Posted on 09/28/2014 6:24:41 PM PDT by RoosterRedux
Spent the last week with Mom in hospital. A very close friend of Mom's (like an adopted daughter) is a wonderful help, but as a Catholic, is always fearful of her destination.
She says that assuming that she will go to Heaven is beyond her...so she is painfully afraid and spreads that fear to others.
Please help with your opinions.
What should I say to her? She is neurotically fearful of her own future and spreads that fear generously.
You have to make a decision: are you trying to alleviate her problems and the problems you are perceiving she is making for others, or are you going to try to use this as a means of undermining her Catholicism.
If your answer is the first option, you need to remind her that scrupulosity is a sin. See, ON THE ONE HAND, Catholics believe you shouldn’t presume upon God’s mercy; you can’t say (as movies incessantly and slanderously suppose Catholics do say), “Oh, such-and-such is a mortal sin, but it’s OK, I’ll just do it and go to confession afterwards.” No, confession must include a sincere intent to turn away from one’s sins. And it’s not possible that anyone can go to confession without knowing that, since it’s part of the priests’s admonition AND the penitent’s “act of contrition.” Catholics believe that they CAN turn away from God, renounce their faith, and fall into a trap of mortal sin. They don’t believe in “once saved, always saved,” because St. Paul warned about people losing their faith and falling into sin.
ON THE OTHER HAND — and this is where you need to reach out to your sister — Catholics also believe that Christ is infinitely more powerful than Satan, and he knows that we are sinners, and that he loves us, and that he will never abandon us. Whereas the libertine or the antinominist sins by thinking that God doesn’t really care whether we sin or not, the scrupulous person sins by failing to place enough faith in God’s love and mercy. Their image of God is too much of One who is awaiting a reason to justify rejection or punishment.
Referring to scrupulosity as a sin is awkward, since the very problem the scrupulous person has is expecting judgment for their sins. It IS a sin: the person is defaming God in their own minds. But it is not one in which the sinner is largely culpable: they are trying to do right, and are often afflicted by OCD, which has a chemical basis. In any event, they need to learn that God forgives sins.
A spiritual director is the best call for helping someone who is scrupulous: seeking one is very natural to the scrupulous person, and therefore spiritual directors are often very experienced, or at the very least well trained, in dealing with scrupulous people. If it actually is a result of OCD, and that OCD is manifesting itself in other harmful ways, the spiritual director will also have the authority and skill to help the scrupulous person seek whatever medical attention may be appropriate IN ADDITION TO the spiritual help.
Have you reminded her that fear & doubt come from the devil? It is how he tempts our faith. And lies are his specialty.
I can relate to the fear of taking God’s Mercy for granted, but I can also say that we receive Grace according to how much we can defy our fear. (This is why I ask for other people’s prayers when I fear that my own faith isn’t strong enough)
It’s always wonderful advice to tell someone to go to confession. But if the issue is scrupulosity, she may find some tiny and very venial matter she commits shortly after leaving confession, or worry she didn’t remember all her sins, or that her purpose of amendment wasn’t sincere enough. Scrupulous people often need more help than a five-minute anonymous confession can offer. Spiritual directors are often needed.
Even a rose grows in the dirt.
Pray for her, get her a bible and urge her to read the gospels, and do get her a priest. She’s in good hands.
Oh, and if you throw out the word, “scrupulosity,” you can also console her that even some saints have had to struggle with the temptation towards that sin. I might suppose that in some cases, that struggle helped inspire their saintliness! But it IS a temptation from the devil, and she must seek spiritual help in fighting it.
I write about the need for a spiritual director. I’m sure you understand that presumes she is already praying, studying the bible, and availing herself of the sacraments. If not, she may be in the sinful state of despair, in which she needs to do all of those things, but still needs a spiritual director.
1 Tim 1:
7For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline.
8Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony of our Lord or of me His prisoner, but join with me in suffering for the gospel according to the power of God,
9who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity,
10but now has been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel,
11for which I was appointed a preacher and an apostle and a teacher.
12For this reason I also suffer these things, but I am not ashamed; for I know whom I have believed and I am convinced that He is able to guard what I have entrusted to Him until that day.
13Retain the standard of sound words which you have heard from me, in the faith and love which are in Christ Jesus.
14Guard, through the Holy Spirit who dwells in us, the treasure which has been entrusted to you.
Well, to me the text indicates an outside agent snatching someone out of God’s hand. Can’t be done. If you can “snatch” yourself out (and there is sufficient Biblical evidence that you can do so), then you’re right; but no one else can do it to you and that, I believe, was the sense of the passage.
Tell her to stay away from your mother. She’s using religion as an excuse to upset your mom, taking advantage of her difficult situation to hurt her. She’s not neurotic, she’s cruel and hateful and hiding behind neurotic religiosity to commit a terrible spiritual crime. Tell her to go to church and pray for your mom if she’s worried about her soul, but that you’re not putting up with her emotional abuse anymore. But first get clear yourself - she’s no friend. And no truly religious person would even think of using religion to so upset someone facing dire illness. So she’s a fraud, too. Get rid of her - she’s hurting your mom.
A Protestant whose minister assures him that once he “accepts Jesus” he is absolutely saved and backsliding won’t change that, will feel good about himself and won’t repent new sins and doesn’t know that his ticket has got unpunched. But he feels good about himself on this earth and that is all that counts.
One thing you could tell her is that she needs to focus on the faith of the Church, not “her” faith. She needs to listen to the Church, which is Christ speaking to her.
Tell her she is right not to presume on the mercy of God, but also that if she ignores Church teaching on the forgiveness of sin, then she is causing her own difficulty.
Tell her that if she feels she has unconfessed sin, she needs to go to Confession immediately.
That could well be what the problem is. Something is weighing on her heart.
Most (good) Catholics will end up in Purgatory. Most all Protestants — Hell. Doesn’t matter what Protestant beliefs they have.
God always keeps his promises. If you look at the story of the talents, there is logically no example given for the investor who risked all and lost. The only loser is the one who did not trust and buried his talent. It is God’s way of saying that if you take the risk of trusting Him, He will not fail and your reward will be very great.
Making a general confession, where your whole life is on display, is a very comforting exercise. All the trivial stuff falls away. The big screw-ups, the big regrets are all brought into view. Once those are exposed and rejected there is great peace, because there is nothing too big for God to handle, and like others have said here, God’s Word never fails.
Hello
... and that leaves the question hanging as to just where the likes of you will end up.
Ha! I was just checking this thread out. Any suggestion for this Catholic lady?
Well, off hand, I would just tell her to go to her Bible. I am certain God would love to save her, and He would.
John 20:28-31:
28 "And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God.
29 Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.
30 And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book:
31 But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name."
Doubting Thomas believed, and was pronounced saved, free of guilt, and Heaven-bound, without any Catholicism, baptism, or good works involved. Thomas's requirement, and hers likewise, as for all of us, is simply to persistently and completely dedicate all her trust in the Crucified Jesus Christ, and appropriate His Lordship over all her heart.
That is the saving Gospel. There is no other. And The Father will save, comfort, and give grace and peace for her future.
Tell her, "Be obedient. Do as Thomas did, whose soul is at this moment with Jesus in Heaven. Be assured. Throw yourself on Him and receive His Blessing. Do not wait. Let no one distract you. Accept everlasting life, starting now."
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