J.M.J.
Each time a new year begins, we always wish and pray for ourselves a better life ahead. To be able to achieve that, we know that we need to make some life changes. While there are situations outside us that we cannot change, there are things within us that we can.
Many Catholics, however, are unable to start off the year on the right foot, going downhill from there, and finishing the year not attaining any of their resolutions or the changes needed because of one thing—the past.
There is a saying that goes, “Hindsight is 20/20.” With 20/20 denoting good, normal vision in the Snellen eye chart on the walls of optometry and ophthalmology clinics, the phrase means that it is always easy to see what should have been done, or what choices should have been made in a situation after it is finished; once it’s already in the past.
But rather than using such expression as an inspiration to ‘move on’ after having an apparent understanding of the past, the “coulda, wouda, shoulda” becomes a heavy emotional and mental baggage to those who are unable to ‘let go.’ Instead of only taking the lessons learned, the heaviness of bringing the past with them is weighing them down. Usually, these people cannot stop blaming themselves for the mistakes and bad choices they made. They constantly think about the damages those caused, be it big or small.
Fixating on the past makes us unable to realize the good things left in us at the present. Sometimes, the good thing is right in front of us; yet, we do not see it. We cannot appreciate things for what they are worth. How we interpret our circumstances is far from what they actually are. Because of this, we might miss so many opportunities to live again, and be happy.
A damaged past could then cause further injury. People who are ‘lost’ at the present do not know what they really want. They also cannot envision any clear future for themselves.
My Reflection
The Past
1. The tendency to hold on to the past is so understandable, especially because of how the past directly affects the present. Perhaps it’s an injustice or an evil thing done to us in the past, which causes us suffering, humiliation and other sorts of affliction. Other times, we make bad choices and mistakes ourselves. Unable to forgive ourselves, we keep thinking about how we could have picked another choice instead. We imagine some form of an “alternate reality” or “parallel universe” that only exists in science fiction movies, series or books in which the characters have a ‘better version’ of themselves.
2. We are not in sci-fi; we are in the reality of carrying with us past wounds and hurts that are preventing us from accomplishing the better life we are praying for. I feel you in how hard it is to let go of the past, as I, too, found myself in that situation before. So if you are suffering with emotional baggages, read on, and consider my advice in this piece.
3. At times, people ‘wait’ for the ‘wounds’ to be healed before they decide to move on. But let me tell you that your wounds will never be healed until you make an act of will to let go of the past. You might end up wasting your life away, waiting for your wounds to heal themselves. It’s not happening. Again, in an act of will, you must first let go of the hurt, then move on from the past… and that’s when the wounds get healed.
4. But what is the most crucial step to be able to willfully let go and move on? To see things in the light of most holy faith.
I was able to let go of the past completely, and move on, when my understanding and practice of the Faith became much stronger.
5. For Catholics, seeing things in light of our Faith is the advantage. But it is something that the unbelievers of the Catholic Church and the unbelievers of God, the secular world, do not have.
Unbelievers of the Catholic Faith
6. To John Calvin, for example, the person who founded Reformed Protestantism, your life was terrible because you deserved it. For him, God made two groups: the elect, chosen to show His mercy, and the damned, chosen to show His justice. It means that, according to him, because you are among the damned, you deserve it that this person hurt you; or you deserve it that you made the wrong choice. And worse, he said that God could do to you whatever pleased Him, because He is God. I think he meant that your disadvantage is the advantage of others. To him, God created some men to be miserable sinners, bound to Hell.
7. If people were to see their lives in the way he saw things, in the eyes of wrong faith, they would really fall into despair. Those who accept similar beliefs, which are opposite to the faith of the Catholic Church, would find no reason in overcoming the hurts of the past because even if they did so, nothing but a bleak future would await them.
Unbelievers of God and the secular world
8. As for the unbelievers of God, they see things at their face value, solely with their mere eyes. Some of them think that you have the right to hold on to your hatred and have grudge against those who hurt you, because you own your feelings, and those people deserve it. And if bad choices and wrong decisions are your fault, then sorry for you, but the consequences of your actions are only yours to put up with. You are the choices you make, they say; you drive your own life. It wanted to sound ‘liberating.’ But what they really mean is that you’ve got this lousy life because of those stupid choices you made. Many of them also see life in the world as a matter of luck; that you were just unlucky with people and things, which spelled out bad for you. If you are unable to build up a nice life in the past, the future seems dim for you, while others are lucky to have more successful and pleasurable lives.
