“Great news! I got a promotion . . . and I’m ENGAGED!”

My friend went on and on sharing the romantic story of how her tall, handsome, Catholic man proposed. Everything in her life seemed to be the stuff of her dreams . . . and mine. As she was oozing with excitement, I smiled and was happy for her, but inside I had this strange, silent but sickly feeling of envy. There was this small part of me that wanted her to gain 10 lbs, break out with acne, or just stop talking. (Ok, not my finest moment).

Then as she was telling me how God had spoken to her miraculously through the prophetic gift in Adoration, my heart screamed: “God never speaks to me like that!” . . . I felt as though an invisible monster had taken over my heart. I should have been happy for my friend, but instead I was consumed with envy.

The Invisible Monster

Everywhere I look there seem to be people that can do things better than me. My roommate can play guitar and sings with a voice that sounds like a blend between Kelly Clarkson and enchanted angels. When I sing, cats squeal from all down the street. My athletic brother can run marathons while eating a Big Mac – That’s just wrong!

It seems like I’m surrounded by “-er” people . . . They’re pretty-er, funny-er, talented-er, just bett-er.

Unfortunately, when we try to measure ourselves up to others, we can be led into a very serious sin – Coveting our Neighbor.

What the heck does “coveting” mean? The Hebrew word translated “covet” is chamad (חמד) which is commonly translated into English as “covet,” “lust,” and “strong desire.”

In Exodus, God makes it clear to the people of Israel that they are not to covet their neighbor’s goods, servants, wife, his ox, or donkey (Exodus 20:17). Honestly? In all of my life I have never longed after a donkey. Seriously though, God might have chosen these words had he handed down the law today: “You shouldn’t desire after your friend’s x-box, clothing, their status, their cute boyfriend or girlfriend, their looks, their athletic skills, or their things.”

Unlike the other commandments which focus on outward actions, this commandment focuses on the human heart. It is an attitude that can sneak up on us before we even realize that’s what we are feeling.

Green with Envy

All of us may have had a moment when someone else has gotten something we really wanted. Maybe your friend always gets the “A” while you struggle to get a “C.” Or their parents are always buying them stuff like an X-box or a new car while your parents always say no, or can’t afford those things. Maybe you’d just like the attention that’s always lavished on the star jock and his cheerleader girlfriend. There is a part of your heart that wants to scream: “THEY SHOULDN’T HAVE THAT . . . I WANT IT!” That is coveting. That is envy . . . And we do it all the time.

The big issue with this sin is that it can be destructive to not only our own heart, but it can lead to destruction in relationships, bitterness, resentment, gossip, and ugly, malicious actions between friends and siblings. But at times we feel helpless to our feelings. How do we tame the monster?

How to Obey the Tenth Commandment

God tells us we can turn to him and resist sin. (James 4:7) Over the years, He has taught me a great tool for turning my envy to rejoicing.

Just SLAPP the envy:

• S: Stop and recognize the competition and jealousy in your heart.
• L: Look to Love. Remind yourself that God calls us to love our neighbors and be happy for their blessings. “Love is not boastful. Love is kind. Love is not jealous” (1 Corinthians 13).
• A: Ask for God to change your heart, remove jealousy, and give you the ability to love.
• P: Praise God for today’s blessing. Give thanks for his blessing on your friend.
• P: Praise God for tomorrow’s promises still to come! Boldly claim in faith that today you may not have everything you desire, but you trust in His love -that He knows you and loves you and has great plans for you…

It sounds something like this:

(Stop and Recognize your heart) Lord, I am so upset that Sarah has this amazing boyfriend. (Look to Love) I know you want me to be happy for her, but I can’t. I am jealous. (Ask for Grace) Please take this jealousy from my heart. Help me to be truly excited for her and celebrate with her. (Praise for today) Thank you for blessing Sarah with your gifts.Thank you for loving her. (Praise God for tomorrow) Lord, I KNOW you love me too, and you have great plans for me. And I wait with expectation for the blessing you have to bring in my life. Lord I trust in YOU!

You may have to say the last sentence over and over. I often do . . . But I promise you, it works and God is faithful! I encourage you today to stop comparing yourself to others and open your heart to the Love of Christ. His love will tame the invisible monster and give you power to rejoice with your friends and receive the blessings He has just for you.

