While quickly going over the headlines I see this – Vatican laments drop in confessions

A Vatican official is lamenting that many faithful no longer confess their sins, and says some confuse a psychologist’s couch for a confessional booth.Archbishop Mauro Piacenza has told Vatican Radio the sacrament of penance has been experiencing a “deep crisis” for decades. Piacenza, an official for the Vatican office on clergy, says fewer people distinguish between good and evil, and as a result don’t go to confession.

The archbishop said in the interview Tuesday that if faithful don’t have a sense of sin, they might “confuse” confession with “the couch of a psychologist or a psychiatrist.”

This story, while all of three paragraphs, raises so many questions I am having a hard time even starting. Let me try but please hang with me was I get to my ultimate point.

Point #1 – How does the Vatican know confession is down?

Your first reaction may be “Well, the priests say they spend less time doing confession…” But that doesn’t mean confessions are down, maybe the priests who perform confession have become exceedingly efficient in doing so? What is they are seeing *more* people in less time?

Working under the assumption that confession is down, however; does that imply the Church is auditing/counting each individual who goes to confession? Are the masses being tracked, and if so, to what end? Better yet, do they even know they are being tracked?

Point #2 – Why is it a bad thing?

What if people are going less because the time commitments in life mean they have to bunch up all the thoughts for one confession a week, not three?

The Archbishop makes this sound like a lack of confession is a bad thing – what if it is not? What if confession is down because Catholics, or those in the Catholic Church that would seek Confession, have become better people because of their faith?

Less sin would require less confession, no?

Point #3 – Does the church want people to be sinners?

Assuming point number two – the “better people” part – is not that case and people are not becoming “better” people, does that mean the Church would not want them to improve who they are?

Would it make sense that a group that espouses God’s love would wish for other to grow become of that love? If they are not growing – emotionally or spiritually – wouldn’t it be safe to say the Church isn’t doing something right in their teachings or simply trying to limit their teachings so that people never find true enlightenment, thereby creating a cyclical “sinning class”

Point #4 – Confession and Therapy are not the same!!

I, personally, know of no one who goes to confession to address mental health issues, nor do I know of anyone who sees their psychologist to ask forgiveness from god for their sins.

Again, there is no evidence that people are making this leap, rather it appears as if the Archbishop is making an unsubstantiated claim based… well… on nothing – hence unsubstantiated.

Point #5 – The church is now, vaguely, suggesting people do not seek help for mental health issues OR that a lack of confession causes mental health issues.

If you and have individual who is desperately seeking assistance for their actions/thoughts/feelings, who in God’s name cares if they go to a Psychologist first before going to confession?

It’s about the mental health and well being of that person, not about a process or tradition for an organization dating back to the Roman Empire. The Church, the one all about God’s love, should be supporting the person first.

Furthermore, the Church needs to remember without the support, without that person, there is no Church. If a sinner who didn’t seek help – in one form or another – ended up committing suicide the Church would only chastise their actions, disavowing any previous association, and claim that person is now in hell.

So, in the end…

You have a member of the leadership chastising people for not going to Confession but, he assumes it’s a negative. In the same breath, this individual links sinning to mental heath and provides no basis for the statement.

It’s irresponsible. It’s dangerous.

Picture this – you have a devoted believer of the Catholic faith who a mental health concern and goes to a Psychologist but, after hearing this, feels guilty for doings so and then, as a result, they go to confession but stop their therapy. Now, the issues that was being addressed with a trained therapist, is suddenly left needed some form of attention.

They think “oh, but the confession will take care of that” but the emotions and feelings continue to grow, not understanding simply saying “I swore today” isn’t helping the person address the fact that there very well may be a dangerous medical condition at play. Confusion and frustration sets in. Now this individual who was addressing the root cause (or attempting to) is worse off and, possibly, a risk to themselves or the world around them.

How does this help anyone? Really?

This has nothing to do with Religion, Faith, God…  it has to do with how of touch, and how unrealistic, the Catholic Church has become.

Transit Kings

Thanks to Lazy@The Chill Out I’ve had the chance to listen to “Early Bath” by the Transit Kings.  

For those of you unfamiliar with the Transit Kings let me give you a brief history.  They are an electronic music group based of the U.K. Started by Alex Paterson (The Orb), Jimmy Cauty (The KLF), Guy Pratt (session player for a large number of bands) and Dom Beken (High Frequency Bandwidth).

The music tends to be more upbeat than Orb/KLF efforts but manages to retain a fair amount of “atmosphere” mainly due to the samples used on the recordings.  

Early Bath is a limited edition compilation release of demos, remixes and one live recording.  A must for any fan of the group but seeing only 500 copies exist, obtaining a copy may be rather difficult.  If one can track down the release, I strongly urge you to pick it up as the musical genius that blends ambient/jazz/dance is in full force.

Health Update

I’m feeling a hell of a lot better, thanks for the good wishes from all.  Still surprised at how quickly my condition changes from one moment to the next, but one cannot compare the way I felt yesterday to the way I do now.

