Catholic & Single Dating a dualistic person

Mar 9, 2011

The Gospel reading for this past Sunday shows Jesus driving home the objective fact that only those who do the Father’s will are going to make it to heaven. Our Lord must have encountered a great deal of excuse makers who though they were assured of getting into heaven.

Jesus states, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.” He goes on to say that there will be those who say they prophesied, or drove out demons, or did mighty deeds in His name.

But Jesus is not impressed. “Did you do the will of my Father?” That is the question we will all be asked. We will not be able to stand there and say, “but I went to Mass every day” or “I gave 10% of my money to the Church” or “I spent lots of my free time volunteering for good causes,” if at the same time we lived a consistent life of sin that we knew was not in accordance with God’s will.

Perhaps you willingly engage in pornography, have pre-marital sex, steal from your company, lie to people, cheat on your taxes, overcharge someone in the name of business, break traffic and other legitimate civil laws, gossip about others habitually, or are mean spirited to such a degree that you are inclined to think and talk negatively of others.

There are people who use prayer as their excuse for doing some pretty lousy things to other people. And there are those who use their religion to excuse their questionable practices, or question your actions and accuse you of not being Christian. I have heard stories of people getting cheated or dealing with sub-par work from Catholic business owners who assumed that because they were Catholic the people should do business with them and not question the work. I, myself, have been told on many occasions that I owe a refund for a member who no longer wants to be a member, and I should give it if I am a true Catholic.

None of these things (and so many more common daily things) are in accordance with God’s will. Therefore, if we readily and willingly do these things, we are not doing the will of the Father as Jesus indicated is required.

What I am referring to here is the “Dualistic Man.”

The Dualistic Man is a human being who attempts to live in two worlds at the same time. One world is where they play God and do whatever it is they desire. The other world is where they have to do what is expected and do their best to conceal the secret world they have created.

So many who live this dualism have done it for so long they don’t even realize that do it anymore. It’s just who they are. This is why they are shocked and surprised when someone discovers something about their secret world. It’s not the “real” world, so why would anyone take anything they do in that world seriously or judge them by it?

Many of us have come across this phenomenon in every day life, especially in dating experiences. You hear the person speak so wonderfully about very important things like living the Catholic faith or any other important topic of life, and they seem so normal and grounded. Then you discover they have been doing something contrary to what they talked about, and it leaves you confused, or even hurt.

This is the Dualistic Man in action. They create a world without consequences. It is a world they can enter into at will in order to be someone that they know they cannot be in the real world.

What happens, sad to say, is they get to the point where they cannot distinguish between the secret and the real world, and thus lose themselves.

You might be surprised to hear that every person has some level of the “Dualistic Man” in them. This is simply because we all sin. No one would sin if we knew we could not get away with it. We sin precisely because we think what we are about to do is something good, and we should do it. It is presented in our minds in that secret world where actions have no consequences.

Happily, for many of us, we are quickly jolted out of this secret world because of our well-informed consciences that convict us of the sin, produce sufficient sorrow and guilt, and prompt us to make things right again. That is called grace. And the more we live in the life of grace, the less frequent our visits to the secret world become.

Many others, unfortunately, have spent too much time in the secret world and developed the habit of living a dualistic life. They need a great deal of help to end this unhealthy existence, especially if they ever hope to enter into the vocation of marriage, and more so, enter into the kingdom of heaven.

The remedy is a simplistic approach to life. Simplicity in attitude, in the way we live, in the way we deal with others, in the way we approach God. Simplicity and focus bring clarity to our minds and peace to our lives. Do the will of the Father, and you will be happy. This shows your love for God, and He in turn blesses you abundantly. Jesus made Himself available to us completely so that we could do the Will of His Father in Heaven.

We all owe it to God and to ourselves, and also to the people we date and the one person we hope to love and marry one day, to live every day in accordance with what we know is God’s will so that we will grow in grace and merit receiving such blessings as the gift of love and marriage.

Our Lord said to live every day as if it were our last. Can you say at the end of this day that you have done everything in accordance with God’s will? If not, make your peace with Him and beg Him to give you the strength to amend your life in every way necessary so that your life will be simplified, focused, and totally dedicated to doing what is right and living truth.