Lately I've been feeling really lost. I've always been Catholic, but now it's like I no longer know what I believe. I don't feel at ease, so I've started reading about other religions but I've only read the basics about a few, and that's not enough... I guess I still have a very long way to go to fully understand them. I have this strange feeling I just can't get rid of... Have you ever felt this way?
Have you ever thought about how maybe we are supposed to feel lost? It seems that people want to grasp onto a comforting set of beliefs that explains/takes all of the mystery out of the world and the universe. To me to feel lost and to gaze up at the stars and realize that no one really could possibly understand the meaning behind it all is crucial to ones sense of humility and wonder.
Yes. An early christian mystic, St. John of the Cross, wrote about this stage in spiritual development as "The dark night of the soul" in his book "The Ascent of Mount Carmel" (which you can find online). Consider this to be spiritual growing pains. You are becoming aware of a hunger that you need God to fill (true personal knowledge of God, not something someone has told you in catholic school).
Wow Kharakov this is actually something nice i've seen you say!! and as for catholicks they are different i think cuz You shouldnt confess your sins to some guy in a box,but you confess your sins to Jesus which is called repentence. So why dont u ask Jesus to fill up your empty ness that you've been filling!
Amber, you still confess to God, but you tell a ordained minister... i think it might stem from the diciples been given the authority to forive the sins, you know...or it might be like in the Eastern Orthodox church where you confess to God, with someone more experienced than you [not a minister] present, you then work through your sin, and try to reslove it and better yourself after... the othodox pracitce stems from when early christains would gather and confess sins to God in the presence of others, and then they would try and beat the sin, and stop it...-> see my post in the "trinity" thread in the Islam forum, i explain it better, and provide a link
Sorry. You had to go say something like this, didn't you: Talk to fucking God people. WTF is wrong with you anyway? Worship God. Jesus didn't tell you to pray to him, he said pray to God the Father: Matthew 6:9-13 "This, then, is how you should pray: " 'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, 10your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. 11Give us today our daily bread. 12Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. 13And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.[a]' " Jesus was a living example of a good son of God, the way God would like his sons to behave (lay down their lives for their brothers, patiently doing God's will, don't abuse your power, etc.). You should have a personal relationship with God the Father. Confessing your sins to Jesus is a symptom of ignorance. Rely upon God the Father to teach you what is right and wrong, and to cause your actions to result in good, no matter how wrong they seem at the time: Genesis 37:28 "So when the Midianite merchants came by, his brothers pulled Joseph up out of the cistern and sold him for twenty shekels [b] of silver to the Ishmaelites, who took him to Egypt. " Joseph's brothers sold him as a slave (later they felt guilty for the "evil" they had done). Genesis 45:4-7 "4 Then Joseph said to his brothers, "Come close to me." When they had done so, he said, "I am your brother Joseph, the one you sold into Egypt! 5 And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you. 6 For two years now there has been famine in the land, and for the next five years there will not be plowing and reaping. 7 But God sent me ahead of you to preserve for you a remnant on earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance. [a] " His brothers selling Joseph into slavery seemed like a great evil at the time it happened, but God planned from the begining for this to happen so that Joseph would become a lord of Egypt and could save his family in the future (at the time of famine). There is a lot more to the story than the passages I quoted, and it is a good example of how God works in ways that men believe to be "evil" but are actually good.
Clover, I can totally relate to your dilemma. Have felt that way for hmm at least ten years, and am only now coming upon some real answers. It took a lot of soul searching and reading around. Though really everything I hold to be true (with regards religion/spitituality) was what I believed in my heart anyway. Everything I learn has left it's mark, which I suppose makes me reluctant to sumrise those beliefs into one word, almost as if that negates all the rest. Don't see why we can only have one thing our whole lives. That's probably a backward way of coming to a religion, but there you go. Can be pretty hard to do all that with the clamour of dogma and righteousness. Everyone has their own beliefs and agenda, but of course what they think is own truly right for them. And anyway for every one yelling and insisting about God/Christianity is another who is really trying not to cringe and insist that the Goddess/'paganism' gets some air time too (won't mention any names) You just have to make your own mind up. Clearly the powers that be are not going to spoon fed answers or just make it easy in a snap (where's the fun in that) I won't mention my final, or at least current, path. As that's not really relevant. Surfice to say it certainly wasn't the one anybody expected, they can't have done or surely they wouldn't have baptised me. Hope that helps, good luck
Yeah yeah... (Liotta) It's... (Pesci) What? (Liotta) Just... ya know, you're, you're funny. (Pesci) What do ya mean, funny? Let me understand this cause, I don't know maybe it's me, I'm a little fucked up maybe, but I'm funny how? I mean, funny like I'm a clown, I amuse you? I make you laugh... I'm here to fuckin' amuse you? What do you mean funny, funny how? How am I funny? (Liotta) Just...you know how to tell the story, what? (Pesci) No, no, I don't know... you said it. How do I know? You said I'm funny. How the fuck am I funny, what the fuck is so funny about me? Tell me, tell me what's funny! (Liotta) Get the fuck outta here, Tommy! (Pesci) Ya motherfucker, I almost had him, I almost had him! Ya stutterin' prick ya! Frankie, was he shakin'?
I agree with you, everything you learn leaves a mark in you, and that definately is a good thing. I'm just trying to learn as much as I can about different beliefs, because everything may enrich my soul and my knowledge of the Divine. I'm not trying to reach any conclusion for the time being, I'm just trying to open my mind and learning everything I can. Maybe some day I will reach a conclusion. By the way thanks to you all for sharing your experiences and advices with me.