9. The secular world is about ‘enjoying’ a hedonistic life. But it has many contradicting notions of how to live a ‘good’ life. Its vision is clouded—the way it believes that forgiveness is conditional, that justice is eye-for-an-eye, and that people should do whatever they want, even it’a harmful. For example, the secular would reason that a woman should get an abortion if she thinks it would ‘undo’ her mistake of getting pregnant. But sooner or later, that mother would realize that the act only did further irreparable damage, for it took an innocent baby’s life, and wounded her soul with severe grief, which was not obvious to her before. Secular people might think that they are ‘free,’ but without true faith, the world will only cause them more emotional and mental baggages of the past, and even in the future.
10. If you are one of those who desire a better life, but continue to see things the way that non-Catholics, the unbelievers, and the secular do, you would only be stuck in the past, unable to live well at the present and to prepare for a gracious life in the future.
The Present
God opens the eye of the mind
When others wronged you
1. The secular view of the world is shallow, as it lacks spiritual perspective. As I already mentioned, the critical step for us Catholics is to see our lives in the light of the most holy faith.
Saint Catherine of Siena (whose full name was Catherine Benincasa), whom I consider one of my dear spiritual sisters in Heaven, often spoke about this “light of most holy faith” in her famous Letters that she wrote and sent out to different people. (On a personal note, I have always loved writing letters ever since I was a teenager…).
The light of most holy faith is what opens “the eye of the mind,” according to Saint Catherine of Siena. I think it helps us to not limit our view of things only within their face value. This light makes us see things in the eyes of God, Who gives us the true clear vision of the mind.
“I Catherine, servant and slave of the servants of Jesus Christ, write to you in His precious Blood: with desire to see in you the light of most holy faith. This is a light which shows us the way of truth, and without it no activity, or desire, or work of ours would come to fruition, or to the end for which we began it…”
After reading the writings of Saint Catherine of Siena, I got astonished that her words resonated with how I was able to make it in letting go of the past, and moving on, through the Catholic Faith. I considered it as an affirmation from God that I was on the right track.
2. Under the light of most holy faith, if you were to look at those who hurt you, injured you, humiliated you, or did you an injustice, you would be able to see that from past to present, it is still the hand of God that drives your life; He is actually in control of your life. He very well saw and knew what was done to you in the past. It’s just that He allowed it to happen to you because, for one, He is purifying something in your life.
3. That’s how I understood it with my experiences before. An injustice was done to me a few years ago, which I already spoke about in previous posts. Before that, I thought I was already ‘great’ and ‘virtuous.’ Now I know that God allowed me to be hurt in the past to purify me.
It took a while, but the light of most holy faith opened my mind and heart to God’s real work. I had begun to see my flaws—that I had yet to improve on many other things as a person and as Catholic—when I looked beyond the hurts. Finally, in an act of will, and guided by the light of most holy faith, I resolved to let go of all that happened. And that’s when my emotional wounds started to quickly heal. I was humbled, and taught the virtue of humility, and other virtues, as I approached God in a childlike-manner, asking for His help and wisdom, and crying to Him, “Abba, Father!”
4. God wanted me to cling to Him, rather than to rely on myself or any other people who are mere creatures of God. I did not readily understand what He was doing, but He was showing me the areas of my life that needed to be purified, that needed to be made holy, which are necessary in order for me to walk in the path of holiness and perfection of the soul.
That must be how it is with you as well. Perhaps God is purifying you, like He did to me. But you still have not realized it yet. If you are still suffering from a hurtful past, like when people you cared for left you, and those you loved let you down; if you are unable to recover from painful events in your life, look at these things now in the light of most holy faith, and it will open your mind anew. God must be showing you the areas of your life, such as your beliefs, values or actions, which need to be corrected and purified. Once you identify what those are, and work on amending them with due diligence, your intense grief will turn into an immense grace.
5. I know that it is the grace of God that humbled me, purified me, and enabled me to let go of the resentment I was feeling. His love has given me complete healing from the hurt.
Since I came to understand these things, I have always believed that God will never stop ‘calling our attention,’ be it through our unpleasant past or present struggle, until we’re able to correct everything in our souls. And part of that purification is how God permits the evils of the world to affect you. That is because we are all called to be ‘saints-in-the-making.’
“I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.”
– Philippians 1:6″
6. God will always draw out something good from the bad. I’ve witnessed this in my life.
“We know that all things work for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.”
