The rule of three in the battle against sin

Q: Dear Dan, I am struggling with a recurring problem with anger that I can’t seem to overcome. I have read books, tried to understand how it surfaces in me, prayed fervently (I am living in a state of grace outside of this problem). But I seem to be making no progress. I am very very very very very very very very frustrated.

A: Yours is a challenging question. Because of the complex issues involved with this issue and my lack of knowledge of anything about you personally, I can’t give you a specific answer. I can however, point you to principals that I have no doubt will in some way help you face and overcome this challenge.

After years of observing intelligent, capable, and committed people work to solve problems, I have come to discover a rule that is almost universally true. Those who use this rule will be significantly more likely to overcome the challenges they face, those who don’t, will likely find themselves frustrated, dejected, and shackled with recurring sin and the debilitating and often disastrous consequences.

The rule itself is simple but it depends on a handful of basic realities that are worth a brief moment of exploration.

1. Sin clouds the heart and mind. Small sins and imperfections, left unchecked, cause a gradual and often unnoticed degeneration of the mind and will. Thus, when someone is caught in a destructive cycle, they often do not have, within themselves, the necessary faculties to identify the root cause, isolate it, formulate a solution, and then implement that solution.
2. We humans are finite creatures. We come into this world with blind spots. Even in the garden before our natures were tainted by sin, we had blind spots. In our perfect state, these were merely dependencies on one another to allow the other to see what the other could not see and to serve them in their need. In our fallen state, these blind-spots and dependencies can and do morph into serious realms of spirtiual delusion and dsyfunction. Post fall, with respect to serious emotional, psychological, and spiritual problems, it is very rare that we can effectively identify and overcome them on our own.

What can we do about these limitations and challenges? Well, the traditional means of the sacraments, prayer, spiritual reading, etc. are essential. Even so, many people are still stuck in their spiritual battles even after years of faithful practice of these life-giving disciplines. Other, less commonly used but very powerful tools are the combination of a rule of life coupled with a daily examen. Together these dramatically increase our spiritual peripheral vision by making us more self-aware (these practices consistently utilized can also help to shed light on our root sin). These tools help us to become more cognisant of our blind-spots and delusion not because we begin to see them clearly but because we see the patterns of the outcomes more clearly. Remember, you can never clearly see exactly what it is in your blind-spot.

Even with these wise and helpful practices, many people still are stuck in their spiritual growth. Why? It is because they don’t practice this simple rule:

If, with full vigor and commitment, we attempt to overcome a pattern of sin, imperfection, or any other major personal challenge three times without clear success or significant progress, we must seek outside help to properly diagnose and solve the problem.

Here’s an insight to the solution to this problem from God the Father given to St. Catherine of Sienna on the inherent incompleteness of our design and our clear need for others (Dialogue #7):

The same is true of many of my gifts and graces, virtues and other spiritual gifts, and those things necessary for the body and human life. I have distributed them all in such a way that no one has all of them. Thus I have given you reason – necessity, in fact – to practice mutual charity. For I could well have supplied you with all your needs, both spiritual and material. But I wanted to make you dependent on one another…

So, we are designed with a fundamental need for one another. Humility, mutual dependence and charity, are absolutely necessary for our spiritual growth; they are absolutely necessary for us to overcome serious spiritual challenges. Our culture, fueled by the lies of the enemy, militate against these holy needs and seek to replace them with the anti-virtues of pride, independence, and hyper-individualism. These ant-virtues coupled with fear and vanity have locked up and destroyed many people of good-will who simply would not reach out and get help with the challenges they face.

Jesus said that He came to give us life and that more abundantly. Reach out for that life that he offers to you. Don’t settle for less. Get the help you need.

PS: For more in-depth treatment of these ideas, you can pre-order Dan’s book, Navigating the Interior Life – Spiritual Direction and the Journey to God. It is scheduled to be available later in 2012.

I am stuck in my spiritual growth… how do I get unstuck? This is frustrating! Part II of II

Q: Dear Sister Carmen, I feel like I am stuck in mansion somewhere in mansion one or two. Is this normal? Where do most people get stuck in the journey through the mansions and is there any common way you can suggest that we get unstuck? Maybe I am just impatient. I feel like I should be growing but I am not.

In our first post in this two part series we talked about a few of the reasons we get stuck and touched on the key issues we often face in the first three mansions. In this post, we will provide a little summary of the first three mansions through a brief examination of conscience may help to determine just where you “feel stuck”. Perhaps the following will be of some help.

