Q&A Home > S > Spiritual Life

For the past couple of weeks, I have become more distant from God and I have grown quite frustrated with my spiritual state. I am a servant, but lately I have been serving with less zeal, and I even desire to stop serving. When I take Communion, instead of feeling spiritual, I end up feeling lost and confused. I am lost and unable to find my way. I am depressed out of my mind and cannot find meaning in my life anymore. I feel that my trying to be spiritual is making me more depressed because it seems that when I live my life away from God, my life is better. I am stuck right in the middle of living an evil life and a spiritual life. The evil life is involved with hanging out with the wrong crowd, having girlfriends, going to parties, and controlling myself as little as possible.

Only the love of God and trust in His providence can bear all this with patience, endurance, and long-suffering for the sake of the good, which is the service of God. When life is good, when things are going our way, we forget about God and the soul can adapt to an easygoing lifestyle. Our spiritual weariness insinuates itself into our behavior patterns almost without notice and leaves us open to the transgression of the moment.

If we allow ourselves to lose contact with the spiritual, we will become spiritually cold. We can come in out of the cold because the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ is always there to provide the opportunity. St. John Chrysostom says, "We need to submit to the spirit, to commit ourselves wholeheartedly to keep the flesh in its place. By doing so our flesh will become spiritual again. Otherwise, if we give in to the easy life, this will lower our soul to the level of the flesh and make it carnal again" (Homily on Romans, 13).

Trust that God never abandons whoever seeks him. What you need is perseverance and hope. Do not despair but be assured that God is stretching out His Hands to you. "But we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance character; and character hope" (Rom 5:3).

"Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit" (Rom 15:13).