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Writer's pictureProfiles in Catholicism
May 29, 202332 min read

Drug Addiction



A Message from the Editor


There were 70,601 fentanyl overdose deaths reported in 2021 in the United Stets. More than a year ago, Rep. Greg Murphy, M.D. published an Op-Ed in The Daily Advance that more young people are dying from fentanyl than from Covid-19. . Yet we are paying a fraction of the attention to this epidemic than has been paid to the Covid-19 pandemic


Fentanyl test strips (FTS) are a form of drug testing technology which can detect the presence of fentanyl in drug samples prior to use. FTS are a reliable, common-sense means of providing people at risk of fentanyl exposure with more information that can decrease risk of overdose. If High Schools and Colleges would perform this test on their students monthly, we could decrease fentanyl deaths significantly through effective counseling. . Those politicians and school and colleges board members who oppose this are morally responsible for many of these deaths Parents need to be more active in demanding monthly tests at schools.


Several religions have covered up child sexual abuse crimes. Covering up child sex abuse crimes can lead to more child sexual abuse crimes. Local, state and national government need to have more effective punishments for child sex abuse crimes as well as their cover-up if we are to significantly reduce these crimes.


A Quote to Remember


“I understood, through rehab, things about creating characters. I understood that creating whole people means knowing where we come from, how we can make a mistake and how we overcome things to make ourselves stronger.” by Samuel L. Jackson


Prayers


A prayer to end death from Opioids

“Rock Bottom”


Dear Lord, my skin is blotchy and my complexion pale,

There are sores on my face and I cannot look in the mirror,

My stomach churns, noisily, but food and drink must wait,

As the money dropped by me pays for slowly slowly death.


Dear Lord, last night my head was down, behind a food bin,

Under some steps, cold still, even as Spring turns to Summer,

Behind a supermarket where dogs come and share the scraps

I collect to stay their going and keep me warm amidst rags.


Dear Lord, bread and soup are brought round late, better late,

The day is for begging and, if possible, stealing, but time is

Dribbling away as there is less and less money for more and

More of what I need to needle, when I can, if there is a vein.


Dear Lord, it was so sparkly when it began, taking it once,

With others, at a party, well dressed as we were, still at home,

Hiding it until the clothes tore, the dirtiness grew, the secret

Written in the changes, isolation and growing unspokennesses.


Dear Lord, where are the pushers now, having pushed me to the

Brink, what is next if not the end of broken health and wealth,

The screaming shame and pain of a dripping loss of life, dribbling

Away, shrinking the hope of another day, another “fix” away?


Dear Lord, where are the gangs going, the dealers and wheelers

We do not see, the peddlers who peddle in secret and secure

Untold income from the dying and always, always making more,

More draining the lives of losers, like me, until the last drop?


Dear Lord, you are the “rock” at the bottom, lying as I do on the Stone ground, looking into the eyes of the sky, the startling stars,

Wondering, as I lose a little more consciousness remaining in me,

How to help those who start, to stop, or to stop those even starting.


Oh rock beneath the rubbish, send your Holy Spirit to blow through

The cluttered thoughts, sparking a change impossible to engineer,

As I lie, tied down with myriad little worries, memories, demands

Impossible to satisfy with nowhere else to go, to turn, but to you.


Oh Mother of the Lord, visit this wine-less heap of unhappiness,

Stretching back too long and not enough time left to go on, further,

And plead with your Son, who can turn our strangled sufferings – if

He speak the word of freedom from these pains and chains closing in!


Oh Joseph, too, do not neglect to take and shape my day, long since

Lost to work and rest, that from this bottom of the drain, may light

Draw to me what darkness has kept away and spread the hope of a

Life still to be lived, rising as from a rock on which to stand again!


Oh Lord, let me be as the one who stands again and looks back, Aghast, at the life that was, and take that picture that contrasts today

With yesterday, that this slab of earth on which I lie is not the place

Whereon I die, stretched out both to reach another, different high.

Oh Holy Family, Love’s own home for all, let me but stand again, Hand in hand with your Holy help, steadying me in the company of The Church of sinners clinging to the Spirit’s purgatorial ways, giving

Us the grace to announce to you the gift of love ever newly given you!


by Francis Etheredge, author of the forthcoming, Lord, Do You Mean Me? A father-Catechist! to be published by En Route Books and Media, 2023: https://enroutebooksandmedia.com/doyoumeanme/.


Prayer for Immigrants Who Died Trying to Reach the United States

In your mercy, Lord, receive the souls of those who undertook perilous journeys to escape hunger or crushing oppression or threats of violence May they who did not know peace and security in this life now find in you and with all the angels and saints a place of peace and happiness, as the share in the fullness of life with you, their creator and redeemer. Amen by Father Louis Cameli Profiles in Catholicism


Prayer for the 15 Nigerian children into who died in a boating accident


Dear God, Into your hands we commend the lives of these beautiful children from Sokoto, Nigeria. Receive them in your presence and fill them with your joyous love where there is no tears neither suffering and grant to their families the comfort and healing they need. Amen.

by Margarita Carreon Profiles in Catholicism


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Spiritual and Emotional Roots and Treatment of Addiction - Dr. John Townsend







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