The Jeff Cavins Show (Your Catholic Bible Study Podcast) - Dealing with Shame in Your Life

Episode Date: November 7, 2025

Shame can quietly take root in our hearts—dictating how we see ourselves, how we live, and even how we relate to God. Drawing on Scripture and the wisdom of St. John Paul II, Jeff explains the crucial difference between guilt and shame—and how Jesus not only takes away our sins but melts away our shame with His love. Email us with comments or questions at [e-mail]. Text “jeffcavins” to 33-777 to subscribe and get Jeff’s shownotes delivered straight to your email! Or visit https://media.ascensionpress.com/?s=&page=2&category%5B0%5D=Ascension%20Podcasts&category%5B1%5D=The%20Jeff%20Cavins%20Show for full shownotes!

This podcast is brought to you by Ascension. To discover even more free Catholic podcasts, videos, and resources, to help you live your faith every day, visit ascensionpress.com. Welcome to the Jeff Kaven Show, where we talk about the Bible, discipleship, and evangelization, putting it all together in living as activated disciples. This is show 455, dealing with shame in your life. Well, my friend, how are you? How are you doing this week? I hope you're doing really well, particularly in the area of being a disciple of the Lord. Every single day, getting up and spending some time with the Lord, and then throughout the day,

your eyes are open, your heart's open, and hopefully your mouth is open too. And you're sharing with people wonderful things that God has done in your life. I pray that. That's what this show is all about, really. is 455 shows. And I think we stayed on course throughout the whole, the whole time talking about Jesus and walking with Jesus, walking in the power of Jesus, and becoming Jesus in this world. So I hope you get something out of it every week. And do me a favor. If you enjoy this show, it's very easy to get on the Ascension app now. And I would encourage you to share it with two or three people.

and just gift them with a free app. And they have access to so much on the Ascension app. So go ahead and share that with some people. Hey, today, you know what, we're going to talk about a topic that is timely. Now, when I say timely, there are different ways that you can prepare for a weekly show. One way is that you can just decide on topics,

you know, that you want to cover. And then there's times when you, you, pray about the show that you're preparing for, like today. And suddenly a topic comes up. And it's almost like the Lord is saying, I want to speak to certain people about this. There are going to be people that are going to be tuning in. And I want them to know how to deal with shame in your life. So that's what I did. That's what I did today. And so I can't help but believe that this is for you. And maybe you are facing shame in your life right now, or maybe somebody in your family is that you can share this with. But I want to be obedient to what I think the Lord was telling me

to do today. There's not a shortage of topics to talk about. I'll tell you that right now. But this was really, I think, given to me by the Lord for today. So we're going to talk about that. By the way, if you do want the show notes, and I have a few scriptures that I'm going to include here, All you got to do is text my name, Jeff Kavens. That's one word, Jeff Kavins, and text it to the number 3377. And we'll get you on board. We'll get you the show notes for every show going forward. They'll be waiting for you in your mailbox.

You'll get them. So let's talk about this a little bit. Now, no doubt you have probably been told or you witness someone being told, shame on you, right? It's kind of a common phrase in our culture. Shame on you. Now, when you really understand what shame is, I think that that phrase will probably be deleted and go in the trash can, and you won't be using that, at least the way we normally do. The last thing we really want to do is put shame on people. And it's devastating. It can it can tear your life apart. It can ruin your image of who you are as a daughter of God, as a son of God.

And it's very destructive, I think, to do that. We haven't used that with the kids growing up in our family, Emily and myself. We never want to put shame on people. We want shame to come off of people. That's really what we want. And Jesus is the answer. And we'll see that in just a moment or so. We'll see that.

But even children who don't know what the phrase means, they hear it and they don't know what it means, but it must be something bad, you know. And a parent who says, shame on you, even the way they say it, the child might not understand what shame is, but they do understand that there's something bad and probably something bad about me and that I should be disappointed in myself, right? Well, you heard this because someone was disappointed in you, if you heard that growing up, or they wanted you to simply know you did something wrong, you know, something that was uncalled for. You were not doing what you should have been doing, and so they placed that shame on you.

