CASTIMONIA

Sexual Purity Support & Recovery Group

Character Defects

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New Castimonia Meeting in Cypress, TX (Northwest Houston)!

I am humbled to announce that we will officially be starting a new Castimonia meeting on Thursday nights at Fairfield Baptist Church in Cypress, TX on June 4th!  This is our second meeting located in Northwest Houston.
Location information is written below.
Beginning June 4, 2015
Thursday Nights
Time: 8:00PM – 9:30PM
Location: Fairfield Baptist Church
Room 206/208
27240 Highway 290
Cypress, TX 77433
281.373.5446
This meeting should help those that live in far Northwest Houston who may not have the opportunity to travel down to Katy or Lifepath Church to a Castimonia meeting.
Praise be to God, the father of our Lord Jesus Christ, for all He has done to grow His ministry!

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Rigorous Honesty – VIDEO

I love recovery movies.  These movies typically include plots involving alcoholism, drug addiction, sex addiction, support groups, honesty, selfishness, selflessness, redemption, etc… that are the main theme in the movie. 

I finally watched the movie Flight which came out a few years ago. Below is a synopsis of the movie.

Commercial airline pilot Whip Whitaker (Denzel Washington) has a problem with drugs and alcohol, though so far he’s managed to complete his flights safely. His luck runs out when a disastrous mechanical malfunction sends his plane hurtling toward the ground. Whip pulls off a miraculous crash-landing… More that results in only six lives lost. Shaken to the core, Whip vows to get sober — but when the crash investigation exposes his addiction, he finds himself in an even worse situation.
What I saw in this movie was the healing power of finally stepping out of denial and practicing rigorous honesty with ourselves and with others.  This is exactly what we do in Castimonia in our program.  We stop lying and start being honest, even when we have a slip or relapse.  We have come to understand that rigorous honesty is more important that our sobriety in the program.  If we are not honest, we are not sober, even if we haven’t slipped or relapsed.  If we are not honest, then we are simply a “dry drunk” white-knuckling through recovery.  Rigorous honesty is tough, something that I personally have to practice on a daily basis.  For the man in this film, when he finally became honest, he gave everything up in doing so.  THIS is the level of rigorous honesty we must achieve, to be honest even when it means we may lose everything! 

I hope you enjoy watching this video as much as I enjoyed creating it.  As always, take what you like and leave the rest.

FAIR USE NOTICE: This video may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for purposes such as criticism, comment, teaching, & education, etc. This constitutes a ’fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law NO COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT INTENDED! All trademarks and copyrights remain the property of their owners.

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Freedom or Death – VIDEO

What is it about underdog war movies that really gets my blood pumping? I love these types of movies and this one is one of my favorites.  It wasn’t until entering recovery that the Holy Spirit gave me some special “recovery glasses” that have allowed me to spot recovery themes in various media; music, movies, photographs, etc…  These themes can include support groups, honesty, selfishness, selflessness, redemption, etc… that are portrayed in the movie. 

Braveheart is one of these movies.  The plot of this movie has been pasted below courtesy of Google:

Braveheart tells the story of the legendary thirteenth century Scottish hero named William Wallace (Mel Gibson). Wallace rallies the Scottish against the English monarch and Edward I (Peter Hanly) after he suffers a personal tragedy by English soldiers. Wallace gathers a group of amateur warriors that is stronger than any English army.

What I saw in this movie was the fight that William Wallace had in him to be free.  This is the same fight that I see in myself and many men who struggle with maintaining sexual purity.  For far too long we have been under the thumb of tyranny and oppression by our sexual sin and now that we have entered recovery, we must FIGHT, fight for our freedom!  This is exactly what we do in Castimonia, we come together in the group to fight against the world and the sexual sin that keep us captive.  We must be willing to fight for our purity, fight for our families, and fight for our God.

I hope you enjoy watching this video as much as I enjoyed creating it.  As always, take what you like and leave the rest.

FAIR USE NOTICE: This video may contain copyrighted material. Such material is made available for purposes such as criticism, comment, teaching, & education, etc. This constitutes a ’fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 of the US Copyright Law NO COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT INTENDED! All trademarks and copyrights remain the property of their owners.

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Effects of Emotional Abuse

Douglas Besharov states in Recognizing Child Abuse: A Guide for the Concerned, “Emotional abuse is an assault on the child’s psyche, just as physical abuse is an assault on the child’s body”(1990). Children who are constantly ignored, shamed, terrorized or humiliated suffer at least as much, if not more, than if they are physically assaulted. Danya Glaser (2002) finds that emotional abuse can be “more strongly predictive of subsequent impairments in the children’s development than the severity of physical abuse.” An infant who is severely deprived of basic emotional nurturance, even though physically well cared for, can fail to thrive and can eventually die. Babies with less severe emotional deprivation can grow into anxious and insecure children who are slow to develop and who have low self-esteem. Although the visible signs of emotional abuse in children can be difficult to detect, the hidden scars of this type of abuse manifest in numerous behavioral ways, including insecurity, poor self-esteem, destructive behavior, angry acts (such as fire setting and animal cruelty), withdrawal, poor development of basic skills, alcohol or drug abuse, suicide, difficulty forming relationships and unstable job histories. Emotionally abused children often grow up thinking that they are deficient in some way. A continuing tragedy of emotional abuse is that, when these children become parents, they may continue the cycle with their own children. Some children may experience emotional abuse only, without ever experiencing another form of abuse. However, emotional abuse typically is associated with and results from other types of abuse and neglect, which makes it a significant risk factor in all child abuse and neglect cases. Emotional abuse that exists independently of other forms of abuse is the most difficult form of child abuse to identify and stop.

There is no greater evil than those who willingly hurt an innocent child. Unknown