7 Mortal Sins

Though I am not Catholic and rarely call myself Christian I find the mythology appealing (hence the title). I was raised a certain brand of Protestant Christian and often find that it affects my view on life, thought and action.

I am a religious and spiritual person. I attend a spiritual group regularly. I engage in religious and spiritual devotional activities. I pray, sing, dance, create and spread the love and joy of (God) whenever I can or remember to and this pursuit is not limited to external ambition but thoroughly internal as well. In this blog I hope to share what I often feel I cannot share with the outside world. I hope to do this because I want to be who I am and also happy, and also proud, and also good... and sometimes I allow these thoughts and feelings to keep me from being happy, proud or good.

Maybe at some point I will share this intentionally with loved ones... but for now a modern confessional.

7 Mortal Sins (they change over time but here is what I will write about)

Lust

Gluttony

Envy
Wrath *inward and outward

Pride/Vanity

Sloth

Greed

So lets begin awkwardly enough with tonight shall we?

You will have to indulge me I am not a Catholic, so I may ruin the ritual, but I haven't ever really confessed so in my mind I last confessed a day or two ago.

"Bless me Father, for I have sinned. It has been a day or two since my last confession."

I was at a restaurant tonight, on the way in I noticed several attractive people, mostly women, but also appreciated the marble streaks of white hair on the middle aged men's heads.  I stood in line thinking about how I would be dining alone and thought about how nice it would be to have a girlfriend. I scanned the room in search of someone delightful, I found many ladies, most of whom seemed engaged in pleasant conversation with friends and loved ones. In many ways I find this beautiful, but sometimes can't help but be jealous. Tonight however I was content to eat alone... and perhaps that is the sin of sloth poking its head in a small way... keeping me from pursuing what I could, or perhaps I am just satisfied with my own company. Regardless I noticed I was in line behind a tall man who seemed to be the father of a little girl. In front of him in line was a equally tall blond woman who I assumed (incorrectly) to be the mother.  The man was tickling his daughter in a playful way. Nothing wrong about that but things like that always stand out to me, because I know that is how some things start. Overly sensitive to the sins we commit ourselves I guess, I watched out of the corner of my eye, this young girl with tangled hair and big eyes, peering joyfully at her father whom she loves.

I remember that big eyed look. It wasn't my daughter, I was too young at the time. I was 6 years her senior though, 6 years is a world of difference at that age. I was a teen, I thought I knew everything, I thought if I could get away with things it was worth it. I was all black and white thinking (not that I have moved beyond that too much) and often times when she was around it was the one, and often times when I was alone in thought it was that one too, but all other times it was the other. I knew it was wrong, though no laws were broken, I knew I was betraying a young girl's trust and shaming her innocence though I didn't understand quite how... I hoped she would think it was all a game. I dreamed each night that she lusted after me like I did her.
But every time I saw her it was that same innocence... and then a growing and gradual... distrust, a growing yet gradual pushing away. It wasn't till I was 16 that I had the wake up call I needed to stop, but even then I didn't, not right away. I was addicted to this girl who followed me in my dreams and whom my body craved. She was a regular in my fantasies. She was a regular in my daily life routines.
I gradually broke away, by changing patterns. She did too, by growing into a person, a troubled teen and not some innocent plaything.

For the record, we were never nude together (except in my thoughts). But what I longed for was her smell.
I would position her in ways in which I could smell her, rub my face in her clothed private areas. In so many ways I am disgusted, I was then too, but I didn't stop. And still to this day I sometimes dream about her.

The less judgemental of you out there might say "Why didn't you pursue her when she was older?"
Because it wasn't just the sin of Lust, its the Pride and Wrath that comes along with it.
Its the million nights of fantasy, contrasted with the guilt and shame. The judgment and assumed judgment if anyone found out.  So whats to be ashamed about?  Well besides the age difference which I don't condone, though it may not be out of the ordinary (in our very strange world), we come to our second taboo... which is that she was related to me.
I hate to say it but I am excited by taboo and as a teenager I attempted to prove that everything that was extreme was my friend or at least my associate and even now some of those images and thoughts haunt me. So this was my relative, this child not yet a teen, this hurt and neglected girl, who I treated like a thing.
The assumed reasons fill pages, the rationale, the reasoning, the hypothetical responses to confrontation, but none has happened. It sort of haunts me still. The look in her eye that wonders if she can trust me. The inability to actually know or care or relate because of this secret perpetrated at her expense, and am I to bring it up? Perhaps throw her from her security in reminding her of things done, and even if I take all the blame she can never deny it away again.  Not to mention she tells our family, not to mention the social consequences of breaking taboos.

So this is my first sin of lust against another.  This repeated action hidden in shame. But shame makes you do terrible things to yourself and sometimes others. So I shall confess other sins, eventually to cleanse the soul, and then? Well if it doesn't become the mundane and daily sins, then surely the contemplation of what these concepts are... taboo, sin, good and evil, cruelty, vice and habit, fetish, soul and self, the role of the society and of the individual. Perhaps I will even throw God into the mix, to contemplate on just what type of person I am and  who I am called to be. Or who we are all called to be.