The interesting thing about shame, though, is that it's not something that you have to put on people. It's something that arises in the right circumstance where shame is appropriate, and it's the response. Well, look at that. Pope John Paul II has some really beautiful thoughts about this. But shame is a painful feeling of usually humiliation or distress that's caused by the consciousness of a wrong or foolish thing that you did. You're feeling like you're unacceptable, right? You know, one of the great classic examples of this that was put into literature with Nathaniel Hawthorne was his classic tale by Nathaniel Hawthorne. and it features Hester Prine.

Now, Hester Prine, you probably have heard about her. She was a 17th century, a Boston woman. She conceived a daughter through an adulterous affair and then struggled to create a new life of repentance in dignity. And she was led from the town prison with her infant daughter in her arms and on her gown was attached a scarlet letter. The uppercase letter, A, or adultery. So you probably have heard of that book.

And it dramatizes what many of us experience in other areas of our lives. Shame is associated with the desire to hide or like Hester Pryne did to just disappear. But you can't. It's almost like it'll outrun you. Now the psalmist said in Psalm 44, all day long, my disgrace is before me. and shame has covered my face at the sound of the taunter and reviler at the sight of the enemy and the avenger. That really describes it well, doesn't it? All day long, my disgrace is before me and my shame has covered my face. It's like, it's like I cannot get rid of this. And you know,

the book of Revelation identifies the devil in a number of roles in the book of Revelation and the dragon, but one description of Satan in the book of Revelation is this. He is the accuser of the brethren. He's the accuser of the brethren. And so if you have done something, said something, experienced something that has brought shame into your life, you better believe that he's going to be on you like a cheap suit. And he is going to be accusing you. day and night. And you either listen to that or you listen to what Jesus says. And I would highly recommend reading John chapter 8 with the woman caught in adultery and what

Jesus' response to her was. So now, before we go into this a little bit deeper here, I want you to know that there is a difference between guilt and shame. There is. There is a difference. guilt is related to a specific behavior it's an action that that was wrong you know and you're guilty and if you end up going to court you stand before your peers and they may say guilty you're guilty but shame isn't an action it speaks to who you are and how you feel about yourself it speaks

it speaks to your self identity that I'm a shamed person shame colors who you are you're in entire self. And that's why it's so important to deal with. Shame is something that we can experience. And listen, it's not just you doing something that can bring shame or you saying something that can bring shame into your life. You may experience shame because of a family member. You might experience shame because of a pastor. You might experience shame because of where you live. Maybe that brought on shame in your life. Or you experience shame because something that was private in your phone became public on social media. And there you are, right? And then you experience that shame. And so the shame is so powerful that it can hit you when you don't even

do it. Like I said, it could be something maybe your father, your mother, or your, a relative or someone in your city, you know, did something and you feel that shame. There is also an aspect of shame, though, that I would say is positive. Now, I don't think it's positive in the sense that it's good, but I think it's quite effective. And that is that the positive side of shame is that shame, you will typically think about the possibility of shame before you you do something that will bring on shame. It acts almost like a deterrent. You think, well, if I'm going to if I'm going to gamble and I'm going to put my house up as collateral

and then I'm going to go to Vegas and I'm going to gamble because I think I'm really lucky this month and you think about the consequences. What if I lose my house? What if I don't have any more money? what if something happens and I'm arrested or whatever it's a deterrence like I don't even want to risk that so there's a bit of this shame that we're aware of that is a deterrent to doing things it's the risk of shame right sometimes it's the price is just too much and you're not going to do it you simply aren't going to do it so thank God for shame and that's in that case but shame is a flag and you're not meant to walk in shame You're just not meant to walk in shame. So I'm going to take a break here. When I come back, I'm going to share with you something that Pope John Paul said,

Saint Pope John Paul said about shame. And I want to offer you the solution to dealing with shame and giving it to Jesus and being free and walking as a whole daughter of God, a whole son of God. Okay, you're listening to the Jeff Kaven show. Hi, my name's Father Mike Schmitz, and I'm excited to announce that I'll be hosting Season 4 of the Catholic Classics podcast from Ascension Press. This year, we'll read through The Imitation of Christ by Thomas Acampus and unpack the timeless wisdom and profound spiritual lessons laid out in this book.

