Now that that is out of the way....
I started the seminary in January of 2010, almost a year ago. I must say, for my own recording, that the last semester was not good. I went to the bar at least once a week, drank way too much, looked at women lustfully, fell into sin many times, let my pride get the best of me, was lazy, and the list goes on. Not much progress was made, not because of God, but because of me. The summer started out as usual, me helping my parents at home and drinking every night with my friends with the occasional (3 nights a week) drive to Deadwood to gamble all of my money away. My summer assignment, Duc in Altum, started at the end of May and proceeded until the end of July. This was a time of great stress for me. My leader was John Paul Trask, and I must admit I hated him most of the summer. I also had Charlie Pugsley and Randy Vette on my team. I grew to hate Charlie as well. Randy was the only one who never seemed to disturb me. I must make it clear at this point that all of these bad relationships were made that way by me. My pride is an ugly thing and gets in the way of a lot of my friendships. The summer concluded with Totus Tuus, a seminarian retreat, and our bishop leaving. Totus Tuus was ok, but I still had some problems. Mark Horn led the camp and I can't count the number of problems I have with him. The ending events of the summer were stressful as well due to my relationships with both John Paul and Mark. A new guy joined the seminarian crew during the retreat: Stephen Engelhardt. Now Stephen I don't know very well. I avoid him because he has a hygiene problem, is somewhat condescending, and is a hard person to have a conversation with. He's 18 and seems to think he has the world figured out. I can tell he has low self-esteem. I have a hard time with him, and I know that that needs to improve. That's all I'm going to say about Stephen at this point. All in all, my summer was very sinful. I drank constantly, chased girls, and had an ugly pride.
The school year started up great though. The semester has been a great time of growth. Looking back on my summer it makes me realize how shallow my religious life was. When I got back, started hanging out with my same old friends again. One of my best friends from last year was kicked out of the seminary, which was a big disappointment to me. He was a good friend, but he was a bad influence. He is the kid I partied with last semester. I know our sins are our own fault's, but he did not help. He is not to blame for my sinfulness, I consider myself to blame for not challenging him, and myself, to do better. So when I got back from the summer I started hanging out with the same old guys again. To make a long story short, I did something that I never had done much of before: prayed. I went into the chapel, sat in front of the tabernacle....and prayed. It worked. My time at the seminary has been so much better this semester I can't even begin to explain it. To go back a little bit though, I stopped hanging out with my group from last year. Not intentionally, we just sort of drifted apart. When I was with them, a side came out of me that I didn't want to have anymore. All we did was talk about people, and how much better and smarter we were than other people. Yes, we called ourselves humble, but that's why it's called "false" humility. My closest friend became Bill. He has helped me tremendously this semester, but like my friend from last year, we need to challenge each other more. We fall into that prideful state more and more as the semester goes on, but I would like to change that.
I realize now, that this post is turning into an autobiography, and that's not what I intended. These things, I'm sure will come up later. I am beginning a silent retreat right now, and should not be on the computer so I'm going to wrap it up.
Every once in a while, a guy's gotta hit the reset button. That's exactly what's happening this weekend. My scheduled prayer life fell apart this week. I fell into the sin of lust. I stopped praying the liturgy of the hours, rosary, and personal prayer. I didn't pray yesterday or today. Looking back I realize that my most important type of prayer, personal prayer, was getting shorter and shorter everyday, until it was about 5 minutes long. I realize that when I'm happy and things are going well, I tend to skip the personal prayer. I don't realize that all of those blessings in my life are coming from God. I forget to thank him and to ask him to continue blessing me. This is where the reset button comes in. I have to pick myself back up and start over. I'm going to confession tomorrow and reestablishing my connection with God. It's easy for a guy to get down on himself in this state and think that he's not making any progress, but that's just not true. That's the Evil One creeping in. Every time we fall down we need to pick ourselves back up. Looking back on this semester, so much progress has been made. I pray the liturgy of the hours, personal prayer, and rosary. I don't dread functions like I used to. I look forward to adoration. My room is clean and neat. I'm more disciplined with my studies and sleep. I don't fall into the sin of lust, pride, or gluttony nearly as much as I used to. I don't drink as much. I have good solid friendships, even with girls. What I'm getting at is that progress is being made whether we see it or not. Don't feel sad about things, tomorrow's a new day. God gives us so many chances we don't deserve....
In relationship to the above paragraph, the great Thomas Edison must be quoted.
"I failed my way to success."
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