“Love…in all simplicity”
Ash Wednesday is just one week away. On March 5, the Divine Bridegroom will speak the words of Hosea 2:14 over every baptized soul: “I will now allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her.”
Although Christ’s call is universal, His tender words are different for every soul. Your cross is fitted for your shoulders alone, and your heart belongs to Him in a way that nobody else’s can.
For many University of Dallas students, one of their Lenten crosses will be in the shape of scrupulosity. As beautiful and purifying as the season is, the Church’s beautiful invitation to fasting and sacrifice can easily become twisted into a spiritual and mental life of fear and obsession.
For those unfamiliar with the term, scrupulosity is an excessive fear of having sinned. Often a form of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, it leads to obsessive habits and rituals in order to ensure that one avoids any feared wrongdoing.
Of course, the Catholic Church hates and preaches against all sin! But the scrupulous person’s feared “sins” are often not sins at all. The Church desires fearless sainthood for her children, not mental illness.
For those with scrupulosity, it can be easy for Lent to trigger an excessively rigorous prayer regimen, an obsession with making sure one is keeping his fast and an increased fear of sin and damnation. But despite the difficulties of navigating Lent with OCD or scrupulosity, the merits of Christ’s Cross and the joy of His Resurrection are for you!
If you struggle with scrupulosity, below is some advice on how to live out this upcoming Lenten season of mercy, surrender and unfathomable love.
1. Self-knowledge is key to holiness. We enter Lent with the wondrous, but often messy, gift of being human persons who are both soul and body. To live out our call to love, we must know ourselves and the relationships among our bodies, minds and souls.
This means we need to acknowledge our physiological and mental limitations. As much as you desire to fast and sacrifice with radical love for the Lord, if you are steeped in OCD, now is likely not the time for a bread and water Lent. Caring for your brain is already a gift of radical love to the One who created the masterpiece of the human brain!
Similarly, as you select Lenten prayers and readings, be aware of what might trigger increased scrupulosity or compulsions. Even if the speaker is wonderful, the scrupulous soul might need to skip out on a parish mission about the Four Last Things. Similarly, this might not be the Lent for a deep reading of “The Imitation of Christ” or other intensely ascetical works.
2. Do not bind what Rome has loosed. If you are reading this and are between the ages of 18 and 59, you are obligated to give up meat on all Fridays in Lent and to fast on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday. That’s it.
Now of course, the Church also exhorts us to practice prayer, fasting and almsgiving during Lent, and we ought to listen. But you are not under pain of sin to give up warm showers or attend Stations of the Cross.
I’m not saying to treat Lent lightly. However, if you have scrupulosity, remember that simple and humble offerings delight your Father, who already delights in you and whose love for you does not change based on what you gave up for Lent.
3. Suffer and love in Christ. One of my favorite quotes is from Georges Bernanos’ “Diary of a Country Priest”:
“How easy it is to hate oneself! True grace is to forget. Yet if pride could die in us, the supreme grace would be to love oneself in all simplicity—as one would love any one of those who themselves have suffered and loved in Christ.”
Scrupulosity and an obsession with moral perfection often go hand-in-hand with self-loathing. Lent is the perfect time to invite Jesus into any self-hatred, anxiety, resentment or exhaustion.
When describing her struggles with scrupulosity, St. Thérèse wrote, “You would have to go through that martyrdom to understand it well.” Although Jesus did not have mental illness, through His Passion He endured the same anguish that you experience.
In Gethsemane, His fear was so great that He sweated blood. On the Cross, He cried out, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”
From that suffering cry emerges the promise that you are not abandoned. In your darkest moments, when you feel so alone that you doubt God’s love could ever reach you, Christ sees you from the Cross and promises that you are not alone in your suffering.
This Lent, let Him suffer with you and in you. And as you suffer and love in Christ, Who is the Resurrection and the Life, remember that this season does not only lead to Calvary, but also to the empty tomb.
Larisa Tuttle is the Commentary Editor for the Cor Chronicle. She is a senior double major in English and Theology. She is the President of the Thomistic Institute at UD and a Blessed is She Mentor.