– Romans 8:28
Indeed, I always get amazed to see clearly at the present—that it was only a wrong notion of me that God was being ‘harsh’ for not caring that something sad or hurtful happened to me years ago in the past. But the truth is, God was there all along to turn those ‘bad’ into my ‘good.’ He used those sad, hurtful events in my life to purify many aspects in my life that needed correcting. He allowed those things to happen back then so that when I finally know how to let go of those pains, I would be more ready to receive a far greater grace. And I did receive it.
“So, knowing that this is the case, I desired to see in you the light of most holy faith; and so I want you to have it. And because I want this, and love you immeasurably for your salvation, and desire with great desire to see you in the state of the perfect, therefore I pray you with many words… And whenever your faults may be shown you, rejoice, and thank the Divine Goodness…”
– Saint Catherine of Siena
7. Human beings, in general, always tend to be impatient. To be able to say that things are ‘working,’ we want to see immediate results; something has to happen “now.” But there are times that we would only see how God was in control of our lives all along years after we got hurt and wounded.
8. That’s why those who do not see in the eyes of God in the light of most holy faith easily fall into despair after expecting that their hurts and wounds would go away after just a short period of saying prayers and doing religious devotions and activities.
9. God instead wants us to perfect our virtue of patience. And while perfecting ourselves in the virtue, He wants us to have a deeper look into ourselves and to examine how we can make holy the weak aspects of our lives. When we do that, we will have the strength in our will to let go of the past by realizing that holding on to those hurts and grudges is useless. God wants us to possess greater graces after we are able to move on.
When you wronged others or yourself
10. There’s no person who has never made bad choices and wrong decisions, and committed mistakes or lapse of judgment. It could be either because back at the time, we were either foolish or younger in age. Or perhaps, because of lack of experience. At times, certain circumstances prevented us to have the right judgment. Some mistakes only had small consequences. Others had life-changing consequences, which is why those who committed them find themselves unable to let go of their past, and haunted by regrets.
All of us had those things. Because hindsight is 20/20, I could not believe it myself how I misread the ‘signs’ and missed the writings on the wall, and consequently, made very bad choices and wrong decisions!
11. To be able to overcome regrets, as I have said, you have to look at your past mistakes in the eyes of God, in the light of most holy faith. Without such faith, you risk feeling hopeless, that nothing can save you nor rectify your wrongs. But in allowing the light of faith to open your mind, the grace of God will reveal to you that there is always hope for redemption, and fill you with courage to rise up and walk again in the path of virtue.
12. If you are going through this, remember that forgiveness is of utmost importance to your recovery. You did what you could, such as confessing and admitting your wrongful actions, even blaming yourself so many times. But you must also be ready to forgive yourself because—a clear vision of the present and the future begins with a clean heart and a peaceful mind.
13. And if you still can, find a way to make amends for your mistakes. But if it is not possible anymore, you can still pray for yourself, for the person you hurt, or for the situation, which is also very important to do. In faith, let everything rest on God’s mercy and forgiveness, and move on.
14. Whether our unhealed wounds are caused by others, or by our own doing, it is dangerous for us Catholics to remain attached to the past. That’s because when people are depressed and regretful of the past, they are tempted to become slothful in attending to not only their physical needs, but most of all, their spiritual needs. Having a dull or non-existent prayer life and skipping the Sacraments of Confession and the Eucharist in the Mass could result from a distressed emotional state. And without spiritual graces, a ‘better’ temporal life becomes unattainable.
“Therefore, like a prudent person, she looks with the light of most holy faith, which is in the eye of the mind, and beholds what is harmful and what is useful to her… She’ flees all causes that may incline her to vice or hinder her perfection.”
– Saint Catherine of Siena
Our past and present, our offering
15. Seeing then in the eyes of God, in the light of most holy faith, our past wounds and hurts, and their consequences in our present, become our loving offering to Jesus, as our share in His Passion.
16. In God, we find rest. But for some reason, we refuse to give to Him our heavy burdens and baggages, and try to carry them ourselves. There’s a Filipino idiomatic expression, “Pasan ko ang daigdig” or “I’m carrying the universe.” But God does not want us to carry the world. He wants us to carry our share of the Cross. The evil in the world pulls us to sin and to despair, but the Cross lifts us up from sin, and frees us from despair. God does not want us to linger in the pains of our past, and to continue to struggle with them. He wants us to accept all these hurts in our past and our present, and place them at the foot of His Cross. In a loving act of will, we must offer them up to God, and commend our lives to His ways and plans.
