VIII: Dangers to Young Men

EVERY period of life has its pitfalls. But no time is so dangerous as that of youth.

A young man feels that he is more or less his own master. He also feels that he is very capable of managing his own affairs. He is full of life. The future looks bright. He has great confidence in himself. Self-confidence is a good thing, but not if it displaces confidence in the wisdom of others.

And that is the very thing which ordinarily happens with a young man, and it is the main source of danger to him. How many men of middle age have said that they would give all they possess to have known at twenty what they knew at forty! Yet, in spite of this, the man at twenty fancies that he has no need of advice or direction. The man who has that assurance is the very one who needs advice most.

If a young man can be brought to see the benefit of advising with his parents, he has escaped half the dangers ahead. I do not say he must always act on their advice, for he may have tendencies and capabilities which they fail to appreciate. But ordinarily their advice will be sound and the best to follow.

A young man sees visions. Life to him is one brilliant prospect. A heart to heart talk with parents will often dispel the unrealities of his vision and disclose the substantial realities. My first word to young men is they should have full confidence in themselves, and yet distrust themselves. That looks like a contradiction, does it not?

Napoleon always planned to win. He also made every provision for retreat, in case of defeat. Let a young man have confidence in himself, but also realize that distrust of self is the true associate of self-confidence. This self-assurance, joined with self-distrust, will also be the young man’s greatest protection against the peculiar dangers which beset the path of youth. He should have confidence in his power to overcome temptation. Otherwise, he is defeated beforehand. But he should also have that distrust of self which warns him against rushing into temptation.

No man is strong of body, no matter what his constitution may be, if he does not eat what preserves health and avoid what ruins it. Because a man is strong, he cannot trust himself to eat tainted meat. Any man who is so sure of his strength that he does not distrust dangerous food has not self-confidence, but self-disregard.

There are certain things in life more deadly for young men, no matter how virtuous they may consider themselves, than poisoned meat is for a healthy and strong man. There is such a thing as poisoned pleasure. Keep away from it!

Sometimes we read of persons poisoned by something they ate at a banquet. They enjoyed the banquet immensely. A few hours later they were dangerously ill, or perhaps dead. There are pleasures of life which are tainted. They cause illness of mind and body, and often death. But we cannot be taken unawares by them, as men at a banquet. We are warned. Tainted pleasure is labelled.

Every pleasure of life that is forbidden by God’s commandments is labelled poisonous. Sin is that label. The man who wants to disregard that label, may do so. But he must not blame anyone but himself if he meets with fatal results.

If we should see a warning flag outside a house, in a neighborhood where there was smallpox, we would keep away. God puts a warning flag on every pleasure that is dangerous to the life of the soul. It is the warning flag called Sin. Is a thing a sin? Keep away from it. Otherwise you will rue your action. You may have what you call a good time, but you will pay for it.

The government and the press have of late been warning men of the dreadful dangers of certain sexual indulgences. God gives a better warning. He gives the only warning that is really effective. He tells men that if they do certain things they violate His orders—they disobey the Ruler of the world. They commit sin, and if they die in sin, they will lose their souls.

That is God’s preventive, and it is the best on all occasions. Instruction and enumeration of diseases and disasters which usually follow impure practices will not stop them. Men will take a chance. That is why nowadays when we are better informed on sexual consequences than ever before, there is more sexual delinquency than ever before.

God knows man better than he knows himself. He provides the best means of safeguarding virtue and welfare. He says: Thou shalt not do it. And He adds that the man who violates His command, will lose his soul. Because he has God’s help, a Catholic young man has greater protection in life than any other.

The Catholic knows that he who loves God must also respect and reverence Him. The reverence which he has for God makes him regulate his life as God directs. Those who have no faith look upon God as a benevolent somebody who may be treated with less regard than they have for their fellow man.

If the government orders us to do something, we must respect the order. It will not do to say we love the government while we disobey it. Nor will it do to say that the government is good, and that it is too kind to punish for defying its orders.

