Crossroads to faithlessness

Looking back at my journey thus far I cannot help but think back to the time where I faced the darkest trials against my faith. High school time was when my faith was tested and challenged the most at times, I thought I had almost lost faith. When looking at our youth and young people I cannot help but think about all the difficulties and obstacles regarding their faith. In high school and college times are when many young people lose hope in God, and drop their faith. There may be many factors that contribute to this; let us explore some of the possible reasons why our youth may have lost their faith during this difficult time of their life. During high school many youths experience more freedom then they have ever received in their lives. They no longer rely on the values, ethics, disciplines and guidance of their parents. Because of the immense amount of freedom and that they have not been taught how to responsibly handle such freedom, many young people tend to rebel and cave into pure pressure. At this time they are heavily exposed to many hazardous and secular values that may go against the teachings of their parents. These values lead them to go against their parents teachings, values and what they have been taught at church. These negative values lead them down a road that departs from the love of God, their relationship with Christ is diminished because they have embraced such immorality. They eventually try to justify their actions and go against the truths of faith, they reject the moral truth and therefore also reject God who is the source of these moral truths. They stray from God and his path because they have mistakenly taken the path of immorality. They either eventually lose faith in God or because of the sins they have committed they know longer abide by the law of The Lord because they deem it irrelevant to their lives. They become secular and lose hope of The Ever Loving God. May this short reflection fuel us to aid those who have crossed onto this path of faithlessness, because it only takes a moment for us to help them understand the mercy of Our Lord and this can quickly lead them to conversion.