“What color are my eyes?”

Guys, have you ever heard that before from a girl? It’s the carefully laid trap by a girl who knows when she is being looked at in a lustful way. Gentlemen, it can only get worse from there. Contrary to what we might think, there isn’t an answer that will equal a “get out of jail free” card like in Monopoly. Even if you manage to mumble through her correct eye color, chances are she is still feeling hurt from your eyes only looking at her body instead of appreciating her as a person.

It’s not only guys who struggle with this sin. Both guys and girls think that something as simple as checking a person out just for their “hot bod” isn’t a big deal. It is a big deal though, and any person can tell you they can feel the difference from when someone looks at them with love or with lust. It’s degrading.

You can look at the 9th commandment and think; “Coveting my neighbor’s wife” doesn’t exactly apply to me as a teen. Let’s take a deeper look at it and see precisely why it does apply to you.

It’s the Thought That Counts

In Matthew 5:28, Jesus says that, “Anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”

When Jesus said this, it was completely radical, because he revealed that lust (something that happens inside your heart) is a sin just as much as an external action. What we think with our minds and desire in our hearts is a big deal.

“For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be. ‘The lamp of the body is the eye. If your eye is sound, your whole body will be filled with light but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be in darkness.” (Matthew 6:21-23)

At Mass on Sunday, we make a public confession and ask for forgiveness for not only our actions but for what goes on in the heart and mind:

“I confess to almighty God, and to you my brothers and sisters, that I have greatly sinned, in my thoughts and in my words”

Lust Wounds Love

When you lust after someone, either in physical actions or in thoughts, it wounds your ability to love and be loved. Lust is deliberately inflaming a sexual desire or temptation that naturally comes to you.

Pope John Paul II always said that loving is the opposite of using. Love requires sacrifice, responsibility and a total commitment to the other person. Jesus showed us the model referenced in Ephesians 5:25 “Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the Church.”

A quick look at any crucifix will remind us how Christ loved the Church: by laying down his life! So when you reduce someone to an object for pleasure, it excludes God’s plan for love. Bishop Fulton Sheen once said that lust turns love into poison. Lust turns something that is designed to be given away (love) and turns it into something that’s only about “me” and what “I” can get from the other person.

Don’t confuse every lustful thought as a mortal sin. There’s a difference between thoughts that are brought on by ourselves and entertained and ones that pop up and are dismissed. Pray for help in the moment for Jesus to cleanse your mind of the image or thought!

Blessed Are the Pure of Heart (Matthew 5:8)

Just as looking at someone lustfully damages love and tears someone down, looking at someone lovingly affirms their dignity and can build them up. We have to untrain our eyes and hearts from lust and back to love. Purity in the heart is what we should strive for. God can clean the gunk built up in us through lust of the eyes and give us a heavenly vision.

“If, by love and right living, you wash off the filth that has become stuck to your heart, the divine beauty will shine forth in you. Think of iron, which at one moment is dark and tarnished and the next, once the rust has been scraped off, shines and glistens brightly in the sun. It is the same with the inner core of man, which the Lord calls the heart. It has been in damp and foul places and is covered in patches of rust; but once the rust has been scraped off, it will recover itself and once more resemble its ‘original design’ . And whoever is pure in heart is blessed because, seeing his own purity, he sees the ‘original designer’ reflected in the image” ~St. Gregory of Nyssa

Ask God to help you if you struggle with this sin. Here are some do’s and don’ts for the ninth commandment.

How To Obey The Ninth Commandment

Don’t

• Lust after another person, either in your thoughts or your actions. This damages your ability to love and be loved.
• Look twice. A girl I knew once said, “I know my dad looks at other women. But he never looks twice.” Be the witness when people around you are undressing a person with their eyes. It could change hearts even if they never tell you.
• Give up. It can seem like trying to stop a waterfall by cupping your hands under it, but purity is possible in the world today. It’s worth fighting for, and God’s grace is enough for us to do it!

