I already help with RCIA at my parish. This is a extremely embarrassing thing I deal with. This is a embarrassing thing in general. Everyone who posts about their scrupulosity online, I can guarantee are not as open about it in real life. There are some people I would not mind telling, but I am not going to tell my whole parish by doing what would be necessary to start a group. There is no way I am going to openly shout “Hey, I am scrupulous” to everyone in my parish. Good idea, just never going to happen.
I can empathize with that; however, the OCD support group might be of help… so instead of a scrupulosity support group… an OCD support group? Maybe you can find a therapist that would be willing to donate some time to develop the group?
It is hard enough trying to find a spiritual director, which is what I am trying to do. The thought of emailing and or mailing a ton of therapists to find one willing to work for free is not very appealing to me. This is just not something I am going to do. I am not a very outgoing person either. Theoretically, good idea. However, wrong founder.I can empathize with that; however, the OCD support group might be of help… so instead of a scrupulosity support group… an OCD support group? Maybe you can find a therapist that would be willing to donate some time to develop the group?
- totally understand.
Sorry, I couldn’t resist.
) I never know what I am going to say but hope the Spirit leads me and gives me something to say that is helpful to you. God bless. Pray for me. I will pray for you.You do not know the extent of my problem. Nor the extent to how much your little witticism annoys me. But that is okay, I do not expect you too. I know how to laugh. This is not a laughing matter though. Thank you for your thoughts though.Laughing boy needs to learn how to laugh.
You do the best you can and let God worry about the rest. Give your concerns to him because he cares for you. Ask him to guide you. I don’t find that God controls every aspect of my life. He doesn’t tell me what I am going to eat for supper, what I am going to wear. He gives me freedom to choose these things. Even major life choices he lets me choose out of the available options. God is not expecting us to be robots. He allows us to make choices out of the available goods. And he knows we will fail from time to time. The thing he most wants from us is to be merciful as he is merciful. We can’t be merciful if we see God as some merciless tyrant.
The merciful father of the prodigal son and the good Shepherd who seeks out the lost are good images to keep in mind.
If God expects perfection out of us, yet we can not deliver on this how can we resolve this. It is nearly impossible for us to be perfect. Even Scripture says if we say we have no sin we are liars. In Matthew where it says be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect it does this in context of forgiveness of your neighbor and loving your enemies. If we compare this to Luke in a similar passage it actually says be merciful as your heavenly father is merciful. So we can see when it says be perfect it is talking about being merciful. It is talking about loving the way God loves, unconditionally. For if our love was conditional we could not love our enemies.
In order to have mercy on others we must have mercy on ourselves. We can not give to others what we do not possess. I need help with this just as much as anyone else. Thanks for letting me go on like this. (Not that you had a choice
I think that falls under the banner of “No kidding to much preoccupation with anything is bad” but tell that to someone with OCD. They know that already. Like me, the problem is that they cannot help it.
I started saying The Divine Mercy Chaplet every Friday. Perhaps I should read more about the lives of saints who battled scrupulosity. I did get to talk with my senior pastor about one of my issues recently. I got his opinion and that helped a little. I am seriously working on getting a spiritual director. I have reached out to two different religious orders so far. And I recently bought some stamped envelopes to send out more letters to more places that might be able to help me. I am not giving up. I sure am trying. Other than one episode of uncontrollable intrusive thoughts for a hour or two yesterday, the last two days have actually been okay. Thank you for your advice.