My faith is in shambles. Should I leave the faith?

As a cradle Catholic, I have totally lost my faith in God as I have never received anything I prayed for. I am tired of waiting for my turn while others receive it unconditionally, and that includes other religions too.

So, Why be a Christian, let alone a Catholic, when your prayers are never answered, while people of other religions have their prayers answered by their god or gods?

God bless your heart, and thank you for allowing us to minister to you :wink:

Sometimes in life, all one can see is grey and dull, and it can be hard to tell oneself that this is just a momentary situation that is not going to last forever. In Denmark we have the famous author HC Andersen who wrote the fairy tale of the snow queen and her mirror, which broke, and the pieces came into the eyes of people, so that suddenly everything they saw was ugly and deformed and depressing. But still there was a solution: The snow queen - H.C. Andersen

I want to leave it there for this post. Read the fairy tale, and see if it resonates.

I wouldn’t blame you if you took a break from mass and church all together. I doubt Jesus would hold it against you.

If you’re having a low experience then, why not mix things up? Try something new, try something else you find healthy and beneficial

Today I went to a mass and during SIGN OF PEACE half the young phony people standing around me snubbed me and didn’t say hi. I mean, how much snobbier can anybody get? And I dress nice and take good care of my appearance - so it’s not like I’m some gargoyle

Then I went to a social event afterwards and nobody said hi. There’s just so many problems sometimes and it extends into the ranks of leadership being phonies, too

Being Catholic doesn’t make you better than everyone else.

But sometimes… sometimes the light shines so brilliantly upon me. Sometimes the church is so beautiful and my generosity is received

But stop… there are some LAME Catholics. I swear there are Catholic who are so fake it’s enough for anybody to just say forget this

You know something else… if there weren’t lamos in leadership roles in my church the place would have a THOUSAND times more parishioners. I mean, lame leaders chase people away like you wouldn’t believe…

This reminds me of something the conservative satirist PJ O’Rourke wrote: Santa Claus is “cute. He’s nonthreatening. He’s always cheerful. And he loves animals. He may know who’s been naughty and who’s been nice, but he never does anything about it. He gives everyone everything they want without the thought of quid pro quo. He works hard for charities, and he’s famously generous to the poor. Santa Claus is preferable to God in every way but one: There is no such thing as Santa Claus.”

Since you have asked God for things He can give you, I suggest that you now ask what you can give Him. The Bible says it’s better to give than to receive.

Another suggestion: start a prayer journal. It doesn’t have to be a lot of words. It could even be like a Christmas list of everything you ask God for. My first wife (God rest her soul) and I had one. We misplaced it and forgot about it. When I found it again, I was surprised by how many requests had been answered, including some big ones: for example, some friends had only one child for a long time and they wanted more. When I found the prayer journal, our friends had three kids.

Another thing: when I was a volunteer hospital chaplain in training, I seemed unable to do it and was ready to give up. I had to get my attention off myself. Once I stopped focusing on myself and what kind of job I was doing as a chaplain, I was OK.

Finally, one guy I used to listen to on a Christian radio station used to say, “Find a burden and get under it”—that is, find someone who can use your help.

Thank you for your question. I’m sure you are not the only one who feels the way that you do.

I think your understanding of what it means to be Christian is skewed. Many have left the Church, because they didn’t “feel like they were being fed.” But, we should be asking, Lord, how have I not fed others? Even Mother Teresa described as a “dark night of the soul,” where she felt like God had abandoned her. And this went on for years, but she never stopped trusting Him.

Secondly, looking at others’ blessings and not being happy for them is also disordered. It falls under envy and coveting.

Being a Christian is about relationship, not about what we can get out of it. A relationship that simply takes and takes is not really a relationship at all. Christ gave of Himself fully and He gives us the grace to do likewise.

The life of a Christian is so much more than a relationship. It is the deepest form of relationship. A Covenant. Jesus compares His relationship with the church like that of a Husband and his bride. The Sacraments are like Marriage.

  • Baptism like the Wedding (involves vows and becoming one with another).
  • Reconciliation (Confession) like Forgiving and asking for Forgiveness (sleeping on the couch unless we admit our faults and seek reconciliation)
  • Holy Communion (Eucharist) like Intimacy (receiving and giving love and fruit may come from this)
  • Anointing of the Sick like taking care of one another in sickness.

Why get Married? If it is just to get instant gratification, then you are getting Married for the wrong reasons.

Why be Catholic and not some other religion? Because all other religions is man’s search for God, but the Catholic Christian Faith is God’s search for man. God sent His Son (Jesus) to show us the way, the truth, and the life. Jesus founded a Church (The Catholic Church) and through her, salvific grace flows, so that we might have eternal life.

In this relationship, there is unity, intimacy, forgiveness, unconditional love, and life (the good and the bad, but we live it together).

Why Pray if my Prayers are never answered? Matthew 7:7 says, “Ask and it will be given to you…” Some interpret this to mean that God will give them whatever they ask for (like a magic genie), but this is not what this verse is saying. Let’s first look at how this chapter begins.

  1. Stop judging others (when you have your own sins, habits, and temptations that need addressed).
  2. Do not justify your own sins, because of the sins of another.

Now let’s look at what follows.

  1. Seek God’s ways and not your own.
  2. Invite God into your life and He will enter.
  3. God does not give us what we want, He gives us what we need.
  4. God, our Father, gives His children what is good.
  5. “Do to others as you would want you would have them do to you.”
  6. The road that leads to destruction is wide and many will seek it.
  7. The road to life is narrow and few will find it.
  8. Beware of wolves in sheep’s clothing (false prophets).
  9. “Not everyone who says, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.” Meaning, just because you ask God for things does not mean that you honor your relationship with Him.
  10. Anyone who builds their house on sand is a fool. Implying that not seeking God’s way lead to one losing his home (Heaven).
  11. Verse 27 references the floods, pointing to the opposite of God’s Covenant with the Israelites (to whom He was speaking to).
  12. Jesus spoke these words with authority (given Him by the Father).

It all comes back to Covenant (God’s relationship with us). If you would like to read more about this, may I recommend Dr. Scott Hahn’s book titled, “A Father Who Keeps His Promises: God’s Covenant Love in Scripture.”

Have you ever heard that Garth Brooks song, “Unanswered Prayers”? It talks about how sometimes the unanswered Prayers are God’s greatest gifts. God gives us gifts that we cannot see, because we are focusing on what others have been gifted. If God gave us everything we wanted, then we would (A.) become like spoiled children and not be grateful for anything and (B.) God, our loving Father can see our lives outside of time and knows what is best for us, when we can only see what is right in front of us. Say we are driving down the road (of life) and there is an accident over the hill. God has a helicopter view of what’s ahead, so if we ask him to give us something that would make us go even faster over the hill and he gives us what we want, that would disasters. And if we don’t ask the man above anything at all, we will destroy ourselves on our own. We should be asking God to show us the way, for He sees even more than what is directly ahead in that time, but He knows what is in the past, present, and future. And He knows us.

I once had a non-Christian friends ask me to Pray that she would win a sports care give-away. I told her that I would Pray that God helps her find reliable transportation : ) It wasn’t what she had in mind, but I believe God knows what is best for her and had she won the sports car, I don’t know that she would have given God the glory, but might have been ungrateful (especially when the shine fades off). Or maybe she would have driven it above speeds that were safe and perhaps crashed it, injuring herself and/or others.

Go give that Garth Brooks song a listen or re-listen if you’ve heard it before : )