It is all nonsense, this prattle about God being too good to punish transgressions of His law. It is worse than prattle, for it leads to the utter disregard of God’s law, and to the ruin of body and mind here and the ruin of the soul hereafter. Your father loved you when he punished you for your faults. He punished you because he loved you. God is not only good. He is also just. What a weakling He would be if He allowed His creatures to despise His authority!

Some young men who want to have their fling imagine that they can leave God out of the reckoning. But ask them at sixty. Even if there were no hereafter, the wages of sin is death. Nature, which is God’s servant, takes an awful toll for transgressions of God’s law.

But I leave that out. I am talking to Catholic young men. They know that Christ died on the Cross to save them from the consequences of sin. They know therefore that sin is a dreadful thing. That is enough. That is more than they could learn from all the lectures and instructions on sex matters which they could get in a year.

The love and fear of God have been sufficient to make generations of pure youths during all the ages of Christianity. How much sex instruction do they get in Ireland? And yet there is not a purer people in all the world. They fear God and love Him.

Everyone who truly loves God, fears Him— fears to offend Him. The reason so many young men are going to the devil is that they do not fear God. Neither do they love Him. They may say they do, but will they insult one whom they love? And what is it but an insult to God, deliberately to do what He declares to be most hateful to Him?

It only requires one truth rightly understood to make us virtuous. It is not necessary to know all the whys and wherefores of virtue. It is enough to know that God Almighty commands. If the commander of an army gives an order, the soldier has not to be told the why and wherefore. So it is sufficient for the young man to know that God commands him to avoid certain sexual indulgences. Even if no harm followed, the command is entitled to obedience.

And, thank God, with Catholic young men it is sufficient. That is why a Catholic keeps away from certain places, no matter how many irreligious young men may frequent such resorts. I know it is a terrible temptation to a young fellow to see his companions going the way of sin. But remember that numbers do not make an argument for a thing. If ten men or a thousand jumped from the Brooklyn Bridge, that would not make it right. If ten or a thousand ate tainted meat, that would not make it less detrimental for each one. So numbers do not count with God. Do not forget that.

Numbers are the young man’s big temptation in many things. He must make up his mind now that a crowd does not make a wrong thing right. Each man stands judgment with God on his own account.

Reverence for God is the young man’s greatest safeguard as he goes through life. It alone will carry him securely over the most dangerous paths. Reverence for God will also make him avoid the dangerous spots along the road. It is not safe to play with dynamite. Passions require only a spark under certain conditions, to cause an explosion. Keep away from the spark.

God has given certain passions and instincts for a wise purpose. Man is drawn strongly and agreeably towards woman for the purpose of honorable marriage. If man were without these passions and instincts, he would never marry. In that case, the human family would perish. Man is supposed to master his passions in accordance with God’s law. If he does not master his passions, they will run away with him.

No man is tempted beyond his strength. God says it. But man must do his part. If you give an unruly horse too much rein, he will run away with you. And so the passions. Either you are master or they. If they are in the saddle, God help you! If you have strong passions, God gave them to you, and He also has given you control of them. If they get beyond you, it is because you let them.

It is silly to hear young men say that they cannot help such and such a vice. They cannot help it because they do not, or did not, want to. God does not impose an impossible law. It may be hard at times to observe it, but it is hard at times to observe the law of the government. It is hard at times for a soldier to carry out orders. But that does not excuse him if he fails. So we should never say that God’s law is too much for us.

The sexual instinct is so strong in men generally because it is God’s way of bringing man and woman to be husband and wife. The sexual instinct in a man goes out to women generally. But it may be indulged only towards the one woman who is his wife, and has won his love in honorable marriage. Any sexual indulgence outside matrimony is condemned solemnly by Almighty God. The sexual instinct is nature’s means of establishing the family and continuing the human race. To employ it otherwise is to disobey the orders of nature’s God.

