The forgotten sacrament

 

How our parish churches might look like in 2050 #7

A casual look at an old missal from my home parish in Dublin got me thinking.  It dates from the early 1980s and was published in the 1970s.  In the parish schedule printed inside the cover, it gives Mass and confession times.  In addition to confessions during masses on Saturday morning as well as on the evenings of the first Friday, a total of 3 hours put aside for the hearing of private confessions in that parish each and every Saturday - an hour and a half in the morning and an hour and a half in the evening.  At that time, three priests served a parish of very roughly 5,000 Roman Catholics.  Today, one priest serves a bigger population.

 

I recall lengthy queues of people, in the early 1970s, waiting for confession in rows adjacent to the confession box on a Saturday night. The advice received by lay Catholics at least up to this period was to go once a month. The very diligent might go twice a month.  The tortured and scrupulous might have attempted to go more often again.  Various studies from that period indicate particularly high rates of participation among Irish Catholics and these were well in excess of rates abroad. Today, only a tiny proportion of people in Ireland participate frequently in confession.

This is possibly one of the most dramatic behavioural shifts in recent Irish religious history and there has been little or no serious discussion of this change.

We might remember that a major fear on the part of many lay people including young men coming of age in their teens was to die in a state of mortal sin before confessing – or incurring additional mortal sin by receiving holy communion in a state of mortal sin. It was one thing to die in mortal sin and go to eternal fire - forever and ever - but to die with two mortal sins stretched the imagination beyond any imagining.   There was a very real sense of fear and anxiety even in those heady post-Vatican 2 years among many people, but especially older persons.  Hell was very real, Sin was just as real and mortal sin sent shudders down the spine. No amount of talk about a forgiving and loving God could completely remove that little and not so little nagging fear somewhere at the back of one’s mind that one might be on the road to perdition.  I remember all this only too well and it wasn’t just me.  It was a factor in helping me to ‘lose my religion’ for 7 years.  But, that is another story.

The decline in Mass attendance is paralleled by a sharp decline in the number of persons frequently the sacrament of confession or reconciliation.  It does not seem that, today, there is a regular service of private confession in the parish mentioned above. Perhaps, as in probably most other parishes, confession is available only on special request, or, is available during special seasons such as Lent and Advent and usually in that case as part of a communal celebration.

What happened in the last 50 years?  Did sin largely disappear?  Or, was the importance of ‘a good confession’ relegated to the margins? Or, did people just stop going for whatever reasons?  The odd thing is that, to the best of my knowledge, it is still a universal practice for children aged about 8 to make their ‘First confession’ just prior to receiving their first Holy Communion. I suspect that for a great many of these it will be their last.

Of course, the astute observer will comment that a high prevalence of confession and religious practice did not prevent violence, rape, abuse, murder, tax evasion, lying and theft either then or now.  Indeed, some of  the worst perpetrators were – at least by external appearances – devout and religiously observant. It is entirely understandable that, nowadays, many people reject religious belief and practice entirely stating that those representing the church were guilty of the most heinous crimes and religion was just a cover up for evil.  However, the story is more complicated than that.  We need to keep a sense of perspective and see the greater good that faithful, but frail, Christians do – by the Grace of God – day after day.

‘Confession’ is held as one of the 7 sacraments of the Western Church. It is also practiced among Eastern (Orthodox) Catholics.  Among Anglicans, private confession is rarely if ever practiced.  That said, the pithy phrase ‘all may, some should, none have to’ has been coined by US Episcopalians (US Anglicans).  In practice, as distinct from the rules of the Roman Catholic church, this formula describes fairly accurately the situation on the grounds and in practice in the vast majority of Roman Catholic parishes today.

The days of frequent private confession accompanied by a careful examination of conscience are gone. We threw the baby out with the bathwater.

In my view, these developments raise questions about how seriously we take the Eucharist.  Surely, we do not need to return to the days of scruples, fear and punishment where God was ready to pounce at the slightest bad thought, action or word. However, we do need a sense of proportion.  After all, we are, all of us, sinners. We struggle with tendencies to grasp, to judge, to lash out, to accumulate at the expense of others.  We can also be good at kidding ourselves along the lines of ‘sure everyone does that’ or ‘I can’t help it’.

Sin separates us from God and from one another and that is why the world we live in is as sick as it is.  The remedy for sin is Jesus Christ. And we receive his forgiveness in the Eucharist.  However, personal or private confession is a huge help by way of preparation for the Eucharist. And it remains the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church that confession, prior to receiving holy communion, is mandatory in the case of mortal sin. There are almost no exceptions to this rule.

St Paul did not mince his words with the Christians in Corinth: “Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be answerable for the body and blood of the Lord.” (1 Corinthians 11:27).

Everyone needs to decide on their own path.  By church regulation, Roman Catholics other than very young children are obliged to participate in the sacrament of reconciliation at least once at year – typically at Advent and/or Lent. 

“After having reached the age of discretion, each member of the faithful is obliged to confess faithfully his or her grave sins at least once a year.” (Code of Canon Law 989)

This is a good starting point. However, it may help and I think it should help to participate more frequently especially if one is fortunate enough to know a wise and prudent ‘confessor’ priest.  The Church does encourage people to confess more than once a year.

I think that there should be a dedicated space in every church for anyone to drop in and speak – in confidence – to a priest at appointed times (it does not have to be the Box but that could be an option). Someone might or might not want to avail of the sacrament.  It would be an opportunity to talk honestly and openly.  This was the practice during the ‘covid years’ in a parish I was familiar with in Dublin. I can’t tell you how much I benefited from this at the time.

‘Why can’t we just confess directly to the Lord as the Protestants do?’, I hear someone asking. Yes, of course we can and we should do that also. In fact, it is a good exercise to examine one’s conscience every evening and make a personal act of contrition. However, in the sacrament of confession we encounter the Lord himself – who listens to us through the ministry of the priest and who absolves us of our sins. I reckon it is one of the big pluses of being Roman Catholic.  Forget about the hang-ups and dreads of adolescence and let’s grow up and learn to use and enjoy this great sacrament of Christ’s endless patience, mercy and love.

And let’s start again at loving God with our whole heart and mind and soul.