know that the mere will to be holy is at least a start! I say the Morning Offering daily giving my day to Jesus through Mary…but I always wonder by nighttime…why I wasn’t much better than the day before! Are you saying that if I just keep up this desire for holiness and keep going to daily Mass & Communion, and frequenting Confession (still not sure of how often), that God will eventually make ME holy?
Click to expand...
If He can make prostitutes and tax collectors holy, He can make you holy. There is no limit to His Almighty Mercy!
 
Marsha_Adams said:
…
By the way, I should mention that you will never “get there”. You will never say, “Oh, now I know what holy people confess, because I have achieved holiness.” From what I have read and heard, the holier a person becomes the more aware he is of his short comings and sins.
Click to expand...
Yeah! Bravo!
That is one of the most brilliant things I’ve ever heard anyone at Catholic Forums say!
Excellent! Well done!
:):)🙂
 
Confession, what to do?

What do you all think? If your Priest doesn’t seem to want ‘frequent confessions’ then what do you do?
 
suemar said:
I’m not sure how to phrase this, but what does one have to do to become holy? I go to Mass & Communion on a daily basis and say the rosary with my husband everyday. During Confession one day I asked our priest how often I should receive the Sacrament of Penance. He didn’t think I should go once a week or every 2 weeks since that was for very holy people, so he suggested once a month. I have been doing just that for about a year now, but I still feel a bit confused and wonder what the “Holy People” confess and how ‘I get there’.
Click to expand...
I think the best way to become a holy person is to behave like a holy person - and go to Confession as often as you feel the need, even if that’s once a week or once every two weeks. I have never heard of there being limits on how often you can go to Confession based on how holy you are, or not.

I also think that the reason people who go frequently to Confession are holy is because they keep their accounts with God very short, by going to Confession frequently. :love: :getholy:
 
suemar said:
I’m not sure how to phrase this, but what does one have to do to become holy? I go to Mass & Communion on a daily basis and say the rosary with my husband everyday. During Confession one day I asked our priest how often I should receive the Sacrament of Penance. He didn’t think I should go once a week or every 2 weeks since that was for very holy people, so he suggested once a month. I have been doing just that for about a year now, but I still feel a bit confused and wonder what the “Holy People” confess and how ‘I get there’.
Click to expand...
If I am worrying about how holy I am because I attend the sacraments a lot then I might not get there as we also have to be humble. I think St. Timothy said that if a person considers himself to be free from sin then he is fooling himself. I think it’s Timothy. A holy person would confess to the same sins as everybody else and if he was self-righteous he would confess to the sin of pride.
 
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