From a reader:
I don’t know whether you’ll get a chance to read this email, but I just thought I would send you a quick note and say thank you for your constant prodding to go to confession. Thanks to all your reminders, this past weekend I went to confession for the first time in probably close to four years.
Due to a confluence of circumstances too complicated to get into here, I gradually … stopped believing in God altogether. During the few years that followed, somehow I was never able to leave Catholicism completely behind (no matter how much I tried), and I kept coming back to your blog to get my occasional “Catholicism fix,” for lack of a better term. With no small amount of help from the work you do here, I began to find my way back to the Church. Your nudging finally convinced me to take the plunge and get back in a confessional.
It turned out not to be nearly so difficult as I was expecting–and it feels great to be back!
There’s no telling how much longer it might have taken for me to take
that step without your help. Not sure where things will go from here. That’s up to God I guess. If you find a second to send a prayer my way, I could certainly use it. … Thanks again, and God bless!
He found something that was missing in his life.
What about you?
Examine your conscience and go to confession.
Loading ...
I love these posts, Fr. Z. It always heartens me. I recall when I made that leap, and nothing has been the same since. It’s a good reminder of how much we have to be thankful for.
Father, Thanks for posting this; it reminds me of this morning’s LOTH Ps 39 II … ” And now, Lord, what is there to wait for ? In you rests all my hopes . … ”
AMDG
pax et bonum
Joan
Praise God!!!!! :)
That’s what brought me back. Something was missing. I was 19, my family had fallen away from Mass attendance, and I had graduated from a Catholic high school and “didn’t have to” do all that anymore. So I spent my freshman year of college reading other religious texts, toying with the idea of changing religions as an older sibling eventually did. But something was missing from each one, and I could not bring myself to deny Jesus.
There have been many times where I’ve felt like the sacrament of baptism, performed when I was 4 months old, has been like a spiritual “homing device,” and has always insistently led me back.
So, something was missing. One Sunday, October 4, 1998, to be exact, the campus building I wanted to study in turned out to be locked. The old family parish was only minutes away, and I went on a whim, not planning on making a regular “thing” of it… except I did.
Laus Tibi Domine! This blog also not infrequently prods me to go to confession (somehow it’s like Fr. Z knows when I need to go and have been convincing myself it’s not a big deal). The grace I experience every time I go (along with the fact that they haven’t let out-of-tune guitars into the confessional… yet…) make the Sacrament of Reconciliation a favorite for me!
I’ve caught some big fish this Lent. Hoping for another really big one tomorrow. Keep that fish in prayer, fellow readers.
I’ll be making my first confession soon. The more I examine my conscience, the longer the list gets. It’s uncanny the things I keep dredging up from the deep. I hope the priest has plenty of time.
That’s fantastic! I keep going back for the grace too…..I would like to go every week, the grace is so abundant.
Wonderful news
Prayed for him/her and anyone out there in same condition
Prayers for Random Friar and his “big fish”
Deo Gratias!
Update: GOT HIM!
Praised be Jesus Christ forever!! (Angels rejoicing, saints praising God…)