This article is written for rebellious teens and young girls going into that phase. If you are not a rebellious teen, please let your son or daughter read this, or some young person you know at least.
Dear Rebellious Teen,
Now, you might think this is just another Catholic article your parents want you to read, but this time it’s different. This is coming from a sixteen year old who understands what you’re going through, what you’re feeling, and why you’re rebellious. But before you make stupid teenage decisions that you will regret for the rest of your life, please hear me out on these few points:
Your parents are actually right! When they talk about the dumb things they did when they were teenagers and that they now try to stop you from making the same mistakes, actually listen to them! Wouldn’t it be amazing to live a good Catholic life while learning from others’ mistakes without doing them? Unfortunately you don’t know everything, but you can learn from people’s experiences and mistakes and grow in wisdom! I bet this is sounding ‘uncool,’ isn’t it? But in the end, do you want to regret your teenage years living in sin? By all means, enjoy life! But follow the advice of others, through them you can avoid plenty of mistakes.
Don’t listen to your rebellious peers! Once you start listening to your parents and following God’s law, your peers will probably think you’ve lost a few brain cells. But in listening to your parents and following God’s law, you will save your soul! “What doth it profit a man to gain the whole world but suffer the loss of his soul?” You have to decide now whether you want to be everlastingly happy with Our Lord, or be somewhat happy for a few moments then suffer eternal pain in hell. Our Lord was alone on the Cross to give you an example. Follow Him and Him alone. People’s opinions and comments about you don’t matter; they don’t decide your eternity.
If you start sanctifying your soul at this young age, you have so much time to become a great saint! God isn’t trying to wake you up right now for no reason. He wants you to be holy! Maybe it isn’t fun or pleasurable like – as you might think – Justin Bieber, but what really matters? You’re meant to have a life full of true happiness, and this is only found when the soul finds God, “A soul is restless until it rests in Thee.” The Source of happiness is God, and the only way to be happy is to live for Him, by Him, and in Him.
“It’s too hard…there are too many rules…” I thought so too, but what’s really hard is having to constantly deal with our vices, human respect, and being controlled by the media. That is what I call slavery to the world. But isn’t a person more free when he gives his life to Christ, abandoning all vices and replacing them with virtue? Aren’t we free when we set aside all human respect and live for the goodness of God, and serve our one true Father in heaven? Don’t let the world tell you otherwise, freedom lies in the straight and narrow path, go find it.
So please, listen to the advice given to you, give your life to God, and find true happiness. Although there might be pleasures in the world, it never lasts. There is a choice between eternal happiness and eternal pain, which will you choose? The Truth will set you free, embrace It. God bless you all!
8 thoughts on “Letter to the Rebellious Teen”
Thank you! But my name isn’t Sean, it’s Alexandra 😀
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“But why listen to your parents? They’re just dragging you down and keeping
you from sanctifying your soul.”
I presume you meant to write “peers” instead of “parents” in that sentence.
You’re right! I missed that… I’ll fix it right away. Thank you, God bless!
Actually I did mean peers, it was just unclear. I rephrased it.
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Alexandra…I only read one paragraph of your article and then I stopped….when you wrote, “Your parents are right!” I stopped. It may be that, at the tender age of 16, you discovered that YOUR parents are right. My parents physically abused me and often told me how bad I was. They told me that if anyone ever knew how I really was inside, they would not like me or love me. Were they right? If they were, I would have killed myself as a teen. My whole survival to adulthood depended on the fact that there were some other people in my social milieu (ie., teachers) who told me that parents aren’t automatically right about everything. I would have killed myself by now if that were not the case. If no one would ever love me, and I was a bad person, why live? My parents used the “Fourth Commandment” constantly to try to control me. I rebelled because, by rebelling, I survived to adulthood. My parents told me God wanted me to “obey” but they never, once in all my years, told me that God loved me. To obey without love is the same as slavery. Were they right? Should I have believed them? In fact, I mostly, generally did believe them, which is why I needed psychological treatment to even begin to live a normal life in adulthood. Parents aren’t always right.