"In the spirit of Christ the Shepherd, priests should instruct their people to seek forgiveness of their sins with contrite hearts in the sacrament of Penance, thereby turning more and more to the Lord as they remember His words: 'Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand' (Mt. 4:17)'’. —Vatican II, Decree on the Priestly Ministry and Life.

"We would like to recommend two things very simply. We think they are very important. The first one, to all: to give and restore, if necessary, to the Sacrament of Penance, the vital function it has in Christian life. There is no redemption in practice from human frailty, it can be said, and there is no real evocation to following Christ, and spiritual perfection, which is hot derived from the strict and wise reception of this Sacrament; the Sacrament of humility and joy. The second thing, to priests: to recommend to them the esteem, the practice, patience and the art of the care of souls, characteristic of this ministry." —Pope Paul VI, 5th April 1974

Nihil obstat: R. J. Cuming D.D. Censor. Imprimatur: David Norris V.G. Westminster, 12-II-75.

The Nihil obstat and Imprimatur are a declaration that a book or pamphlet is considered to be free from doctrinal or moral error. It is not implied that those who have granted the Nihil obstat and Imprimatur agree with the contents, opinions or statements expressed.

Confession:Why we go

James Tolhurst

One of the most common expressions in use in the Church must be "I really ought to go to Confession." It is certainly time but it so often remains unfulfilled. Why ought we to go to a priest and confess our sins? What is so special about Confession?

Man's Yearning for God’s Forgiveness

The reason for Confession goes back to the very beginning of mankind and the advent of sin into the world. Alongside the disaster that was sin. God introduced an assurance of ultimate forgiveness. It was part of God's persevering guidance of Israel that: "Even when man disobeyed you and lost your friendship you did not abandon him to the power of death, but helped all men to seek and find you. Again and again you offered a covenant to man, and through the prophets taught him to hope for salvation." (Eucharistic Prayer IV)

Increasingly, Israel turned to the Lord their God that He might purify them of their sins and take away their guilt:

"But who can detect all his errors? From hidden faults acquit me. From presumption restrain your servant and let it not rule me.

Then shall I be blameless,

clean from grave sin."           (Psalm 19: 12-14)

It involved a turning towards Him, a rending of the hearts rather than of the garments; a realisation that He alone could bring about forgiveness:

"But now I have acknowledged my sins

My guilt I did not hide,

I said, 'I will confess my offence to the Lord'

And you. Lord, have forgiven the guilt of my sin." (Psalm 31: 5)

Unlike other nations, Israel had the strong personal attachment to the God who was offended by sin. Other deities thrived on force and cruelty and the justification of power. But Almighty God showed His chosen people that ultimately sin was the cause of all unhappiness and that they would only live in peace and harmony if they turned from it in the depths of their hearts and asked for forgiveness:

"My offences truly I know them;

My sin is always before me.

Against you. you alone have I sinned

What is evil in your sight, I have done." (Psalm 50:5-6)

As God was personally concerned with the whole people of Israel and all mankind so the individual had to realise that he could not place the blame for his inhumanity and greed and selfishness on the environment, the stars, fate or the gods. He must recognise his own responsibility and turn to God. his help and his Saviour: "0 Lord, I am oppressed; be thou my security." (Isaiah 38: 14)

Of course this yearning for true forgiveness was implanted in the heart of man in order that it should be fulfilled. Our thirst is only satisfied by drinking. Man's thirst for forgiveness is only satisfied by that forgiveness being expressed in tangible form. At the summit of Israel's spiritual life the people could beg of God who had saved them at the Passover to take away their sins. But there was a yearning for far more than that in the prophets and the psalms.

The Lamb of God Who Takes Away the Sin of the World

John the Baptist is the voice of Israel when he points to Jesus Christ and says "Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!" (John 1:29) Our Lord is that forgiveness of God for which Israel and through them, all mankind, waited. He is that fulfilment of the line of revelation in Person. That is the significance of His statement in the synagogue at Capernaum: "This Scripture which I have read in your hearing today is fulfilled." (Luke 4: 21) He is, in very person, man's salvation and therefore knows all that there is in man, all his life, with its sorrows, its joys, its heights and depths. He knows it. He forgives, and He loves.

He expresses the pardon of God, not as some thought the demands of justice. To the woman caught in the act of adultery He says: "Has no one condemned you? Neither do I condemn you; go, and do not sin again." (John 8:11) There is no question of overlooking man's sinfulness. He tells the Samaritan woman the truth about her life and does not deny the protestations of Simon the Pharisee about the sinful woman at His feet but shows that the pardon of God grapples with sinners and lifts them up. His is the concern of the Good Shepherd and the love of the Prodigal Son's father because greater love than His, no man has or ever will have.