Since one enters the Castle through the gate of prayer the person entering the first mansion already feels drawn to prayer. Teresa does not talk much about prayer in the first three mansions but she does talk about what may help or hinder prayer.

First Mansion

• How generous are you in the development of your prayer life?

• Are you growing in the poverty of self-knowledge which in turn helps you to know God better?

• What for you are occasions of sin and what determined means do you take to avoid them?

• How frequently do you avail yourself of the sacrament of confession?

Second Mansion

• How are you strengthening the practice of virtue?

• Is your prayer becoming more simplified?

• Are you growing in a healthy concept of perfection?

• Do you quiet your own voice in order to discern the gentle voice of God?

• Do you seek guidance in learning to conform your will to God’s?

Third Mansion

In the third mansion we see that true conformity with God’s Will is reached only when our “false gods” (centers of our lives) die and integration takes place not only in relation among these centers, but new life emerges as a result. “Unless the seed falls into the ground and dies…”

• Are you desirous not to offend God even by venial sin?

• Do you eagerly perform penance?

• Do you spend quality time in prayer?

• Do you use your time well?

• Is your life orderly?

• Do you practice works of charity?

Teresa speaks of seven mansions or main rooms. But there are rooms within each mansion. Our movement within these “rooms” is fluid not static. Although we may spend more time in one room than in another we tend to move in and out and may have brief glimpses of rooms to come, if the Lord chooses.

This whole process is about change or transformation. Change can take place only through our generosity and willingness to surrender. In the example of our butterfly above there are four main life cycles: 1) the egg or beginning stage; 2) the caterpillar or growth stage; 3) the chrysalis or transformation stage; and 4) the adult or perfected stage. We might compare the growth stage here of the caterpillar to the first three mansions. Without this growth the transformation might never take place and thus perfection would be stunted.

This is all a preparation for what lies beyond the first three mansions which is God’s to give not ours to produce.

PS: To learn more about the Carmelite Sisters visit our web site: www.carmelitesistersocd.com and for more information please contact the sisters at contact@carmelitesistersocd.com, or 626-289-1353 Ext. 246, 920 East Alhambra Road, Alhambra, California 91801.

How can I get a copy of Navigating the Interior Life?

Q: Dear Dan, is your book available to buy now? If not, when are you aiming to release it?

A: Because so many have asked about the availability of Navigating the Interior Life, we have created the web site www.NavigatingTheInteriorLife.com to provide more information and to give you the opportunity to receive a free advance, signed copy simply by making a donation to Catholic Spiritual Direction. Dan has decided to take this approach in order to thank you for the commitment you make to Catholic Spiritual Direction and to help spread the word about the publication of this book (which is very much needed in the Church today). So, if you would like to help this apostolate as well as get an advance, signed copy when the book becomes available in late fall (God willing), go to www.NavigatingTheInteriorLife.com and click on the purchase tab to make a donation. Once the book arrives from the printer, Dan will begin frantically signing them and we will send them out to you!

Please let others know of this opportunity through email, facebook and twitter. As well, and thank you in advance for your support of the work of Catholic Spiritual Direction!

Yours in Christ – Marta

Who can receive Holy Communion?

Dear Father John, It is my understanding that only Catholics who are in the state of grace may receive Holy Communion. I know that only God really knows the state of a person’s soul. I am also aware that there have been hurts inflicted by very fallible and imperfect members of the Church that may prevent a person from fully and outwardly embracing the Church. If a person is not a member of the Catholic Church, but believes that the Eucharist is truly the Body and Blood of Christ, why should they not receive Holy Communion?

I am honored to be an Extraordinary Minister of Holy Communion. I have been approached while in this position by just such a person. I have given him the Holy Eucharist, but am feeling more and more uncomfortable because I have been told that that someone who is not a Catholic should not receive.  I do not want to drive a further wedge between him and the Church, but feel that I need to talk to him about it. What can I say? How can I explain to this person why he should not receive the Holy Eucharist?

A: This question is extremely difficult for me to answer. I can only provide general observations, but you are referencing some specific situations (or at least one) without detailing them. I apologize ahead of time if my answer doesn’t satisfy. I am also wondering a bit about what they explained to you in this regard when they prepared you to become an Extraordinary Minister of the Eucharist. Perhaps during that preparation you met someone closer to home that you may be able to approach about the specific situation you reference. Here also is a good summary of the biblical and Catechetical passages that are involved in this issue. Now here are a few more thoughts.