Worlds apart!

That’s it for now.

Next week I’m gong to start my new workout routine – it will be a two part process. During the days, over lunch, I’ll be using elliptical machines for roughly 30 to 45 mins, depending on my availability. This will take place either 3 to 4 days a week. The second part will of the process will be doing Pilates after work. I hope to be doing this 4 to 5 days a week, weekends too.

In a past life I would run anywhere from 5 to 7 miles a day, and for the most part, really enjoyed myself. Then in April of 2005 my knees really started to bother me. Walking, and even sitting, became difficult. I had expected to run into knee issues, just not that young. As a result, I simply stopped working out… just stopped. Physically I don’t look much different between now and then, but I’m sure my overall health hasn’t necessarily improved.

So why start the working out again? First and foremost, I don’t want my heart to explode at the age of 32. Yea, I know it the small things… All joking aside, I want to make sure my body sticks around for a bit, so I figure I should do so. Second, I would like to look a bit better in my dress shirts. Vain, yes… so? Finally, I wonder if this has any ability to truly impact my mood. Some people will swear that working out helps their mood, but that never ended with success for me, but I’m willing to give it another try.

It will be interesting to see how things work out – be it physically or emotionally….

Did anyone happen to catch this on the news with the last week? There was a student who was placed on involuntary leave until January 2009, at the earliest, from College of Mount St. Joseph For Expressing Suicidal Ideation.

I don’t want to look at the back story, why the individual expressed the desire to kill himself, but look at the reaction of the school.

When I attended undergrad, it was made quite clear by the administration that they were responsible for my health and safety when I was on campus. I had a health issue; I should get to the clinic. I need to talk to someone; a consoler was available to help me understand some of the emotions I was facing. While I may have felt odd taking advantage of such offers, they were an option.

I have to wonder what the College of Mount St. Joseph is looking out for their students, or are the looking out for their own interests. I would think that if a person is saying he needs help, or is threatening to hurt himself, that you take on your role of administrator and get that individual into some type of treatment program. Not shut the doors on him, potentially at his greatest time of need.

While I have no way of knowing what the administration was thinking, I believe they were trying to cover their asses. Here is my guess of what took place in the administrators mind:

A student expresses the desire to kill himself… what else does the student have the potential to do… come back to the school and start killing others… then we have a set of legal issues on our hands… we would be personally liable.. Let’s just remove the problem from campus.

I have no proof that says this is what really happened, but just my guess.

What I find to be the saddest part of this whole story is the potential impact this has on other individuals, other students, who do have something wrong they need to address. How willing will these students be to seek the help out that could greatly impact the quality of their lives if they are living in fear about how their comments may be interpreted? Living in fear that they may be suspended simply for feeling depressed?

While not knowing the full story on either side, I believe the administration of the College of Mount St. Joseph made very poor choices in how to handle the situation by supporting, essentially, discrimination against an individual with mental illness.

Yes, President-elect Obama has a number of big issues facing him while taking office, but one he said he was going to take on was health care reform.  The MHA asks that you send him an e-card reminding him of his promise…

Thanks to Mental Health Notes on this.

The use of the saying “bane of my existence” has turned into a rather cliché thing, resulting in a phrase that doesn’t seem provide the same impact it once held. The word bane means “A cause of misery or death; an affliction or curse” (source). So, the “bane of my existence” can translate to the curse of my existence or the affliction I face.

Insomnia is the curse I seem to be living with, the affliction I face, and it is a condition that easily can wear one down mentally and physically.

So, what exactly happens?

Let’s says it’s time to go to bed, whatever the time may be. I get into bed and simply lay there… my physical body is craving sleep – my eyes are dry, my ability to think quickly is diminished, and I cannot focus on any given task for a long period of time – unfortunately my mind is racing away. Often times the thoughts are not significant or of importance.

Let me give you an example of what goes through my mind as I lay in bed:

What would life have been like if I didn’t quick playing golf on a regular basis? I wish I could sleep, why did I get the extra bag of M & Ms? God that one time in college was really fun… I wonder if there is life off of planet earth and in what form… what was it like to live in 1874? If I won the lotto today what would I do… oh, wait, that would mean I would have to play the lotto… well then, what if I simply just got an ass load of money, what would I do? If I fall asleep right now I will get 3 hours of sleep. I should have eggs for breakfast. You know, people really should take better care of themselves. Think nothing, damn it. Think of nothing.

The problem is that I have no stressor on my mind. It’s not like I sit thinking about how much I have to do at work, or what I need to take care of around the house. It is simply that I cannot shut down my mind.

So, “bane” is a good way of looking at it. It is my affliction. The odd thing is that I usually have a lot of energy, even with a lack of sleep. I want to avoid long-term health issues, which is why I am taking steps to address the insomnia. Until I find a method that works for me, I’ll be pushing through… and thinking about what would happen if I had an ass load of money.