God sees what we do not see
17. Sometimes, people do not stop grieving over the ‘loss’ of people and things. But we must also try to understand why God allowed things to happen as they did, in the light of practical reason, that is aligned with the faith.
18. Can’t get over losing a romantic relationship? I personally reflected about this before, and I realized that losing something meant that God was actually saving me.
So even you were not aware of it, God knows that years down the road, he or she would turn out to be a person you would very much dislike; the very person you would resent. He sees that you two would stop ‘loving’ and ‘accepting’ each other for whatever reason; that the relationship would only have ended up in divorce. God knows that they are not the person who would help you get to Heaven. It does not mean that just because a person was Catholic, he or she was capable of helping you gain Heaven. In fact, some are ‘just Catholics,’ and nothing more. Worse, they were the kind of person who would pull you down to Hell.
And one more thing I see in romantic relationships of Catholics (those who are truly seeking the Kingdom of God), God always ‘cuts off’ the relationship before it gets even further, as in marriage, no matter how ‘great’ they think their relationships are; no matter how ‘great’ they think the other person is. Because in His eyes, there is something ‘unholy’ in it. Like possibly, it’s a ‘worldly’ relationship in a few or many aspects. Or probably, one person in the relationship, or both, is ‘unholy.’ Therefore, God is saving them from the other person, whether or not he or she admits it to himself or herself.
19. Can’t get over losing things, such as missed opportunities abroad? You do not see it right now, but God sees that such opportunity would have caused you untimely death overseas. It could be the job that God sees you would have been unhappy about in the future, due to changes in your situation. Perhaps that line of work and the people around you there would have led you to sin.
In my own experience before, I lost a big opportunity abroad many years ago. I wasted my time away regretting about losing that chance. Several years later, my personality has changed a lot, and for the better. And as hindsight is 20/20, I saw later on that I actually lost nothing—such ‘missed opportunity’ was totally against my beliefs and values at the present. But I wouldn’t really have known that before, as I was going through the process of overcoming the pain I was feeling. I then promised myself that every time I get the feeling that I ‘missed’ something, I would look at it in the eyes of God, in the light of most holy faith, and trust the will of God. I know it would spare myself of wasting time in holding on to unhealthy emotions and thoughts.
The Future
1. Should we trust in God even when things got ‘bad’ and we are still hurting from it? Yes, definitely! The Scripture, Church Tradition, the wisdom of our Church Fathers, and the visions of the Saints to whom Jesus and the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to these last 2000 years all declare that God is the Divine Master to Whom we must entrust everything.
2. But there are ‘practicing’ Catholics who could not let go of their past hurts and mistakes. I was once like them, until I decided to get over them, and move on. How come some practicing Catholics who regularly pray and receive the Sacraments are still unable to let go?
3. I have given it much thought. And I think it’s because—they do not trust enough in God that His Will is a ‘better’ plan; they do not believe that He has something ‘better’ in store for them. It could be in the form of temporal graces, such as a better person for them, a better thing for them, a better opportunity for them. In the same way, it could also be in the form of spiritual graces such as a more appropriate spiritual direction for them to lead them to their true calling in life. But those who remain tied to their hurtful past cannot share in God’s joyful vision for them going into the future.
4. That is why, as repeatedly mentioned in this writing, unless they start to see things in the eyes of God, they would constantly look back to their past, unable to move on in life. At times, they miss the graces that God is offering them, such as temporal graces in front of them. There are always graces given through the Sacraments if received with the right dispositions (Baltimore Catechism). But if their disposition is to hold on to the past, they would not seem to get any ‘improvement,’ even with the Sacraments and prayers. Without the act of willfully trusting in God, they lack vision of the future with a purposeful life.
5. As truly practicing Catholics, even without the extraordinary grace of visions like those given to the Mystics of the Church, we must fix our gaze on God in the eyes of most holy faith—believing in our Father in Heaven—that He has a plan in our lives now, and in the future!
Mind you that it’s not the kind of plan that some ‘prosperity gospel’ preachers abuse to lure people, using these verses below. We believe in a holy plan that God has divinely written for the well-being of our bodies and souls, here on earth, as it is in Heaven.
“For I know well the plans I have in mind for you—oracle of the LORD—plans for your welfare and not for woe, so as to give you a future of hope. When you call me, and come and pray to me, I will listen to you. When you look for me, you will find me. Yes, when you seek me with all your heart, I will let you find me—oracle of the LORD—and I will change your lot.”
