When I was sixteen, I had a no-good-dirty-rotten boyfriend. True story.
My mother could tell that he was a no-good-dirty-rotten boyfriend. After we broke up the first time, she stepped in and told me that I wasn’t to see him anymore. He was bad for me. He didn’t respect me. She didn’t like the way he treated me.
She was right, but I was sixteen.
I was forbidden from seeing him but….you know how that goes. I disobeyed my mom and snuck around trying to see him all the time. The thing was, was that for a few precious minutes, I would feel good in his presence. If it was a good day with him, he’d flip me a few compliments and show me affection. The affection was never because he cared, it was always selfish and had strings attached. Every time I would sneak away to try and beg love from him, I would always end up feeling worthless. Incredibly, I would put myself through torture just for a few moments of the temporary pleasure I got when he would–maybe–act as if he cared. It never lasted and I would grovel at his feet time and again, hoping for crumbs.
During this time, he was the number one thing my mother and I fought over. She would always say, “Amy, when you get a man one day that treats you with respect, you will understand why I’m trying to keep you away from him.”
I would always yell at her, saying things like, “You don’t know how much I love him! You don’t want me to be truly happy, that’s why you don’t want me to be with him!” Gawwwww…stupid.
One day, I snuck away and lied to my mom telling her I was going to my best friend’s house. I got in my car and off I went in search of the forbidden guy in my life. I found him at his friend’s house far from my home. For a few minutes he acted like he was glad to see me, but then he quickly ignored me and proceeded to just focus on his buddy. I was miserable.
Suddenly, my pager (yes, pager) started going off. It was my best friend trying to get ahold of me because my mom had called her house looking for me. My work had called my house to ask if I’d fill in for a sick person. My mom told them that she would get ahold of me at my friend’s and have me call them back. Well, when my mom called my best friend, she quickly came to the realization that I had lied to her and she was furious. My best friend was trying to warn me and my mom was blowing up my pager because she wanted me home and she wanted me home immediately. It was bad news all around.
To make a long story short, when I got home my mom was angry and hurt. She just couldn’t understand why I would continue to disobey her to be with a jerk.
“If you loved me, you’d let me be with him!”
“You just don’t get our relationship!”
Then I said the worst, “If you don’t let me do what I want, I’ll resent you for the rest of my life!” That’s when my dad completely stepped in and by the tone of his voice, I knew it was time to shut up.
Here’s the thing, I knew my mom was right. My “boyfriend” made me feel horrible. I wasn’t really happy. Sure, I had moments of fleeting happiness with him, but it came at a cost. Lots of sin. However, I was willing to accept the sin for the fleeting moments of happiness. I think a part of me enjoyed the weird, sick “love” mess I was in and I didn’t want to let go of it.
See, most sin brings some sort of temporary pleasure. We enjoy a lot of the sins we engage in because for a brief moment they make us feel good. Gossiping makes us feel better than others. Sex outside of marriage can still feel good. Buying lots of things fills a hollow void. Greed can buy us fun toys and pleasurable experiences. Gluttony allows us to overindulge
When someone tries to call us out of our sins, we flip out. How dare they! We try to shut them down with manipulative sayings like, “If you truly loved me you let me live how I want to live! Stop judging me! You do you and I’ll do me! To each his own, eh?” As soon as someone moves to help us become better, our hearts start to beat faster and we take a defensive stance. Our next step is to make sure we shut them up and shut them up as fast as possible.
That’s what I did with my mom. I pulled out the big guns, so to speak, and used words that I knew would stop her in her tracks. I saw in her reaction how much I had stung her. She immediately stopped talking and walked away. My dad intervened and forced me to take back what I had said, but the damage had been done. I’d hurt my mom deeply because I didn’t trust that what she wanted for me could be better than what I currently had.
It’s that way with God, too. We are fearful that if we give up the sins we enjoy, we will be left with a boring, lackluster, lame-o life. We don’t trust that God will give us something greater than the current pleasure. Our thinking is so small compared to God’s, but we believe we know better. Worst of all, we are scared to death of the sacrifice and discipline that comes with dropping a sin. We wonder if we are strong enough.
I’ll always regret what I said to my mom. For one, it was wrong and incredibly hurtful. For two, she was utterly right and she was only looking out for my best interest. I eventually gave that guy up. When I first met my husband and we starting dating, I finally was introduced to the kind of man my mom was trying to guide me to. My husband has never made me beg for his love. There is no more groveling on the ground for crumbs hoping to be satisfied. My mom could see that the sin of my relationship with my first boyfriend was trapping me. She wasn’t clouded like I was, in fact, her love for me moved her to lead me out of a bad situation.
It’s human nature for us to get defensive when someone tries to call us out of sin, Catholic Pilgrims. Many times we are afraid to let a particular sin go. The uncomfortableness that we feel when someone points out a sin in our life is because we know deep down they are right. If the person is being constructive with their criticism and genuinely concerned, we would do well to listen. Sincere love wants what is truly best for us and sometimes what is best for us is not what we want for ourselves. Sometimes God speaks straight to our hearts to draw us to become who He created us to be. And sometimes He works through loved ones, like a good mother who never gives up.
The best thing of all is when we listen and work to remove that sin, God blesses us with more than we could ever imagine. God has blessed me beyond measure with a wonderful, loving husband. I couldn’t see that that was a possibility, but God knew. He knew that true happiness was possible.