Do

• Men, turn lust into a blessing. Praise God for His masterful artistry when you see a beautiful woman, don’t praise yourself and turn it into a disordered lustful reality. Use your bodies to glorify God in whatever you do (1 Corinthians 10:31).
• Build up and affirm brothers and sisters in Christ for modesty in dress, speech, and actions. It’s a battle to be pure and we need to hear encouragement in our walk.
• Filter what you feed your heart and mind when it comes to tv shows and movies. Know what causes you to sin and get rid of it from your life. “If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one of your members than to have your whole body thrown into hell” (Matthew 5:29).
• Pray for your future spouse every day. Place your trust in God to prepare that person to be with you for the rest of your life/bring you to Heaven. Trust Him to prepare you, too!

Scripture to meditate on:
Colossians 3:5, Matthew 5:8, Galatians 5:19-21, Matthew 15:19, 1 John 2:16, Ephesians 2:3, Galatians 5:16, Philipians 4:8, 1 Thessalonians 4:7

Catechism on the 9th Commandment: 2514-2527

My image of God the Father, enthroned in heaven in flowing white robes and Birkenstock sandals, was overshadowed by my certainty that he didn’t want me to have any fun. Not only was God all about rules, he’d drop anybody that strayed off his path. Parochial school should have taught me how to live but instead I learned how not to die and burn. The result was that I treated Moses’ Commandments with the same reverence I reserved for one of Letterman’s “Top Ten” lists.

So, my moral life was an exercise in hell avoidance. I feigned contrition with a half-hearted sincerity in hope that, should I die tonight, God would go easy on me. I knew how to say I was sorry for breaking the rules. I promised to stop doing the things I had just confessed even though I had no intention of doing so. I even knew my Act of Contrition. I apologized to God without knowing why my sins were sins. (As to that, years later as a married man I learned something about true contrition, namely, if you’re going to apologize, you had better know what you are apologizing for or else you’ll find yourself in even more trouble.)

I’m Sorry

For several years I saw confession as apologizing to a priest who “stood in” for God. If anyone had corrected this impression in religious education class, I missed it because I never listened. Later I learned that it isn’t merely a priest to whom I am confessing but truly, it is Christ. During reconciliation, the priest sits in persona Cristi capitas — in the person of Christ the Head. He offers not his mercy but that of Christ.

Later, also, I would come to understand the difference between apology and repentance and between the private and public nature of sin. In repentance you don’t merely turn away from something, you turn toward something else (see Acts 26:20). And my sin, no matter how private it is, has a ripple effect on those around me.

Everyone in my life suffers to some degree from my selfishness and sin; no sin is ever completely private since we are all bound together in one mystical body. The world looks down upon it as weakness, but as I matured, I came to see the beauty involved in humbling yourself and going before another, staring into the eyes of mercy, and admitting failure.

For years, my faulty understanding stymied my approach to Christ, keeping me from the greatest gift that God had to offer: total forgiveness. I totally failed to connect the dots given me in Catholic school and at countless Sunday Masses. It was only when sin and misery reached such a blinding level that I earnestly began to seek not fame or fortune but the peace that only Jesus can give that my approach to Christ began to change. I learned that St. Augustine was right when he said that we are all restless until we rest in the Lord.

SurMOUNTable Goals

In order to change a skewed understanding of the sacrament, it helps to realize Jesus came not to abolish the law, but to complete it (Matthew 5:17). He came to show us how to “have life and have it abundantly” (John 10:10).

I was not unique in my confusion. Many people today dismiss the moral code set forth in the Ten Commandments because they assume that religion as all about rules, conformity and some sort of guilt-ridden mind control. The doctrines of Christ, safeguarded by the Catholic Church, are dismissed as contrary to human freedom. In this context, obedience is seen as a form of weakness. By extension, Jesus Christ is viewed as the weakest man to walk the planet.

The question Catholic teens ask me most frequently in regard to sexuality is, “How far is too far?” What’s behind that question? What young people are really asking, once we look beneath the euphemistic wordplay is, “What exactly is everything I can do sexually—without going to hell?” They want to clearly delineate the line so they can approach it and tap dance on it, and then justify their behavior.