An Intimate Encounter

Receiving Holy Communion is a deeply personal encounter with Jesus Christ, who is truly present under the appearances of bread and wine, within Christ’s family of the Church. When Jesus gives himself to us in Holy Communion, he is saying many things, things like the following: “I know you and I love you. I long to share your life and to allow you to share my life. I want you with me, and I want my grace to heal, strengthen, enlighten, and guide your difficult journey through this fallen world. I give you this spiritual nourishment as a sign of my love for you and my commitment to you. All that I lived, taught, and suffered, I did for you…”

When we receive Holy Communion, we are accepting Christ’s love and Christ’s grace. That includes accepting all that he has taught, and all that his Church teaches, about the meaning of life and the path to fuller and fuller “union with” (this is what “communion” means) our Lord and Savior here on earth, and to a complete union with him forever in heaven. When we receive him, we are telling him: “Lord, I believe in you, and in all you have taught, and in all you have done for me. I believe in your Church, through which you give me this Blessed Sacrament. I long to follow you more closely. I long for my life to give you glory and to be a mirror of your goodness in this dark world. I promise to do everything I can to obey your commandments, since that is how you have asked me to show you my love (cf. John 14:15). I want to live in true friendship with you, today, tomorrow, and forever.”

Avoiding a Lie

Now, someone who does not accept what the Catholic Church teaches about faith and morals, cannot actually say those things. They cannot be in full communion with Christ in the Catholic Church, because the Catholic Church believes that Christ continues to act in the world through his Church. A Lutheran, an Episcopalian, or a Buddhist, for instance, does not accept all the basic teachings of the Gospels as explained in the Catholic Catechism, and so they are not in “communion” with Christ in his Church – if they did accept those teachings, they would become Catholic. So, for someone in that position to receive Holy Communion in the Catholic Church is, in a sense, for them to say something that they really don’t believe (i.e., “I am in communion with Christ and his Catholic Church”) – it’s a kind of lie. (Here is a short essay I wrote explaining the differences between Catholic and non-Catholic Christians, and here is another short essay I wrote explaining the Church’s view of non-Christian religions.)

If someone who does believe what the Catechism teaches about faith and morals (and the Catechism is simply a systematic explanation of what Jesus taught in the Gospels and the Holy Spirit teaches in the rest of the Scriptures), but refuses to live by that teaching, they would also be contradicting themselves by receiving Holy Communion. Someone who is having an affair, for example, would need to repent of the sin, confess the sin, and make a firm resolution to break off the affair before receiving Holy Communion. An affair is a grave sin against marriage, against God’s plan for marriage, against God’s plan for the people having the affair. To receive Communion without repenting from and confessing that sin is like saying to Jesus, “I want to follow you, but I think you are wrong about the meaning of marriage and the evil of adultery, so I am just going to keep doing my own thing in that area.” It’s a contradiction; it’s saying that I am in communion with Christ, but then, in my next breath, turning around and rejecting him, slapping him in the face. It’s, again, in a certain sense, a lie.

Dealing with Difficult Situations

If you know people who really want to receive Jesus in the Eucharist, but who are not currently in a position to be able to do so, I would encourage you to begin a relationship of spiritual friendship and instruction with them. Explain to them that Jesus too wants to give himself to them in this Blessed Sacrament. But explain to them that the Sacrament doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It is a central part of a relationship in which we must accept Christ for who he truly is: the Lord of the universe and the one Savior. And so, we must acknowledge our dependence on him, and we must “repent and believe in the good news!” as he said in his first homily (Mark 1:15). We must help people in this situation to undertake and persevere on a journey to the fullness of faith. Otherwise, we invite them to live a kind of lie every time they receive Holy Communion, and we only make the situation worse.

While they are on this journey, we should encourage them to come to Mass, to participate in the Liturgy, to receive blessings and to join in the prayer of the Church. But until they have repented from their sin or professed the Catholic faith, they really can’t receive Holy Communion in the way that God desires, and in a way that will nourish their souls with his grace.

“Speaking the Truth in Love” (Ephesians 4:15)

This may be a difficult process. People may be offended. We have to try and understand where they are coming from, and be gentle and respectful and patient, and explain, and not condemn – but at the same time, we must believe deeply in the power of God’s grace to change hearts, and in the power of the truth of our holy faith to “set us free” (cf. John 8:32). We do no favors to anyone by obscuring or disobeying the teaching of our Lord and of his Church. In this area, we need to ask for God’s grace to give us prudence and compassion, so that we don’t “break the bruised weed or put out the smoldering wick” (cf. Matthew 12:2). This is what St. Paul meant, at least in part, by the phrase “speaking the truth in love” (Ephesians 4:15). It’s what St. Peter exhorts us to do: “Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect” (1 Peter 3:15). Sometimes we will make mistakes. But God can use even our clumsy efforts to build his Kingdom.