– Jeremiah 29:11
God also promises that as we walk, bringing with us only our trust in Him, He watches us with His eye:
“I will instruct you and show you the way you should walk, give you counsel with my eye upon you.”
– Psalm 32:8
6. God is true to His promises (1 Corinthians 1:9). If we would just heed His invitation, do what is asked of us, and let go of those heavy baggages, we will one day see how it was all worth it; we will be grateful that we chose to let go.
“But as it is written: “What eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, and what has not entered the human heart, what God has prepared for those who love him.”
– 1 Corinthians 2:9
7. The ‘surprise’ that God has for each one is a holy plan that only He has known for all eternity. It will all be revealed to us in His anointed time.
“In all wisdom and insight, he has made known to us the mystery of his will in accord with his favor that he set forth in him as a plan for the fullness of times, to sum up all things in Christ, in heaven and on earth.”
– Ephesians 1:8-10
8. To understand God’s work of fulfilling His will in our lives, and to fight against the temptation of being stuck in our hurtful past, we must see through our hearts, following what Saint Paul the Apostle, my immediate family’s Patron, said:
“May the eyes of [your] hearts be enlightened, that you may know what is the hope that belongs to his call, what are the riches of glory in his inheritance among the holy ones.”
– Ephesians 1:18
Mama Mary opens the eye of our hearts
Let us pray to Our Lady to help us see through our hearts. Her Immaculate Heart, the heart of Mary, Mother of God, gives us refuge from the pains of the past, and hope for the future.
Conclusion
To conclude this article, here are the words of Saint Catherine of Siena:
“Prayer must not be far from you. Nay, on the due and ordered hours, so far as you can, seek to withdraw a little, to know yourself, and the wrongs done to God, and the largeness of His goodness, which has worked and is working so sweetly in you; opening the eye of your mind in the light of most holy faith, to behold how beyond measure God loves us; love which He shows us through the means of His Only Begotten Son.” And I beg that, if you are not saying it already, you should say every day the office of the Virgin, that she may be your refreshment and your advocate before God.”
As I say in the title of my piece, with God, our spiritual vision is always 20/20. You and I clearly see God’s Will in the past; God’s Grace in the present; God’s Plan in the future. The eyes of our mind, which God opens, and the eyes of our hearts, which Mary opens, work together to enable us see our lives in the most holy perspective.
Happy New Year 2020!
Saint Joseph, pray for us!
Mama Mary, pray for us!
Amen.
She graduated cum laude from the University of Santo Tomas, the country's Pontifical and Catholic university, with an AB in Legal Management and minor units in Theology.
As an unmarried woman, prayer holds a central place in her daily life, with a focus on the Rosary and the Divine Office. Embodying her faith, she emphasizes the growth of her inner spiritual life, guided by the wisdom of Carmelite spirituality.
God manifested to her in a unique and radical manner, which made her know Who He truly is and led her to total surrender of her life to Him.
She has studied the Bible with her family, developing a particular fondness for the Old Testament.
Her adorable and intelligent toy poodle is a delightful companion in her daily life, bringing warmth and joy to her home.
Her hobbies include reading about everything, learning Japanese and German, listening to music and playing the flute.
In her leisure time, she enjoys gaming on PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch OLED, Nintendo 3DS, iOS and OS, and collecting things related to PlayStation and Nintendo.
Email: [email protected]
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Hello, I discovered your blog about six months ago and must say that I love it! It is so refreshing to see a true Catholic and authentic blogger who can bring us back to God and our faith in these times of chaotic distress and despair. Keep up the good work. God bless you, and Merry Christmas
Thank you for taking the time to pray and share. It was very helpful!
Very good. Thank you for letting God guide you in your writings. This piece has blessed me today. I needed to hear it as I have held on to a past hurt for 19 years. Letting go of a rejection that was so painful to me has been almost impossible. I’ve carried it with me all this time. It is much, much better than before, and I know with God all things are possible. So this writing of yours has brought me a step closer to healing. Thank you again. God bless you and keep up the wonderful work in Christ.
Phenomenal, Mary.
Thank you for sharing your journey so openly.
I, too, have a great affiliation to St Catherine of Siena.
May Our Lady and Our Lord hold you fast between them as they accompany you on your journey.
A wonderful page, through it,you are making gret numbers of Saints for our Redeemer’s Kingdom.