Jesus Christ: His Divine Authority Over Sin

But He also expresses the authority and power of God over sin. It is fashionable to explain away the contact between Jesus Christ and the spirits of those who were possessed. Yet we believe in Satanism. .. We might possibly reflect on the uncanny outburst which came from the mouths of the possessed, in the Gospel: "What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God." (Mark 1:24) They knew that He did possess that authority over the mystery of iniquity itself. They knew it and recognised its power even when it came to the destruction of a whole herd of pigs by those whose name was Legion. That same authority not simply to proclaim forgiveness like John the Baptist, but to transform the sinner into one loved anew by God was quite simply divine. The Pharisees were right: "Who can forgive sins but God only?" And Jesus took them up on that very statement and turned to the cripple lying before him:

"Which is easier to say, 'Your sins are forgiven you’, or to Say 'Rise and walk'? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins ... I say to you, take up your bed and go home." (Luke 5: 23-25)

It is fascinating to read the whole account and watch the tension build up and the impact sink in. Here was a man whom they knew was paralysed, yet, at a word, he walked again. Surely, at a word his sins also were forgiven: that greater wound was also cured. Christ clearly claimed that sort of authority not once but time and time again. At a word, he summoned Lazarus from the grave; at a word, he forgave sin. A§ the transforming power of electricity flows into the fire, so the power of God instantaneously brought about health and forgiveness. As the man born blind said, after his cure, "If this man were not from God, He could do nothing"; because He was God in Person, He could enter into relationship with man and quicken him to that new and abundant life.

It is through contact with the flesh of the Son of Man, that people found health and life and forgiveness. As the woman who had spent all her savings on doctors rightly said, "If I touch the hem of His garment, I will be cured," for power went from contact with His humanity. Our religion is not merely 'spiritual' but also 'physical'; for God really spoke and loved and wept and died in the physical Person of Jesus Christ.

Jesus Gave His Apostles Divine Authority to Forgive Sin

He also gathered around Himself those through whom he wanted to express that abiding reality of the Incarnation. He promised the Apostles His own authority to forgive sins;

"Truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." (Matthew 18: 18)

"Binding and loosing" in rabbinical language means the power to judge the permissibility or otherwise of an action and the exclusion from the community by the imposition of a ban, or re-acceptance by the removal of that ban. As Our Lord is referring directly to sin. He clearly means to give His Apostles supreme authority over sinners. He does this when He appears in the Upper Room on Easter Sunday:

"Jesus said to them again, Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I send you.' And when He said this. He breathed on them, and said to them, 'Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained'." (John 20:21-23)

Christ in those words gives to His Apostles, the first bishops of the Church (who possess the fullness of the priesthood) that authority which He has from the beginning with the Father and which He possesses coming into the world as its King and Lord. They are to forgive sins. They are to continue in their own selves that contact with Jesus Christ who is alone our forgiveness, as He is our High Priest.

Sacramental Confession in the Early Church

It is quite true that in the early Church for the first two centuries, there is little mention of the Sacrament of Confession. But there are several reasons for this, not the least being the realisation by the early Christians of the transforming power of baptism. It was almost unthinkable that one should return to sin after dying to it in Christ. As St. John bluntly states: "No one who abides in Him sins." (1 John 3: 6) The early Church was also strengthened in its holiness by the example of the martyrs and the opprobrium heaped upon those who gave way. Nonetheless we do find mention of the apostolic power of binding and loosing in the case of those who are "handed over to Satan" which was considered a form of excommunication, (cf. 1 Cor. 5: 5; 1 Tim. 1: 20)

The early writers talk of Confession being linked to baptism as a "second plank after the shipwreck" 1 when the first holiness is lost. St. Ambrose (A.D. 340-397) writes that the Church "possesses both water and tears; the water of baptism and the tears of repentance"2 and St. Gregory (A.D. 329-389) calls Confession "a baptism of tears.” 3 It was considered only right and just that anyone who did turn to sin after baptism ought to show his sorrow by even a public Confession and then a considerable penance before receiving absolution from the Bishop or Priest. The parallel was drawn between sin and leprosy in the Jewish law. If one was cured, it was mandatory to show oneself to the priest and receive his certificate of purification (cf. Matthew 8:4). St. John Chrysostom (A.D. 347-407) takes up this comparison:

"The Jewish priests had the power of cleansing from bodily leprosy, or rather in no wise to cleanse, but merely to declare •the cleansed to be clean ... As against this, our priests received the power, not merely of declaring an unclean soul, instead of a leprous body, to be clean, but of entirely purifying it.'4 There was a point in favour of public Confession, namely the edification of the other members of the Church, who had been scandalised by the sin. But the abuses were equally apparent and Pope St. Leo (A.D. 459) called it a "custom that cannot be approved" and emphasised that "it is enough to reveal the guilt of the conscience to the priest alone in secret Confession.”5

The Development of Doctrine

Such a practice spread from about the fifth century onward, under the impetus Of the Celtic monks. At the same time it became the custom to replace the long penance with immediate absolution. It is precisely this development of doctrine which led to our modem penance of saying prayers or performing certain small acts of charity. We ask and rely on the prayers of the whole Communion of Saints and the merits of Christ's Passion. Death and Resurrection to make up for our efforts. It is also the explanation for Indulgences.

