Rooting Out Hidden Faults

by James F. McElhone

This step-by-step guide on how to make a Particular Examen is rooted in the five wounds of Jesus and includes prayers, sample format, and predominant faults to avoid in prayer, work, study, and recreation. As most of us struggle with the same assortment of sins, these targeted reflections will assist you in conquering your faults.

This reprint of the 1952 classic contains prayers for each topic from the traditional Roman Missal that help you foster the proper spirit of mind and unction of heart for fruitful meditation.

Here is a valuable resource for any Catholic — priest, consecrated, or lay — wishing to develop a plan for spiritual holiness. It provides self-inventory questions for each vice to help determine angles of attack and addresses misconceptions about each vice. You will learn ways to defeat your vices, and thus serve God more wholeheartedly, and will find rules for practicing fraternal charity by contemplating the cardinal and theological virtues.

If your root sin is a type of pride, this book will show you how to cultivate the corresponding virtue of humility by meditating on the lives of Jesus and Mary. By the same token, if your predominant fault is avarice, the biblical references provided will bolster your resolve and engender thoughts of poverty in spirit instead. Penetrating reflections are offered to overcome lust with purity, anger with
meekness, gluttony with temperance, envy with common sense, and sloth with zeal.

You will also acquire tips on how to:

Read the Bible more efficaciously to reflect on Christ and grow in union with God
Thank God for His goodness and the many graces He showers upon you and others daily
Ask the Holy Ghost for self-knowledge, growth in virtue, and the seven gifts
Determine your dominant sin and assess your progress daily through the Particular Examen
Practice the presence of God in imitation of Our Lady in every circumstance
Develop personal and practical resolutions and a firm purpose of amendment
Hidden saints embolden the Church in times of persecution. Take up your cross. Defend your faith for God’s glory and the salvation of souls.

Genres: Catholic, Theology, Nonfiction

160 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 1951

Reviews

[booklady · Rating 5 out of 5]

Have read parts of this before. Getting it out and reading it again. It's invaluable!

[Maurisa Mayerle · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great book to have on hand not only for spiritual reading but as a reference when examining your conscience before confession.

[Emily Friedl · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best examination of conscience you'll ever read. It has an examen based the virtue of humility for each temperament.

[Emily Howard · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every Catholic should read this book. You can really learn stuff about yourself.

[Kathleen · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book to read if you are really serious about growing, and becoming the person God created you to become. It will cut you open, and you will begin to see yourself as you are.

[Michael Mullin · Rating 5 out of 5]

So good. Changed how I approach Confessions.

[Siobhain · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am so thankful for this book. When I was growing up, I did not get much guidance in forming or examining my conscience. This book has been hugely helpful, especially in the not so obvious areas. I had no idea until I read this book that I was succumbing to pride in so many ways. After reading this, there is the danger that one will start to see the faults of others in a more glaring light as well as one's own. This can help one see the problematic dynamics in a relationship or a situation. Still the true beauty of the book is in better understanding one's own faults and learning how best to identify them, confess them, and work to counter them by growing in the opposite virtues. This book is not recommended for those who are scrupulous. However, if you feel pretty good about yourself and struggle to think of sins to confess when going to confession, this is the book for you. Nothing like a good bright light and a mirror to start examining those flaws. In addition to the meat of the book, the examen, the first pages of the book guide one in a series of meditations on the wounds of Christ and and prayers in order to prepare the heart for an examination of conscience. I highly recommend this book.

[Kristina · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book to take with you for Spiritual Reading in Adoration or any other meditative time. Form your prayer life and examen to root out those particular faults.