Suppose a messenger received a sum of money from a merchant with orders to deposit it in the bank. If the messenger used that money otherwise than as directed, he would be a thief. If he spent it to suit himself, even if what he bought were serviceable, he would be a thief and condemned as such. He might like very much to have a good time with that money, but if he used it for his own purposes, he would pay the penalty by arrest and imprisonment. If he said he was tempted, the court would ignore his plea.

So with us. God has given us certain instincts for a definite purpose. If we use them otherwise than as He directs, we incur the penalty of a transgressor of God’s law. No matter what anyone or any crowd may say, it is wrong and false if it goes against what God commands. There are many young men without any religion who are a law to themselves. We must let them alone. They have their responsibility with God. We have ours. And we shall find before long that their way is the way of destruction, even in this world, the destruction of everything that really counts in life.

The sooner a young man meets the girl he respects and loves, and marries her, the better, generally speaking. An early marriage well made is a great blessing to a young man. But a young man should never keep constant company with a girl whom he does not hope to marry. It is wrong for many reasons.

First of all, it is not fair to a good girl, and that is the only kind of girl he should associate with. It gives her false hopes and keeps her from other prospects. Suppose some one should act thus with his sister! In the second place, company keeping is dangerous unless it is inspired by the reverence and true love which leads to marriage. Protracted courtship is the source of great evils. If, after honorable association with a girl for a reasonable time, a young man realizes that she will not make a good life’s companion, let him cease his attentions to her.

Again I repeat it, a man should seek something more than looks in the girl whom he hopes to make his wife. Her traits, her disposition, and above all, her normal and ordinary conduct are important. When a man meets a girl who is suitable to his character and whose love he may win, the sooner he marries her the better.

Marriage steadies a young man, gives him ambition, and removes him from the temptations which beset the path of the average youth. Unless he has family obligations which stand in the way of marriage, or intends to embrace a life which requires celibacy, his normal career will be aided and safeguarded by a good marriage.

A good marriage! Ah, that is the point. And it will stand a good chance of being good if the young man tries to carry out the teachings and directions of Faith. Even for welfare here, there is nothing so helpful as religion. And for eternal welfare, which after all is life’s main issue, religion is indispensable.

A young man who is a practical Catholic has the best key to welfare in this life and in the life beyond. Dangers to young men are many and insidious these days. Human nature, left to itself, will not ordinarily carry a man through unharmed. That is why God comes to our aid by the Sacraments. No matter how weak we may be, we can make ourselves stronger than any temptation by the right use of the Sacraments.

God says we shall not be tempted above our strength. But He supposes that we take the nourishment He has provided to make us strong. We should not leave the Blessed Eucharist, the food of the strong, to old age, when the passions have run their course of ruin. A fiery horse needs a firm rein. In youth passions are a fiery steed. The Sacraments give us the spiritual strength to hold a firm rein on them. Unless a man controls them by God’s law, they will rush him over a precipice. Rightly controlled, they aid him to attain success and peace.

The passions serve a noble purpose. So does a surgeon’s knife. But the knife must be in a firm and skilled hand. Otherwise the operation brings ruin instead of relief. So the passions. Controlled by the Catholic man skilled in God’s ways and the use of His holy Sacraments, the passions become the motor of splendid achievements.

If a chauffeur guides his power properly, it drives his car safely and for long distances. But let him release control, and the machine will dash to its destruction and his death. The passions are a tremendous power. Controlled by God’s directions, they become man’s best agent of efficiency. Uncontrolled, they become his ruin.

Young man, follow Jesus Christ, and not His enemy, Satan. As you go through life, you are under the leadership of Christ or Satan. There is no middle course. You are either with God, or against Him. If you are with God here you will be with Him hereafter. To be with Him here means that at times you must fight, you must do violence to yourself, you must subdue your unruly passions.

But the issue will be eternal victory. With St.

Paul you will be able to say “I have fought a good fight. As for the rest, there is laid up for me a crown of justice, which the Lord, the just Judge, will render to me in that day.”