Private Confession was obviously very much a part of the Church's life by the eleventh century. The Fourth Lateran Council (1215) merely lays down that one should go to Confession once a year which would have been bad law if the practice of going more often was not already widespread.6 The view that it was sufficient to be contrite and that Confession was superfluous, which Wycliffe held, was solemnly condemned by the Church at Constance in 1415. By then the value of private Confession to a priest was firmly established as the only ordinary means of receiving the forgiveness of Christ in the case of grave or mortal sins.

The Council of Trent

The corrosive action of Protestant doctrine provoked a reaction in the Church in the form of a masterly synthesis by the Council of Trent (1545-1563). The decrees of the Council crystallised this long period of development of the doctrine and practice of the Church over the centuries since Christ. The Council gave its full Apostolic authority to Tradition in a number of precise definitions. The teaching of the Church that Confession is a distinct Sacrament from baptism is clearly emphasised and it is firmly and clearly stated that such was the will of Christ from the beginning. Furthermore, He did not simply commission the Apostles to preach the gospel of forgiveness but gave them the power to absolve from sin in His name. This means that the practice and obligation of confessing all our serious sins in private to a priest is directly willed by Christ Himself.

Trent also encouraged the frequent confession of our imperfections and acts of selfishness which we call "venial sins". In many ways, the Church anticipated the modem yearning for a more personal contact with Jesus Christ by introducing a practice which makes Christ not simply the forgiver but also the encourager and healer of our soul. This, more than anything else contributed to the growth in sanctity in the Church and it is not surprising that all the recent Popes have sprung to its defence.

Recent Developments

Pius XII in Mystici Corporis (1943) not only highly recommends "the pious practice of frequent Confession, introduced by the Church under the guidance of the Holy Spirit" but also reminds "those among the young clergy who are diminishing esteem for frequent Confession, that the enterprise upon which they have embarked is alien to the Spirit of Christ and most detrimental to the Mystical Body of our Saviour.”7 This correlation of Christ and His Church occurs again in the documents of the recent Vatican Council II (1964)'where we find that "those who approach the Sacrament of Penance obtain pardon from God's mercy for the offence committed against Him and are, at the same time, reconciled with the Church which they have wounded by their sins."8

The Church has come to realise that frequent Confession is a catalyst for the whole spiritual life at a time when some are questioning the very basis and value of this sacrament. This is also evident in the insistence of the Church that young children who have reached the age of reason should be instructed to receive their first Confession before their first Holy Communion. Despite contrary opinions. Pope Paul VI in 1971 re-affirmed the traditional discipline authorised by Pope St. Pius X (1910): "The practice now in force of putting Confession ahead of first Communion should be retained."9

Penitential Services

"Penitential Services" as envisaged by the Church can provide a collective preparation and examination of conscience but they must be followed by individual private Confession and absolution as is clear from a ruling issued by the Church in 1972:

"The teaching of the Council of Trent must be firmly held and faithfully put into practice. This implies a repudiation of the recent custom which has sprung up in places by which there is a presumption to satisfy the precept of sacramentally confessing mortal sins for the purpose of obtaining absolution by confession made only generally or through what is called a community celebration of Penance. This repudiation is demanded not only by Divine precept as declared by the Council of Trent, but also by the very good of souls deriving, according to centuries-long experience, from individual confession and absolution rightly administered. Individual confession and absolution remain the only ordinary way for the faithful to be reconciled to God and the Church unless physical or moral impossibility excuses from such Confession."10

In the words of the official Introduction to the New Rite of Penance (1974), the sacrament is not considered to be a "mere perfunctory repetition or psychological exercise," but a case of "conforming interiorly to Christ." Penitential Services, "with the needed, safeguards" could possibly help to create the whole environment favourable to such an attitude especially if the opportunity is taken of emphasising that: "any danger of confusion in the minds of the faithful between these services and the sacrament of Penance itself must be carefully averted." 11

Psychological Need for Confession

An aspect of Confession which is not often realised even by priests is the opportunity which it provides for counsel and encouragement. The idea of spiritual direction so recommended by the Saints is very much a part of frequent Confession. It is extremely important that we receive consolation and should feel free to ask for guidance. This would perhaps give more people the assistance which they are no longer receiving from so many sources and would counteract the increasing bureaucracy and impersonalism that surrounds us.

