Confiteor

Confiteor Deo omnipotenti,  . . .  quia peccavi nimis cogitatione, verbo et opere: mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.

This keeps running through my head, both in English and in Latin: “. . . I have sinned exceedingly in thought, word, and deed. My fault, my fault, my most grievous fault.”

 
When it comes into my head in Latin, you know it’s deeply rooted and deadly serious. Lord, have mercy—please not the Latin version.
 
I have sinned in thought. The self-centeredness, the continual struggle with compassion, the failure to keep my mind focused on the things of God instead of getting distracted with the acquisition and maintenance of my petty possessions. The struggle with forgiveness.

I have sinned in word. The mouth from which springs the most idiotic things at the wrong place and time. The sad story that runs on a continuous loop. The drama queen. The it’s-all-about-me sickening syndrome. The gossiping, both thinking and saying unkind things. Lord, I wish I could blame this on an evil force but I am sorry to say it’s my own stupidity, my bottomless pit of weakness.

I have sinned in deed. Indeed I have. The unkind things I have thought and spoken also can be counted among the deeds. I have wasted money, I have had too much to eat and drink. I have not bothered to tell the clerk that she gave me change for $20 instead of $10 or that I didn’t pay for the cat litter that was in the bottom of my grocery cart. When I was too sensitive and thought people were mistreating me, I took it personally instead of cutting them some slack—no, it was all about me again.

Of course, there’s a viscous loop in operation here—I get hurt, I feel like a failure, I withdraw from polite society because I don’t want to impose myself on anyone else for fear of more rejection. This is more self-centered depressed behavior. I think I’m a jerk, everyone else thinks I’m a jerk, so I’m sure God must think I’m a jerk too.

The only way out of this is grace, grace, and more grace. I’m standing in the need of grace, Lord. Bring it on!