St. Paul was very clear about the reverence and right-heartedness required for worthy reception of Holy Communion: “Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord. Let a man examine himself, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup” (1 Corinthians 11:27–28). Let us all pray that we will receive Jesus with the love he longs for, and help others do the same. He wants that – passionately.

I am too tired to focus in prayer, what can I do?

Q: Dear Dan, I have a question regarding the rosary that I’m hoping you can help me with. I love to pray the rosary and typically I’m able to meditate on the mysteries. Sometimes, I find myself not being able to sleep, but tired enough that I’m not able to effectively focus on the mysteries. In that situation, like last night, I focused my mind on each word, it was almost like praying against a white background, while I just focused on each word of the rosary with my intent on being able to draw my heart to God and away from distractions as much as I can. Is this an acceptable way to offer up the rosary?

Thank you for your blog. I am a quadriplegic and don’t have access to any sort of formal spiritual direction, so your blog has been a very welcome addition to my regular reading. God bless you.

A: Dear Friend, your question was moving to me. I am grateful that this apostolate has been a blessing to you. It is amazing how many people we come across who have very limited access to assistance in their spiritual journey. Your situation is a perfect example of the importance of providing this kind of material. With my admiration, here are a few thoughts.

Too Tired to Focus in Prayer

It might give you comfort to know that this is a universal problem. St. Therese of Lisieux suffered with this problem. Here’s a beautiful reflection of her sentiments on this topic from her Story of a Soul:

O Jesus, Your little bird is happy to be weak and little. What would become of it if it were big? Never would it have the boldness to appear in Your presence, to fall asleep in front of You. Yes, this is still one of the weaknesses of the little bird: when it wants to fix its gaze upon the Divine Sun, and when the clouds prevent it from seeing a single ray of that Sun, in spite of itself, its little eyes close, its little head is hidden beneath its wing, and the poor little thing falls asleep, believing all the time that it is fixing its gaze upon its Dear Star. When it awakens, it doesn’t feel desolate; its little heart is at peace and it begins once again its work of love. It calls upon the angels and saints who rise like eagles before the consuming Fire, and since this is the object of the little bird’s desire the eagles take pity on it, protecting and defending it, and putting to flight at the same time the vultures who want to devour it. These vultures are the demons whom the little bird doesn’t fear, for it is not destined to be their prey but the prey of the Eagle whom it contemplates in the center of the Sun of Love.

As someone who suffers from chronic pain and a very challenging sleep disorder, I understand what it means to be tired during prayer – so much so that I have fallen asleep while standing up during Mass (yes, you do fall down when that happens if you don’t catch yourself quickly enough)! That said, I have also taken aggressive measures regarding diet, medication, and sleep pattern modification. There is no excuse when we fail to do all that is within our power to mitigate challenges we face. However, when all of our good efforts fail or fall short, when our bodies fail us as they will all of us eventually, we recognize, as did St. Therese, that God is merciful and He understands the challenges we face and the weak vessels that we are. In this light, we can wake up and bring our heart and mind back into focus recognizing that we are loved and cherished and that the effort we have put forth to worship Him is reciprocated with love and tenderness.

The Battle of Prayer

Praying the Rosary one word at a time is an excellent way to work to turn our hearts to Him and to our honoring of Mary! There have been times when I have had to pray my vocal prayers with a measure of determined but gentle force in order to keep my mind and heart engaged. This doesn’t sound all that contemplative but these are times when we are wrestling ourselves and our weaknesses to Him and not times of ease and delight. The key here is to avoid getting frustrated. The Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church (#572) desribes this challenge in terms of a “battle”

Prayer is a gift of grace but it always presupposes a determined response on our part because those who pray “battle” against themselves, their surroundings, and espectially the Tempter who does all he can to turn them away from prayer. The battle of prayer is inseparable from progress in the spiritual life…

Whatever you are feeling is what you are feeling, whatever you can do is what you can do, no need to lament or allow anxiety to rule you. Simply turn back to Him a thousand times if you must. Remember that a glance toward Him will bring a response of loving grace. I have no doubt that even the smallest acts of devotion, if they are all we can offer, are of great significance in the kingdom of heaven.

An hour of prayer where we struggle and fight to focus on mere minutes or even seconds of attention to Him can be more meritorious than an hour of tranquil unafflicted devotion.