The First Commandment in 2013

Teenagers, and most adults as well, give a lot of things in their lives more priority or importance than is really necessary. With all the technology and gadgets we have access to it becomes very easy to forget about things like God. Sure most of say were not idolizing our “stuff” but how many people are actually telling the truth when they say that they don’t put their belongings first, or near first, in their life. In the modern world idolatry is just as prevalent as it was in ancient times; we just go about in more subtle ways now. Instead of worshipping huge numbers of gods and goddesses we worship things like wealth and material goods.

The First Commandment states that you shall not commit idolatry; you shall only worship the one true God. Today teenagers especially idolize things before God. We no longer worship a pantheon of gods and goddesses like people did in ancient days; we put things like our iPods, computers, and phones before a majority of things in our lives, including God. These things become so important to us that we ignore our relationship with God. God should be the foremost part of our lives; he should be one of our, if not our first priority. We also hold many famous celebrities in high regard, and there is nothing wrong with that. It becomes a problem when we hold celebrities, or any person, in such a high level of regard that we almost deify them and make them more important than God.

Now many of the denominations of Christianity say that Catholics are guilty of the same sin they accuse so many others of committing when it comes to the saints. Although devote Catholics venerate the saints and relics, that is show great respect and reverence for these people and items, they do not idolize them. For everyday objects though even veneration is going too far; not only does it bring you closer to idolizing the object, but something like your phone or iPod doesn’t deserve that much respect and reverence. If your honest with yourself, it’s really not that important to have massive amounts of wealth or material goods; it’s certainly nice, but should never be desired to the point that it blocks out what’s really important in your life.

One way you could work on changing is by going to church. Instead of just going to church and suffering through it, try and actually listen to the message being given to you. Now you don’t need to put much effort into this either, you go to church for an hour a week and listen and then you’re done. For the rest of the week all you have to do is try and give God a moment or two out of your day to thank him for what you have or to just pray. Eventually the theological virtues of faith, hope, and love will allow you to gain a deeper understanding of God and grow closer to him.

The final thing that disobeying the First Commandment by creating idols to worship or place before God could lead to is belief in magic and other superstitions. The church describes superstition as giving someone or something a power that belongs exclusively to God and relying on said power to help you rather putting your faith and trust in God.