Chapter 12 The Beauty of Confession

The first time I heard Matthew speak on the Pillars of Catholic Spirituality, it surprised me that Confession was the first one. The more I think about it, the more I understand why.

Many doctrines and disciplines separate Catholics from Protestants in the practice of faith, but this one is huge. It’s a rare convert who doesn’t have a bit of anxiety about confessing sins to another living, breathing person, even when he sits in the place of Christ. It is a lot more comfortable simply to visit one’s sins in one’s own mind and ask forgiveness of a real but unseen Christ. I found when I went to confession for the first time that the very act of pronouncing my sins out loud, so I could hear my own voice accusing my own self, was powerful. Once said, there’s no escaping the reality of what I have done. Once said to another, there’s no way I can ever deny I did them.

But oh! The relief—the joy—when I first heard the words of absolution. To this day, I am anxious when I go to confession, and that feeling would be enough to keep me out of the confessional if it were all I experienced. But it isn’t. I unload my burdens and I hear them taken away. If the anxiety before confession might keep me away, the grace of the sacrament received, which is real and palpable, keeps me coming back.

Confession is the natural bookend to Communion, to receiving the Eucharistic Lord into our lives. In earlier times, the Church emphasized this in discipline and lines for confession were long every week. After Vatican II, when the discipline was left to the faithful in the pew, we succumbed to the “I’m OK-You’re OK” mood of the times and confession became the forgotten sacrament. I think it is time to reclaim our patrimony and enter fully into the graces that confession provides. If we, the faithful, begin to go to confession, great things will happen…. in us, and in our parishes.

Confession is so mysterious to a convert! I remember wishing I could tag along and watch someone else go through it so I would know what to do. That, of course, is impossible, just as it will be impossible for me to watch anyone go through the particular judgment before I go through it myself.

One wise confessor once told me that confession should be entered joyfully (not happily—that is something different) because it is an opportunity to rehearse the time we will stand before Christ without the priest as intermediary. Modern man tends to forget—the last things are real: death, judgment, heaven and hell. And because they are, Christ instituted the sacrament of reconciliation to help us through by preparing us on earth, and giving us the grace to repent, return, revive and move closer to the person God intends us to be by seeing where we have fallen short and asking help in renewing our lives.

Most of us go to confession too infrequently—certainly I do, and it’s often because I don’t have a good sense of the ways in which I am out of step with God’s will in my life. Not having a real sense of where I fall short has a way of making confession difficult…

It took me a while to develop the habit of regular examination of conscience. Some of the great saints performed this twice a day—I am lucky to get to it twice a week. But when I do, it recollects me and focuses me on where I can grow in my relationship with God. Far from making me a neurotic mess, it has begun to allow me to see clearly where God is still working on my life.

Over the years, I’ve encountered a few tips about confession, which I will share:

(1) Understand that the seriousness of the sin is not in what we do, it is in Whom we offend. There’s a real tendency to rationalize our common sins as not significant (“God won’t mind if I sleep in and miss mass just this one Sunday…”), but the reality is—that’s often what it is. Rationalization. Be clear minded, and go to confession when you need to. Keep this in mind—all of the most recent popes have gone to confession at least every other week…….we under-utilize this powerful sacrament to change our lives. Many modern advisors (Kelly included) suggest that monthly confession is something of a minimum. (For the record, I am not there yet…)

(2) Understand that without involvement of the will, there is no sin. Not everything we do that is wrong is a sin….sometimes we just “blow it” in good faith. God helps with both, of course, but the essence of sin is setting our will against God’s.

(3) Don’t rationalize and don’t ramble. It’s enough to name my sins without explaining how or why I was involved in them. Most of the time, that’s rationalization again. It’s an amazingly liberating (though very difficult) thing to simply state “I accuse myself of blasphemy…or anger against my husband…or theft…or lying…” without trying to make it look better than it is….God knows the details; He has the videotape.

(4) Don’t turn confession into a counseling session. Confess sins, listen to the priest’s counsel, make a good act of contrition (memorize one) receive absolution and leave to do the prescribed penance as promptly and devoutly as possible. Sometimes the discipline of listening to counsel without giving in to the urge to comment is not only good discipline, it is spiritual growth.

(5) Consider developing a relationship with a regular confessor. That can help address the areas that chronically affect spiritual life. Different confessors have different styles and I have found it’s ok to find someone whose style works well with my own. And when I encounter one of those rare priests who are curt or abrasive or unsympathetic (ask any cradle about tough confessors—there are stories!), I offer a prayer for him, do my penance and I do NOT let the experience keep me away from Christ in the confessional. I try to remain centered on meeting Christ, not on the accidentals of the experience…

(6) Take advantage of travel. Confessing to a priest I will never encounter again is sometimes easier on the nerves. It also provides an opportunity to add a sacred moment to travels. I also take advantage of travel to go to mass in different parishes, Sundays and sometimes during the week, a practice that has much enhanced my appreciation of the mass. For the record, it’s made me both more tolerant of different styles of worship and more appreciative of the great diversity of my Church.

(7) Before confession, I recollect myself before the Blessed Sacrament. I go early and just sit with Jesus for a while. When I examine my conscience before the Lord, I find He gently leads me where I need to go. When I ask God to reveal to me my sins, He does, and then He helps me turn away from them. Not instantly, but with time and with work…

(8) Especially if you have a regular confessor, consider the particular examination of conscience of St. Ignaitus. This emphasizes the life-changing potential of confession, the metanoia, formation of a new mind that should be the result of the sacrament. Because it focuses on the things that separate one from God, rather than a juridical “ticking off” of sins, it is a powerful, powerful practice.

(9) Make confession a family affair. Nothing helps children understand the importance of confession more than seeing their parents go. And the same is true between husband and wife.

In His Service--Martha