I'm up late. Tired. So I sign on to try and get some blog-posting done. Kids are out like a light. Had a TON of family time today. Thank you Lord! I have my browser set to online news. And the top story 30 minutes ago was about how
Vermont State Police just found a body believed to be a missing 12-year-old girl. It seems her UNCLE allegedly planned to force her into a sex ring the day she disappeared.
Y'know sometimes I know I can be overly optimistic. It helps to think the big thing is if a man still has the heart of a boy - all he has to do is grow up and become a true man. But what about stuff like this when the heart of a boy turns into the heart of a beast instead? This is plain evil. I know it happens. We hear stories all the time - don't we?
I told my son Joseph that the drive to reproduce is so powerful in us men that it can help form a family if you're a husband, it can form a whole community if you're a priest, or it can form a monster if you hide a tiny little secret sin long enough. Okay I actually did not tell him ALL that - but that story in the news really makes me sick. Here we have exhibit 'A' in Vermont. God have mercy on us. I will bet anyone out there a hundred bucks if this guy had been mentored by his father or SOMEONE about the requirement for a man to be a man he must be pure - this little girl would be alive today.
Just got an email from a man struggling with purity and I want to do everything I can to guide him to an online solidly Roman Catholic program to help. Anyone know of any Catholic sites? Still have not heard back from the only guy I have met who was building such a program. Hopefully he is so swamped with men asking for help he does not have time to answer my e-mail. That would be good, wouldn't it? There I go being overly optimistic again!
Another scenario is that the Devil hates this guy so much he is doing everything he can to stop him from succeeding in this effort. In case that is the story - please pray for a warrior named Kenneth right now.
Okay. So far the only program brought up is Setting Captives Free - a non-denominational, scripture-based effort that we've been told is bearing great fruit. I still have not heard back from anyone who has taken the course to let me know if it is kind to Catholics. Are any of you readers willing to sign up for this course and work with me on creating such a program? I'm signing up this week and will tell you if I find it Catholic-friendly. If it is I will advise anyone from here on to take the program. Otherwise I hope it is okay to learn from them and bring in all the saints and sacraments that have been so helpful to me in my conversion. God's grace in my ongoing conversion is the only way I hope to continue succeeding in what I expect to be a lifelong battle for the sake of purity.
So far so good - and now that I've said that I brace for an attack! God's grace cover me, please!
Men! Start the process of instructing your sons! This can be done - but we cannot fight the battle not alone. Be a fellow soldier for your sons. I'm not going to tell Joseph about this Vermont story - at least not when he is this age. But during one conversation he asked me for an example of how the reproductive drive can go bad and it happens that a bizarre story had just been in the paper so I told him: "Alright... this guy somewhere in America was just arrested for having 1500 pairs of used girls gym shoes in his home. He worked at a local school and he had stolen each pair from the girl's lockers." Joseph looked at me sideways and asked "Gym shoes?!" I said, "Yes - it had something to do with a malformed reproductive drive! And I don't even want to know HOW so let's not think about it - just remember to walk in the direction of purity and I promise to be here to help you any way I can."
Did I mention how someone from the office of family life out here in a Diocese on the East Coast asked if I knew of anything to help them with what seems like an epidemic of men addicted to internet porn? Readers, why don't we ALL sign up this week? We can discuss how it might help or not help Catholic men and how we might be able to improve on the concept. What we learn can help us form the tools we need to guide our sons - not only away from this insanity of porn - but TO a place of authentic manhood where sexual purity is expected and lived out. Do I hear an AMEN?
See how late it is? See how I ramble when I falling asleep? I'm signing off!
3 comments:
MJP: Regarding some Catholic sites that help men strive for purity:
http://www.thekingsmen.us/
http://www.dads.org/
http://www.catholicmensresources.org/
http://www.e5men.org/
pax
Michael,
I hope all is well with you and your family.
After reading the latest post on your web, with the quote of, “call me an unbeliever” (CMAU) has got me thinking a lot about sex, lust and purity. CMAU stated that purity is impossible, that lust is built into all men. I could not disagree more.
“Blessed are the pure of Heart, for they shall see God” (Matt 5:8) comes to mind immediately. Why would Christ put forth such a statement in the beatitudes if it were not possible?
Lust is also one of the 7 deadly sins. Is gluttony built into all men too? In America, food and drink are more abundant that sex is. Is power, greed, envy also built into us? And just because we have access to satisfy our disorders, does that mean we give up?
I hate Ice Skating, it is such a sissy sport…..But, I have to admire the athleticism and skill that it takes to conduct the moves ice skaters do. They move so effortlessly across the ice, they are completely free to maneuver however they want to on the ice. Ice skaters reach that freedom because of day to day discipline of practice, practice, practice…..Discipline in our lives leads us to freedom.
Discipline in purity will also lead us to freedom, and Christ is our coach, and the men that network together to achieve purity are our team-mates.
Trey
I am a late-30s guy who struggles daily with purity. By the grace of God I have conquered the crosses of masturbation and pornography, but the residue from so many years of indulgence, beginning at age 12 or so, affects my faith walk DAILY, and this can be very discouraging to me! But I can see the grace of God working in my life, and so I lean on Christ and pray and wait patiently for him to refine my heart and purify my motives...
My story begins in early adolescence, when I discovered a Playboy in my dad's dresser. From the start of the onset of puberty, there was porn in our house, brought in by my father. This was in the early 80s and even with the primitive online computer service 'CompuServe' there was an online sex forum that a grade school friend told me about. Masturbation became a daily habit, sometimes even several times daily. I can remember the older brother of a friend telling us about it -- how SICK is that, corrupting your little brother and friend? Then came cable and MTV, and I was totally hooked by the culture. What this did was to turn a young man already predisposed to introversion very much in on himself, and made real relationships with real people awkward and very difficult.
Mom and Dad gave the sex talk one night when the power went off, and they tried their best, but I was already closed in and wasn't really open to having a dialogue. They must have had some idea of my behavior because on a drive for ice cream I remember Dad simply saying that the Church teaches that masturbation is a mortal sin. He just left it there. I needed so much more insight from him!!! But I don't fault him, as I know that he was struggling with his own sickness in this area.
There was so much other dysfunction that I could share... shame, guilt, humiliation by friends who shared with the whole school some things in this area I had foolishly confided in them.
All this set the stage for using girls in college and eventually a marriage that would not last. See -- these sins are NOT trivial and they can really affect so much!!!
I went through the annulment process years ago, and again, by the grace of God, I have been true to living a chaste life since that time, waiting patiently for whatever He has in store. It is really a struggle in this culture! Like I said before I struggle daily with the 'residue' and seek to see with the eyes of faith all women as sisters. It is good to know that freedom IS POSSIBLE!
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