Can we mature in our understanding of the Law so that we mature in our approach to Christ and our readiness to receive God’s mercy? Well, let’s take a minute to look at it more closely:

The Law (Commandments)

Thou shalt not…

• Have other gods before me
• Take the Lord’s name in vain
• The Sabbath day holy
• Dishonor thy father and mother
• Kill
• Commit adultery
• Steal
• Bear false witness
• Covet thy neighbor’s wife (lust)
• Covet thy neighbor’s material goods

The Life in Christ (fulfillment)

Thou shalt…

• Be single-hearted toward me
• Be reverent in speech and conduct
• Keep priorities
• Be respectful and obedient
• Defend life, womb to tomb
• Be faithful to vocation, future spouse
• Be trustworthy
• Be honest in word and deed
• Have only pure admiration
• Be grateful for what you possess

Do you get it? Living a faith-filled life is not so much about what we shouldn’t do as about what we are called to do as we move forward in God’s love. You can use this parallel above as the beginning of your examination of conscience the next time you prepare for the sacrament of reconciliation. In particular, ask yourself how you measure up to the list on the right as you prepare your soul for the sacramental mercy of Christ.

An Excerpt from Blessed are the Bored in Spirit: A Young Catholic’s Search for Meaning

“You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.” Exodus 20:16

I was in ninth grade, on my first youth group trip. A bundle of insecurity, I tried to figure out the best way to fit in and realized that a great way to get everyone’s attention—and alleviate that gnawing feeling of, “am I fitting in?” – was to crack jokes about others in the group.

Patti was an easy target for these jokes. She went to a different school, dressed a little differently, talked a little louder. Leaning against the sink in the girl’s bathroom, sensing everyone’s attention and wanting to seal my spot in the group, I made a joke about her. It was true, but it wasn’t nice.

I didn’t realize she was also in the restroom until she exited the stall into the cloud of my words still suspended mid-air. While everyone else shuffled away awkwardly, my eyes locked with Patti’s.

I wish I could say that seeing how hurt she was cured me of any desire to ever speak ill of anyone. I felt bad. But I also experienced the power of words for the first time, and the power of sharing a secret, fact, or observation about another person was intoxicating. While I knew it was wrong, I often resorted to gossip to garner attention. I operated under the assumptions of “I’m just saying what everyone already knows,” “I’d totally say this to their face.” Or, the ever popular, “Well, I’m telling people so they can add it to their prayer intentions.” While this used to prick my conscience, like any sin, the more I spoke the less I felt bad.

“The eighth commandment forbids misrepresenting the truth in our relations with others” (CCC 2464). This manifests itself in many ways— while lying (not telling the truth) is obviously forbidden – the Catechism clarifies that “respect for the reputation of persons forbids every attitude and word likely to cause them unjust injury” (CCC 2477). This forbids us from saying anything that could damage the reputation of another – even if it’s true.

I struggled to reign in my tongue for years, wanting to be kinder with my speech, but not as much as I wanted to fit in. Then a wise priest gave me James 3 as penance after I confessed my struggles with gossip. Reading that “We bless the Lord and Father, and . . . curse human beings who are made in the likeness of God” (James 3:9), I was struck that my worship and honor of God was only as authentic as the honor I gave those created in His image. Basically, every comment I made about God’s creation was the ugly footnote to my words of worship.

Resolving to be kind to others is difficult, because humans can annoy and hurt us. If you struggle with gossip or unkind speech, don’t act based on what you think others deserve, act based on what God deserves. In the end, it wasn’t kindness that helped me reign in my tongue as much as my desire to worship God authentically, realizing the power of words, and the reality of the community St. Paul describes in Ephesians 4:25 when he states, “Speak the truth, each one to his neighbor, for we are members of one another.” Worship the Lord in truth by honoring those He created.

How to Obey the Eighth Commandment

• Tell the truth
• Speak kindly about others, instead of using your words to tear them down or ruin their reputation
• Always confess all your sins in Confession, not purposefully holding anything back
• Frequent the Sacraments! Confess gossip every time you fall. When you confess, be specific. It will give you the grace to be stronger the next time the situation arises.

“Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, small minds discuss people.” – Eleanor Roosevelt

“You shall not steal.” Exodus 20:15

The idea of stealing something is totally scary to me. I can’t even imagine the amount of fear that would paralyze me if I ever went to steal something like shoes, cash, or a camera. I would be shaking like a wet puppy in winter. But I would be sweating like it’s Phoenix in July. And I’m also pretty sure that the sick feeling in my stomach, the shame, and the guilt would drive me to return the stolen item the next day. I’m a sensitive person.

