they try to control you by inducing GUILT...and you are not guilty of anything...will hypnosis work maybe??? or try NOT TO THINK about stuff that is guilt provoking???..what would work for you???
2007-10-12 17:34:08 · 21 answers · asked by sweet 4 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
If you're Catholic I believe you just go to confession. Poof! Guilt-B-Gone.
2007-10-12 17:37:04 · answer #1 · answered by JAS 6 · 2⤊ 3⤋
As a religion Catholicism tends to emphasize personal responsibility and a strong sense of right and wrong. Guilt is supposed to happen when someone knowingly does wrong (sins). This is your conscience telling you to go back to God.
There would be something wrong with you if you sinned and did not feel guilty. Sociopaths feel no guilt.
However feeling guilty after God has forgiven you is not healthy or Catholic.
The guilt a Catholic feels is really no different that that of a Protestant, an Atheist, a pagan or other believer. The term "Catholic Guilt" is a stereotype.
With love in Christ.
2007-10-14 17:35:42 · answer #2 · answered by imacatholic2 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
As a Catholic, I don't remember a time where I felt guilty, where I had no reason to feel guilty. After all, our Lord does not want us to waste time feeling guilty, but rather, He wants us to repent and turn to Him, and with that, the sin and all the guilt is gone. He won't be remembering, so neither should you...if you do repent and reconcile with God, that is. I know that when I finally went to confession after a long time of not going, I truly felt guilty for my sins, because u know what, I was guilty of my sins. But I'm glad I felt guilty..it meant I still had a conscience and knew the difference between right and wrong. The priest told me, now, if you are truly confessing from the bottom of your heart, you have to believe that once God forgives you...it is completely forgiven AND FORGOTTEN. You can't continue to feel guilty about any of your sins, if you do, then you are not believing God when He promises that those sins no longer exist and you are clean spiritually as you were on the day of your Baptism.
So...although I don't know you, nor do I know what you're feeling guilty about....I do believe that you can either do one of two things.....repent and reconcile with the Lord....or just keep blotting out your guilt and trying to ignore and wash it away with who knows what...until you have no conscience to even make you feel guilty when you have done something wrong.
Remember, the Lord is not about guilt....but rather, about total, selfless love for us all. Believe me, He does not want you or I or anyone for that matter, to waste time feeling guilty when we could be spending that time, close to Him and His Love.
God Bless You
P.S. In addition, only the devil, not Catholic schools, will be making you feel guilty for something that has already been forgiven and forgotten by God.
2007-10-12 17:50:14 · answer #3 · answered by WhiteTiger29 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
**sigh** it's a long arduous road on which you embark for you have been conditioned like a Pavlovian dog. it's been over 30 years since my last confession and i've come a long way from the guilt stricken creature who took blame for everything ... even my own birth. the only thing i can tell you is to engage your intellect, use your logic. you'll have to re-groove your mental/emotional ingraining so it's gonna take practice, perhaps years of practice. above all else ... teach yourself to love yourself, cut yourself some slack, be good to yourself. if you make a mistake remember that a mistake is all that it is and mistakes are to learn from. and ya know what? it's okay to get angry at what they've done to you and how they've done it. what they've done to you, you a pure child, is evil. you can triumph over that evil by recognizing yourself as a basicly good person. you can triumph by knowing that you are NOT a product of "sin", that is was NOT your "sins" that tortured and killed Jesus, that Mother Mary doesn't weep everytime you have a sexual thought. all that blame and shame is a pile of dogmatic BULL FECES meant to ensnare your mind and keep you subservient to an authority that really has no authority.
i still catch myself feeling unreasoning guilt sometimes but at least i catch myself. you can too. it'll take work but it's totally worth it. Truth will set you free and the Truth is ... you're a good person and you deserve to be loved, to be free and to be happy.
PS. oh yeah. and quit the Catholic Church. you don't need a priest as a middleman between you and "God".
PPS. some encouragement (((hugs))) from a fellow recovering Catholic.
2007-10-12 18:05:04 · answer #4 · answered by nebtet 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
If you are guilty of something, it is unresolved or unconfessed. Remember... It is by grace (of God) that we are saved and not by our works so that no one can boast.
The ultimate and best sacrifice has been given and that is Jesus Christ. He died on the cross to pay for all of our sins. His work is finished. (John 19:30)
Don't think that it is hypnosis. Religion does that to blind and control you.
Think about it... Who do you believe in? Who do you trust?
Communication is best. Talk to the person who you think you have offended. I'm positive that that guilt feeling will be gone after you talk about it.
2007-10-12 17:55:41 · answer #5 · answered by momsi 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
guilt is not a bad thing. it's the shame they cause you to feel that is the kicker. all guilt means is that you made a mistake. shame makes us believe we are a mistake. it's the catholic way of control. they are pretty co-dependent. God is not as nearly hard on us as we are on ourselves. we all make mistakes. people that like to focus on the mistakes of others live in fear and are not willing to look at themselves. start focusing on what you do that is good and positive. write about it. keep a journal. it has worked for me.
2007-10-12 17:46:17 · answer #6 · answered by plastik punk -Bottom Contributor 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Watch the atheism 101 video series on YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxF12cpLyhM
Once you realize what a sham theism is, you can say good-bye to religion induced guilt.
2007-10-12 17:56:03 · answer #7 · answered by kc 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Stop thinking it is bad and endulge in the truthfull pleasures of it. If it feels good, it is good. Imagine, the President lies, cheats, steals, puts innocence to death everyday, and the nation still allows him to serve. So why should you feel bad if nothing you have done can top what any President has done? Enjoy the truth, sex is good, drugs are good, lieing is good, stealing is good, and even if you get caught don't feel guilty because your only mistake was getting caught, nothing more.
2007-10-12 17:42:40 · answer #8 · answered by ? 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Jesus not only died to forgive you from sin, He died to release you from the guilt, once confessed and repented. God can use guilt to draw us to Him, and cause us to repent of our sin- however once forgiven He alone can get rid of the guilt as well- Satan wants you to think that you can never be free of it. God does not. Jesus works for me- no one can lay a guilt trip on us, except Satan and ourselves- release your sins along with your guilt and leave it at the foot of the Cross. HE PAID IT ALL!
2007-10-12 17:43:25 · answer #9 · answered by AdoreHim 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
In my Catholic education i was taught that we should feel guilty when we are guilty, and that guilt is a blessing, the voice of conscience leading us to repentence. That teaching was far superior to the teaching of secular society, which tells us that guilt itself is the problem, and we should be able to be guilty without feeling guilty.
2007-10-12 17:38:47 · answer #10 · answered by barbara m 3 · 1⤊ 2⤋
i have rarely if ever felt guilty for anything i have done in my life, it is a worthless emotion used by christianity ( the catholic church in particular) as a control method.
2007-10-12 17:38:31 · answer #11 · answered by fokker_triplane 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