You guys, the imitation of Christ is the second most widely read Catholic devotional ever written only behind the Bible. And so many saints have read this book. So many people have been inspired to imitate the life and teachings of Jesus through this podcast. You will learn what it means to imitate Christ and how we can do that in a world that seems to only want to pull us away from him. Starting October 22nd in the Ascension app, we'll read a section of the book every single day and then unpack what it means and how it applies to our lives today. You can start listening for free today by downloading the Ascension app,

or you can download the reading plan by visiting ascensionpress.com slash Catholic Classics. I'll see you over there. God bless. Welcome back. We're talking about shame today. And one thing for sure is that we don't want to put shame on people. Shame will take care of itself if you do something that is shameful, right? But again, I want to reiterate. I'm doing this today because I just had a real strong feeling that there were going to be people that absolutely needed this.

Not last week, not next week, but today needed this. They needed to hear this. So if you're experiencing shame right now, it becomes inside of you like a dictator. It becomes a dictator and that dictates your life. And this is acted out in a number of ways. One particular way is I'll use a mother or father as an example. The father who has got himself into some serious trouble, but nobody knows it. is afraid of being outed and then the result will be shame.

And so what happens is for a man who or a woman who is caught up in some kind of sin is that that accuser of the brethren is constantly talking to them, dictating to them about their life and what could happen. And so what happens is like in the instance of a father is that he doesn't become the man of God, the father, the leader in his home for his sons and daughters that he knows he should be. Why? Because he feels compromised. Because he feels like, what if that got out? I would be shamed. My children would be shamed. In other words, I don't want to lift the bar too high in case I fall. Now, that is a trap, isn't it? That's a trap. You need to be free from that trap. You really do.

now what did john paul the second say well he has a wonderful book that he wrote and i highly recommend you get it love and responsibility and in there he talks about shame listen to what he says he says we can then say that the phenomenon of shame arises when something of its very nature or in view of its purpose ought to be private passes the bounds of a person's privacy and somehow becomes public. Okay? So the things that were meant to be private and stay private are now out there in the public. And that is exactly what happened to Ms. Prine in the scarlet letter.

I'm trying to remember the name of that book. The scarlet letter, that's what happened to her. But it's also what happened to the woman in John chapter. eight who was caught in adultery. And she was set up for this. She was in a relationship with someone. And the Pharisees and the leaders, they found her and they brought her to Jesus and basically threw her down in front of Jesus and said, we caught her in the act of adultery. Moses said we should stone her. What say you? In Jesus, he went bent down and he wrote on the ground something. And he said, the one of you that's without sin cast the first stone. And he wrote down again on the

ground. And all of them left. They left, starting with the oldest to the youngest. They left. And the lady who was caught in adultery was alone now with Jesus. And she was freed from the accusers. She was freed by the love of Jesus. By the love of Jesus. In fact, Pope John Paul the second says concerning shame that it was his love that dissolved, that melted the shame in her life. Love melts the shame. It's like people with clothes, without clothes. Typically, if people were thinking about the idea of suddenly being found naked in public, they would naturally conclude that is going to be a shameful thing. But here's what John Paul II brings out that love, for example, in a marriage, melts that shame.

Love. Love dissolves that shame between a man and a woman when they're married and alone with each other. It's a beautiful metaphor that he brings. that he brings up. So this lady in John chapter 8, it was the mercy of God. It was the love of Jesus. It was his assurance that that she was a woman of dignity and important to him, to the father, that melted the shame. And I would, I would say that no matter what shame you might be facing in your life today, whatever it might be, um, that Jesus wants you to know that you are loved and forgiven and his arms are around you.

What can man do to you? If Jesus loves you and accepts you and he dissolves, he melts that shame with his love, what more could you ask for? And I find that the people who struggle with shame the most and they can't seem to shake are not always, but many times, are not close to the Lord. Because I can tell you this, if the Lord showed up at your home in person today, instead I want to talk to you about this, when he leaves your house in two or three hours,

you're going to be a different woman. You're going to be a different man. You really are. So let me switch gears here just for a moment. I want to look at a couple of scriptures. I really encourage you to read John chapter 8 and see how Jesus melted the shame of this woman caught in adultery, but I also want to share with you what John wrote in 1st John chapter 2 in verse 1. He talks about if you have sinned, you have an advocate. Okay. If you have