So, why am I writing about this commandment?

Because I have stolen before. Not in the way that you’d think though. I’ve never stolen any sort of “item” for the obvious, above-mentioned reasons. I stole money from my employer . . . multiple times. The typical deal when you get a job is that you spend your time and energy doing labor and in return you get paid. When I was in high school, I worked at a library and made $7.35/hr.

Myself and the other people I worked with would purposely waste time. We would sit in a corner of the library where no one could see us and we would just read. Magazines, kid’s books, Harry Potter . . . anything.

Or we would just talk. Whatever it took to escape the monotony of shelving or organizing books. And it was no big deal. Okay, in all honestly, sometimes I would feel bad about wasting all these hours. I justified it though by telling myself “everyone does it” or that “I’ll work harder the rest of the time I’m here.”

But that was stealing. And the scary thing is that it was so easy. I wasn’t doing the work but I was getting paid. I took the money without exchanging my time and effort. At one point I read an examination of conscience that asked, “Have you stolen from work? Including time?” It was such a gut check as I realized, “Oh my gosh, I do that ALL the time.” I became convicted that this was a big deal because all those half hours added up to hours, and all those hours (at $7.35/hr) actually surmounted to a lot of money. There’s not much difference if I took it from a cash register, or took it dishonestly in my paycheck.

I realize that since I didn’t know I was breaking the seventh commandment, I wasn’t totally to blame. But my conscience had been hinting to me that it wasn’t okay.

After confessing this sin a couple times, I learned my lesson and decided to be honest and responsible with my time at work. I felt so much more free without the guilt weighing on me.

Even when something seems like a little sin or that it’s not a big deal, it still takes you one step farther away from God. I learned that just because everyone does something, whether it’s shoplifting, downloading free music, wasting natural resources, taking wages that haven’t been honestly earned, or cheating on a test, I have to answer to God about my sins. Doing the right thing isn’t always the most popular thing to do, but God and I were both happier when I earned my $7.35 the honest way.

I’m praying for you.

How to Obey the Seventh Commandment

• Be responsible with your money so that you’re able to afford the things you need.
• Be a good student and study so that you won’t have to cheat on a test and steal someone else’s hard work.
• Live simply and give some of your time and money to serve other people.
• Buy music on iTunes instead of ripping it off someone else, or downloading it free, which is stealing from the musician.
• Be respectful of public and private property and don’t vandalize.
• Anything in God’s creation (natural resources, animals) deserve to be honored, cared for, and not wasted. God gave us these things for our good, but we have to be mindful of the good of our neighbor, including future generations.

“You Shall Not Kill” Exodus 20:13

As a little kid, I was jealous of my neighbor. He was my age, but he could hit the baseball better than I could. He would smack the ball into the outfield and everyone would shout “Run! You can do it!”

I never heard “Run!” shouted to me. It was usually “Duck!” or “Open your eyes!” or “Put down the snow-cone until after the game!”

We’ve all experienced knowing someone who’s better than you at something or has something you lack. If you feel happy for them and aspire them to grow and get better, that’s not envy.

That is not how I felt though.

I used to make fun of my neighbor behind his back. I didn’t want to see him do well. I secretly hoped he would strike out or the outfielder would catch his ball. Then I could get up there and hit a home run! At last, I’d have my moment to shine. I would be considered the best. Everyone would want to be like ME! I was envious and it tore me apart. I had no character. I was a bad teammate and a bad friend.

I Hate You

In other cases, this envy turned into hatred. Throughout school and sports there were kids I felt anger, envy, and hatred towards. Sometimes it came from my insecurities. I felt bad about myself so I would tear others down. If someone really had qualities about them that I wanted, I’d try to make fun of them. But if someone made fun of me . . . I was shattered. I have vivid memories of someone making a joke about me and all my classmates around us laughing. After something like that feelings of hatred would well up in my heart as I’d go home and recall how silly the other kids made me feel. I lost the Christian love for them. I seemed to forget that despite my feelings for them, God loved them very much.

