The following comes from a Mar. 24 story on the Vatican Insider, a feature of the Italian newspaper La Stampa.
Priests should sit and wait patiently for faithful in the confessional at times that are convenient for penitents. Cardinal Mauro Piacenza said this afternoon during the inauguration of the course on the inner conscience, the private inner space of each individual. The week-long course has become something of a tradition. It will be taking place in the Chancery office and attended by about five hundred priests and seminarians who are approaching ordination. The meeting will conclude Friday with an Audience with Francis. In the afternoon there will be a penitential liturgy in the St. Peter’s Basilica, when the Pope will confess some of those present, inaugurating the “feast of forgiveness”, during which churches will stay open 24/7 for confessions.
The Sacrament of Reconciliation “is possibly the most concrete and real way to renew one’s personal meeting with Jesus Christ,” Piacenza said. Although it is true that the celebration of this sacrament often comes after a long and trying inner journey and is a destination one reaches after a previous personal Church-mediated encounter with the Lord, there are cases of radical conversions taking place during the very celebration of the sacrament. During this time, a supernatural grace acts through the confessor, working on the penitent’s conscience and can lead to brief instants of unimaginable spiritual highs.”
“When we deal with the inner conscience, what we’re dealing with is God!,” the cardinal said. “The conscience is a shrine where God always speaks to all humans in accordance with creation and to Christians in accordance with creation and redemption… Accompanying a brother in the process of discerning his or her personal way of acting and receiving everything that emerges from the inner conscience, means entering into sacred territory with this person and one needs to be extremely careful when doing so. It’s like walking on silk….”
To read the entire story, click here.
I have never been able to confess the new way, face to face. Give me a dark cubby with a quiet priest patiently waiting for me to tell him my sins. Thank you to all the priests at St. Anne’s in San Diego. They are all wonderful confessors.
I agree Life Lady. I do not care for the face to face confessions. Praise God for St, Anne’s confessionals!
At the parish church where I attended grammar school, during all the Masses, a priest was always in the confessional, ready to hear confessions. This was in addition to the Saturday afternoon and evening schedule. At a parish where I was assigned, I was hearing someone’s confession, and Mass just began. I finished with that person, and turned off the light, and left. After the pastor finished saying his Mass, he yelled at me because I did not stop hearing confession once the Mass bell was rung. I told him I could not throw the person out, but still was reprimanded by this priest. I am always ready and willing to hear confessions, and realize that the actual grace which is given to people will not always be there. I have heard confessions at airports, and train stations, and it is a shame that many priests are not available to administer the sacrament of Penance. Once, while visiting a different city, and wanting to get the grace of confession. I rang the doorbell of a rectory. The priest was angry with me because he was preparing for Halloween, and thought going to confession was not important. The sacraments have been severely downplayed in the past few years, and all the Church seems to stress is social ideas and celebrations instead of saving souls. By joining with the beliefs of the dying Protestant sects, the Catholic Church is herself dying, having given up her traditional religious practices.
Do you know the rationale behind your former superior not wanting to have confessions continue during mass, Fr. Karl? I’ve found that having the opportunity to have a priest in the confessional during mass spurs many mid-mass to head right on back there.
Thanks, by the way, for taking the heat for not ‘throwing the person out.’
Have you thought about applying for a transfer to a diocese where the priests aren’t like that? Go to the South or the mid-West.
Father Karl — it seems like you are always getting “yelled at” by your pastors or bishops.
It must be very hard being you.
Father Karl –
Being yelled at means you are doing something right. Not compromising your faith includes a form of martyrdom suffered bit by little bit on a regular basis. Thank for your devotion and sacrifices.
May the Lord bestow abundant blessings upon you!
Once a week is not enough!
If only in my church. Its laughable.
Saint Padre Pio is a good priest to use as an example.
He never condoned sin, nor gave absolution to those who did not truly repent or intended to continue committing the mortals sin.
Father Karl is so right. If we only had more priests with the approach and availability of him, the Church would be in better shape. But I forgot, there no sins mentioned these days!
I have often wondered, what goes on in the Sacrament of Penance, when our Church leaders go to Confession, who refuse to apply the Code of Canon Law, to politicians such as Nancy Pelosi, Kathleen Sebelius, and many others, who use their political power to wrongfully support the crimes of abortion, same- sex marriage, premarital sex, contraception, and many other evils, against Christ’s teachings. I have wondered about this, for many long years, now. I have also wondered, at times, if our post-Vatican II Popes and those in the College of Cardinals, have at times, been in such a condition of their souls, some of them, perhaps, that might be viewed by God, as a state of Mortal Sin– because of a refusal to stand up for Christ, and run the Church properly. How many times have these incompetent and unfaithful clergy given Holy Communion, from their own hands– to unfaithful Catholics, who publically support baby killing (abortion) and same- sex marriage, and many other evils?? For these unfaithful clergy, Christ has such little meaning, so it seems! The poor little unborn baby, to them, has little value, and the Catholic Sacrament of Holy Matrimony has little respect or value– etc.!! I also have wondered about the possible state of Mortal Sin, in the souls of some of our Church leaders, who in the past have refused to do proper justice, on behalf of little children, who were evilly molested by their own clergy! No heart at all, for these poor, suffering children! Makes me sick! And how do these leaders handle these same crimes, if Catholic laymen confess these same sins to them, when they are hearing confessions??
Cardinals and Bishops have an obligation to be obedient to all the teachings of the Faith. (Bible, CCC, Code of Canon Law, and GIRM)
PRIDE is a capital sin, letting the Mortal Sin of public Scandal continue to stand is an additional Mortal Sin. Without the “resolution not to sin again” our sins are not forgiven.
In order for absolution –
CCC: ” 1451 Among the penitent’s acts contrition occupies first place. Contrition is “sorrow of the soul and detestation for the sin committed, together with the resolution not to sin again.”
CCC: ” 1491 The sacrament of Penance is a whole consisting in three actions of the penitent and the priest’s absolution. The penitent’s acts are repentance, confession or disclosure of sins to the priest, and the intention to make reparation and do works of reparation.”
and
CCC: “1415 Anyone who desires to receive Christ in Eucharistic communion must be in the state of grace.
Anyone aware of having sinned mortally must not receive communion without having received absolution in the sacrament of penance.”
Jesus when forgiving told us to “go and sin no more” Jn 8:11.
11 …. And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and do not sin again.”
(He did NOT say “go and continue sinning”.)
My most interesting confession was at the Franciscan Church in Wurzburg, Germany (which has a tombstone marked Baron von Frankenstein). The priest and I greeted each other in German, Father heard my confession in English and absolved me in Latin! The second most interesting was in the Basilica San Marco in Venice, Italy, when a visiting English priest (Liverpool, I think) heard my confession face-to-face on a quiet section of the pews.
Good sacrament, should be utilized a few times a year. If the Church went back to mandatory weekly confessions, the depleted ranks of overworked priests would go on strike.
Mandatory weekly confession? Where are you getting that from, Good Cause? What is mandated for religious is not the same as what is expected of the laity.
Even so, we eat every day. We bathe regularly. And hey, there’s the law of supply and demand. As demand goes up, supply often follows. So saying the ‘grace’ of a faithful who make use of the Sacrament of Penance on a weekly basis, may be a laity more conscientious of sin, personal failings, and the need and beauty of God’s grace freely offered. This in reality leads to vocations to the religious life as people in general look beyond the practical and try to think as God does.
Even so, weekly confession is an exceedingly practical methodology for those pursuing sanctity. Much like daily bathing is practical for one attempting to smell their very best.