sinned, you have an advocate with the father. And who is that advocate? That's Jesus. He's the righteous one. He is, he is the advocate that you have with the father. So listen to what he says here. He says, my little children, this is 1 John 2.1. My little children, I am writing this to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father Jesus Christ, the righteous. Righteous. So Jesus is the advocate, but listen, he is also your husband. He is your husband. He is the the bridegroom. You are the bride. Christ, as your husband, has borne your shame. He is the suffering servant who took our shame upon himself. And not only did he take your shame upon himself, but he also acts as the advocate for you. So he has taken that on, and now he's an

advocate with the father on your behalf. That is, that's an amazing thing. So if you're struggling with shame today, just look up 1st John 2.1 and just pray it. Do Lexio de Vina on it and take it personally. I am writing this, John says, to you. And that's what it says, to you. And put your name in there so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. to what Hebrews says. Hebrews chapter 12 in verse 2. And, you know, when we talk about Jesus taking on our sin and Jesus taking on our shame in our life, it's not a theoretical thing. It really happened. He really took on your shame. He really did. Listen to what it says in Hebrews 12,

too. The cross back in Jesus' day was a sign of what? Well, it was a sign of death. It was a sign of judgment, but it was also a sign of extreme shame. Because what they would do is they would take somebody who spoke out against the Roman Empire, and they spoke out against Caesar, they spoke out against any of the Roman leadership, and they taught them a lesson. And what they did is they put them on a tree, nailed their body to a tree with their hands and their feet, and it wasn't 24-carat gold either. It was horrible. They would strip them naked and they would nail them to this tree. Where? Right on the main highway into town. Right on the main highway into town. For everybody coming in to sea as a warning that this may happen to you. So listen to what it says in Hebrews 12 too.

looking to Jesus, the founder and perfector of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. Now, let's build on this. We know he's your advocate. We know he took on your shame, but we also know now that he is at the right hand of the throne of God. He is at the right hand of the Father in heaven. I'll tell you what, he's in a very good place as your advocate. And you are in good hands. Jesus endured the cross and the shame for you. The shame was so bad that the Bible says Jesus despised it. He took it for you. Now, I'm going to ask you to think about something here as we get ready to close. If he despised your shame, it was he despised that.

shame and he took it for you and died for you, do you think it's honoring God for you to continue to carry it? Just think about that today. Knowing what he did for you, do you think it's okay to go forward today carrying it yourself? Or do you think it's honoring God to say, I understand what you did for me. Take my shame now. Lord, I give this to you. Wash me clean by your blood. Wash me clean by your blood. Fill me with life in the Eucharist. Give me a desire to marinate in your word to think like you think instead of what I've been accused of and the way I've been talking myself into utter failure and disappointment and depression. You see, this is the turning point right here. And one thing you might want to even think about is going to confession. And maybe

what brought on that shame you've never brought to confession before. Maybe that's what is on the menu today for you. But also to go to confession for the things we, remember in Mass we say, the things we do and the things we failed to do? Well, one of the things we failed to do is appropriate the gift and the grace of God in our life and say, Lord, look, I'm sorry that I'm the one that's been carrying this. And all this time, you took it. For me, you took my shame. So you might want to go to confession on this and just kind of a new beginning for you. But if you are caught, let me just say this. If you are caught right now, here's what I'm going to ask you to do, run run where to the Lord go to confession run to the Lord confess your sins receive forgiveness

receive his love he died for your sins he took your shame experience what the woman in John chapter 8 experienced freedom and a new beginning freedom and a new beginning remember this your dignity comes from God not from what happened to you. I'll say it again. Your dignity comes from God, not from what happened to you. I want to pray for you.

I love you, and I want to pray for you that this thing of dealing with shame in your life will be dealt with and that you truly will see that he took your shame and that you're a new person. You're a new person.

Live in that space. Trust him. Live as though you are cleansed. live that way. It's a new beginning. In the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit, Lord, I lift up my friend to you today, and I ask you, Lord, I ask you, Lord, to heal them. I thank you, Lord, for taking on their shame. I pray that their mind would be renewed by your word and that the narrative for their life would change and that inner talking that's been going on would all be changed because of your work. We respond in faith. We

respond by agreeing with you and personally entrusting ourselves to you, Lord, in this area of shame. Jesus, you're so good. You are so good. Lord, today melt my shame with your love. Dissolve my shame in the waters of baptism. Thank you for the new beginning. In Jesus' name, amen. Name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. you. Look forward to being with you next week.