For some of us, when we think about the fifth commandment we unconsciously skip over it. The truth is, there is more to this commandment than a physical act of violence that results in someone’s death. Killing has roots in envy, anger, and hatred. And I’m sad to admit that I’ve harbored all of those. They produced nothing but sorrow in my life.

Don’t React

Something that’s important is knowing the difference between reacting and responding. For example, when I was a kid on the baseball team I justified everything I did as a reaction to what someone else did to me. Although it seemed like it was natural to feel anger and hatred, it was actually going against the love ingrained in me. When I reacted, it was a quick answer to the problem.

I only found truth when I learned to respond. Responding is different than reacting because responding means you take some time to think. You pray. You ask for advice. You ask God what He wants you to do. Then you act.

God wants us to be joyful. He knows that our joy comes from being intimately close to Him. Envy, anger, and hatred don’t give life, they destroy it. He came that we might have life and have it to the fullest (John 10:10).

A Challenge

Brothers and sisters, we are on this great journey of faith. You are not alone, you are not forgotten. You are loved. And you are awesome! Don’t forget that. Maybe you’ve broken this commandment a few times and need forgiveness. Find a priest and get to Reconciliation. Maybe there is someone in your life who you have hurt or who has hurt you. Pray for them. Pray for the grace in both of your hearts to forgive. If you feel called, talk to them. Lastly, discover and uproot all the things throughout your day that take life instead of give it. Get rid of them. Feel the weight roll off your shoulders. Feel the freedom of walking in the light of the Lord.

Be God’s.

How to Obey the Fifth Commandment

• Be grateful for your gifts instead of resenting others for theirs
• Let people know you admire them and don’t put others down
• Strive to be the best you can be instead of thinking you aren’t good enough
• Love everyone you meet instead of harboring feelings of hatred and anger
• Smile and never give others a reason to frown
• Try to be fully alive, to be one with God and don’t take life from others
• Promote the right to life for all people and never encourage or participate in abortion
• Protect the weak and needy instead of looking down on them
• Give yourself completely to God and don’t give up

“Behold Jesus Christ crucified, Who is the only foundation of our hope; He is our Mediator and Advocate; the victim and sacrifice for our sins. He is goodness and patience itself; His mercy is moved by the tears of sinners, and He never refuses pardon and grace to those who ask it with a truly contrite and humbled heart.”

-Saint Charles Borromeo

“You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.” Exodus 20:7

Doesn’t it seem like there are a lot of sins that are worse than being careless with the name of God? Why does this one matter?

I used to not give much thought to this commandment. I would never confess it when I went to the Sacrament of Reconciliation because I didn’t think it was a big deal. I can remember different times in my life when I have been excited or suppressed and I would yell out, “Oh my God!” One time I was walking barefoot in my parents’ house and stubbed my pinkie toe on the couch. It was so painful that the only thing I could say was the Lord’s name as an explicative. I hear it all the time coming from people when they use the name “Jesus” as a response to bad things happening. As if it could be used as a synonym for any non-holy word or explicative

What’s in a Name?

The concept of having a name is an interesting thing. Don’t you think? A name is one of the most basic necessities we possess. Think about it. Without a name we would not be able to differentiate one person from another. How different would your interactions with other people be if there were no such thing as names?

A name is given to you at birth so that we can know ourselves to be different from someone else when you are called upon. You give your name to other people so that they can invoke your attention or associate a thought or an action with your personhood. Your name is important because of the fact that you are important, because you are created in the image and likeness of God.

God’s Name

As we read in Isaiah 49:16, “See, upon the palm of my hands I have written your name.” God places a lot of importance upon names in scripture. When a person encounters God and is changed, God gives that person a new name. Not all names are the same though. There is one name that is set aside. There is one name that is as important as what it represents. That name is the name of the Lord: Jesus, God, Lord, Messiah, King of Kings.

When He speaks our name, it is intentional. He calls out for our attention and love. Likewise when we speak His name it is to be intentional, so that we can address Him with our attention and return His love.

God’s name is powerful. To even speak it requires an encounter with the Holy Spirit. God gave us his name so that we can know him. He gave us his name so that when we speak it He listens, or call upon it and He delivers us and heals us. May you speak the name of the Lord just as He speaks yours, intentionally and with love.

