When Hannah from Rio Rancho, New Mexico, called in to The Patrick Madrid Show, she brought a tattoo artist’s dilemma to light: How do you honor God in a profession that marks the body?

Hannah said that going professional forced her to “lay down a lot of boundaries” and to be very strict about what she tattoos, what she does not. Her goal is simple: “it’s very important to me that I keep God first, above everything, including above the business.” Still, she worried aloud: “Am I putting that onto people?” and admitted, “I suffer from scrupulosity a lot.”

Patrick affirmed her humility and offered an analogy. People get haircuts and go to salons, he said, because “it’s a good thing to be presentable.” Motives can go wrong, but not every effort to look put together is vanity. At the same time, he invited Hannah to take her unease seriously: “the sense of unease that you feel could be your conscience bothering you,” and he encouraged her to ask the Lord to enlighten her mind.”

Patrick also noted that some Catholic exorcists warn tattoos can be spiritually dangerous, especially when they involve occult symbols. Hannah shared that she steers away from anything in the realm of astrology or occultism. When she asked about Saint Hildegard of Bingen, Patrick reminded her that Hildegard is a canonized saint and a doctor of the Church, and he distinguished astrology from cosmology, the study of the created universe.

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