We need to get to the root of our sins if we are to progress in holiness. Even from the psychological point of view, we must open our hearts totally. William James wrote in 1902: "One would think that in most men the shell of secrecy would have had to open, the pent-in abscess to burst and gain relief, even though the ear that heard the confession were unworthy. The Catholic Church for obvious utilitarian reasons, has substituted auricular Confession to one priest for the more radical act of public Confession. We English-speaking Protestants in the general self-reliance and unsociability of our nature, seem to find it enough if we take God alone into our confidence." 12 It is obviously far healthier to own up to all our sins rather than brush them under the carpet. We confess our sins and even our imperfections to get rid of them in the knowledge that they will not be used in evidence against' us, which is the case with Freudian guilt that brings so many to the mental hospital.

There is bound to be—unless we have advanced very far on the road to sanctity—a resistance to Confession. Our attachment to imperfection and our addiction to sin creates a reluctance and even a total unwillingness to turn to God. The realignment involved in going to Confession will be resisted in the same way that the body resists the denial of cigarettes when it has been used to them over many years. Our Lord knows that we must overcome, in our very being, this disorientation and He gives us the strength to reverse the process. It is His sorrow working in us which prompts the admission, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you; I am no longer worthy to be called your son." (Luke 15: 18-20) The more we come to Confession, the more we will realise His work within us, turning us from sin and drawing us more closely to a union of heart and mind in love. We will feel far less the resistance than the attraction of Christ rejoicing with us.

A Peace the World Cannot Give

We are told that there will be joy in heaven over one sinner who repents. In fact, we notice that Our Lord frequently stressed this aspect of forgiveness. To the cripple He says, "Take heart, my son; your sins are forgiven," (Matthew 9: 2) and when Peter has protested his unworthiness he is told not to be afraid. Confession is meant to bring about a calm after the storm provoked by sin. It restores that harmony which existed between man and God in paradise and naturally produces great peace and joy such as the world cannot give. It is not simply a feeling of relief at owning up to one's sins but also the result of God renewing His life in us.

If we want Christ to live in us and become the whole focus of our lives we must accept that we must decrease and He must increase. We cannot do that of ourselves which is why we must go to Confession for Christ to accomplish it in us. The crowd which surrounded the paralysed man had to believe that his sins were forgiven when Our Lord told him to rise and walk. We have the constant teaching of Christ through His- Church for two thousand years that our sins also are forgiven in Confession. It is the truly Divine Son of God who says through the priest, "I absolve you from your sins . . ."

Further Reading:

Colman 0’Neill, O.P.: Meeting Christ in the Sacraments (Mercier 1966).

Alfred Wilson, C.P.: Pardon and Peace (Sheed & Ward 1974). Benedict Baur, O.S.B.: Frequent Confession (St. Paul 1959).

St. Francis de Sales: The Devout Life (Burns Oates 1959).

Cardinal John Wright: First Confession and First Communion (C.T.S. Pamphlets 1972).

Pope Paul VI, 12th March 1975.

"But if this personal reconciliation of the sinner with God is always possible and, in cases of necessity, sufficient to obtain the life-bringing forgiveness of grace, by means of an act of perfect contrition, as the catechism teaches us, we must recall, however, that this act must include, at least implicitly, the resolution to have recourse, as soon as possible, to the qualified ministry of the priest, who is invested with the marvellous authority of remitting sins and reconciling the unfaithful brother with God and with the living community of the Church."

(1) St. Jerome, Letter 130.9. ML 22.1115.

(2) Letter4J.J2.PL 16.1116

(3) Orationes 39.17. MG 36.356.

(4) On the Priesthood 3.6. MO 48.644.

(5) Encyclical Letter. ML 54.1210.

(6) The Introduction to the New Rite of Penance issued by the Holy See in 1974 reminds us that this law of the Church is still in fact binding on all the faithful who must "confess individually to a priest at least once a year all mortal sins not previously so confessed" (para. 34).

(7) Encyclical Letter Mystici Corporis Christi, para. 87.

(8) Dogmatic Constitution on the Church (1964), para. 11.

(9) General Catechetical Directory (1971), Addendum para. 5.

(10) Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Pastoral Norms Concerning the Administration of General Sacramental Absolution (1972). No. 1.

(11) Sacred Congregation for Divine Worship, Introduction to the New Rite of Penance (1974), para. 37.

(12) The Varieties of Religious Experience (Fontana edition pg. 443).

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