How to Obey the Second Commandment

• Use words like “gosh” instead of carelessly using God’s name as an exclamation
• Clean up all of your speech by not making foul jokes or using crude language
• Do you hear others using God’s name lightly? Stand up for what you believe and say something!

This is an excerpt from “Come Clean: A Teen Guide to Reconciliation“

I stepped into the confessional and kneeled down at the kneeler. The priest opened the partition and I froze. I could not for the life of me remember what to say to the priest. Luckily he sensed my nervousness and walked me through the whole thing.

Because I know that sometimes we forget what to say I’ve provided a basic structure of what you should say at the beginning of your confession. I hope it helps!

YOU: Forgive me father, for I have sinned. It has been ___ long since my last confession and these are my sins: (here you will confess your sins to the priest).

After this (and possibly a short time of counsel and advice from the priest), he will ask you pray the Act of Contrition (you will find two different ones below that you can use). The priest will then give you your penance and absolve you of all your sins.

Act of Contrition

O my God, I am sorry for having offended you. In choosing to do wrong and failing to do good, I have offended you whom I should love above all things. I firmly intend, with your help, to do penance, to sin no more, and to avoid whatever leads me to sin. Our Savior Jesus Christ suffered and died for us. In His name, my God, have mercy.
Amen.

Or

O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended Thee, and I detest all my sins, because I dread the loss of heaven, and the pains of hell; but most of all because they offend Thee, my God, Who are all good and deserving of all my love. I firmly resolve, with the help of Thy grace, to confess my sins, to do penance, and to amend my life. Amen.

“I am the Lord your God, you shall have no other gods besides me.” Exodus 20: 2 – 3

The first commandment was always one of my favorites. No matter how long my list of sins was, I was pretty sure that I hadn’t been sacrificing farm animals, making golden cows, or raising money to support made-up gods. That sort of thing was for people that lived thousands of years ago, not me. There’s no way I would fall for this one, right?

We used to have a priest from Benin at our parish. Benin is a small country in West Africa that is known as the birthplace of voodoo. In my mind, voodoo was for those uncivilized people who thought that sticking pins in dolls, dancing around fires, and worshiping just about any object they could find (a rock, a tree, or great grandma’s skull) would keep all of their gods happy.

I was pretty sure that these people were guilty of breaking the first commandment, and I couldn’t imagine what it must be like to be in voodoo Sunday School or at a voodoo Youth Conference.

Christian Voodoo?

The priest shocked me when he told me that most of these people still consider themselves to be Christian; they just think of the voodoo as an addition to their Christian faith. They know that Christianity matters when you die, because everyone wants to be happy forever in Heaven. But while they’re still down here on earth, they’ve got plenty of problems, stresses, and issues to worry about. Voodoo is where they turn for help; they think that their Christian faith is just something that matters when we die.

I couldn’t believe it. First I thought it was crazy that these people still consider themselves Christian, especially since they’re worshiping so many ridiculous “gods” and trying to appease all these worthless objects.

Then I realized that I was not much better than those pagan voodoo worshipers.

Anything but God

In my head I know that God was the only one worth my worship, but I still found myself turning to so many other relationships, habits, and even sins to save me when I was overwhelmed and in need of help. I knew that Jesus was my Savior, but often I turned anywhere else but towards Him when I needed to be saved from loneliness, hurt, or boredom.

For way too long, I had been acting like God was just off in the distance, maybe He was able to hear my prayers but He was too far away and too important to get involved in the details of my life. But God isn’t a far-off god and He isn’t just concerned with saving us later.

Just before giving the Ten Commandments, He reminded His people, “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.” (Exodus 20:1).

The same God that has saved His people time and time again wants to free us from whatever holds us down. Don’t turn to anything or anyone else. He’s the only one worth your worship, because He’s the only one that can save.

How to obey the 1st Commandment

• Keep God first in your life
• Set aside time for prayer
• Be thankful to God and have faith in His goodness
• Trust in His plans for you and don’t turn to superstitions, horoscopes, fortune tellers, or ouija boards
• Relationships, body image, work, possessions, and a lot of other things can easily become a false god. Try to be aware of what you’re putting all your energy in to.
• Stand up for your faith when faced with ridicule
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