Adult confession vs laundry list style

[Palladio]

Oh how I do agree with that!. Although one effect of confession is to make us feel better, that is not the reason for it. It is to erase the barrier, which is our sins, that stands between us and our God. It is to restore us to the grace we had at baptism and to enable us to once again enter into the presence of God.

Mary

Which is why our parish offers confession before mass: prepatory to the Eucharist.

God bless.

 

[LilyM]

I, for one, happen to agree with you, but the last claims you make seem to ignore the very basis and purpose of confession: forgiveness, grace, salvation, and all that that entails for our immortal souls: everything!

God bless.

I’m not denying this or wishing to downplay the value of confession at all, I am a frequent attendee and fully aware of its power and help. I am well aware it’s about finding a cure for your spiritual illnesses and restoring spiritual health, not just about feeling good.

To take my analogy further, in going to a general physician you are of course seeking a true cure of your illness and a restoration of health. Just that sometimes it is simply the symptoms that need to be treated. Either until the disease naturally resolves itself, as plenty do, or the root cause can be diagnosed.

And let’s not forget that there are many ways in addition to confession to achieve many of the aims you’ve mentioned - the other Sacraments for starters, especially the Eucharist. And like I said, good spiritual direction (which may or may not also involve sacramental confession) and self-analysis too.

 

[ThuribleGuy45]

I’m curious as to what you mean by this. If you don’t confess your sins by telling your confessor how many times you have done something, how else would you confess? You say that reciting how many times you’ve done something reveals a deeper issue. What is that deeper issue? I ask this with all sincerity, not to be a smart aleck. If Reconciliation is more than a “forgiveness machine” as you say, then what is it? I definitely agree that it should help with insight into our failures, but I think looking at the specifics of what we do does give us this insight.

Looking forward to your response.

Mary

Please re-read what I wrote. I didn’t say I wouldn’t state how many times (to the best of my memory) I did something. I also didn’t say that the act of “reciting how many times” revealed a deeper issue. What I was trying to get at, perhaps poorly, was that, in my personal experience, the Reconciliation encounter with Christ’s forgiveness was about more than agonizing over did I do X 9 times, or 11 times. The “deeper issue” was that someone who recorded their sins with tick marks so that their count would be accurate in confession was perhaps dealing with an obsessive-compulsive issue that might hinder a deeper encounter with Christ and His forgiveness, as well as representing a separate issue the priest might need to provide help with.

I frankly expect more from my confessor than the classic response from the 50’s: “Is that all?” I need him to “hear between the lines,” and focus on what he senses are larger spitirual issues with me. Not therapy, but insight. And certainly not to obsess about the math. I hope this clarifies.

 

[fix]

The Church says we must confess mortal sins in kind and number. That is not a “laundry list”, nor is it OCD.

Are we not taught to make an examination of conscience each day? That is not legalism or refusing to get to the so called root cause at all.

I do not deny there may be several levels in understanding this sacrament, but in recent years perhaps too much is made of “therapy” and too much disparging of traditional" confession.

 

[DebChris]

This is really interesting. I’ve had numerous priests over the years say that confession is not therapy – you’re just supposed to tell kind and number.

I’ve also been told that discussing an inclination to a particular type of sin is also not what the sacrament is for. I always figured doing anything but discussing kind and number gave me room to rationalize what I’d done, whereas kind and number gives you no wiggle room for “yes, it was a sin, but…”

I’d love to hear more on this.

Baltobetsy wrote a great explanation of “adult confession” on 8/21 that is worth rereading.
Confession is not therapy and giving a personal background is not meant to be used as an excuse. Within the confessional, a priest may recommend professional counselling for situations beyond the parameters of the confessional.
Again, we can go back to the physical analogy. There are a number of reasons a person may strain a muscle. These can include overtraining, failure to warm-up, cool-down, or improper stretching techniques. A grocery list confession would be similar to saying I strained my muscle. Who is to say that I won’t strain my muscle again?
Instead I might say, “I have not been properly warming up my muscles before participating in a race, nor have I been stretching as I should after my workouts, and as a result I strained my muscle.” In this second example I take responsibility for the actions I took that led to me straining my muscle. In either case I still need to ice the injury. I still need to confess, receive forgiveness for sins committed and do penance. By taking ownership, I am saying these are the actions I must take to reduce the chances of me straining my muscle again or committing this particular sin in the future. The grace and absolution received from the Sacrament of Reconciliation help me in my conversion process as I turn away from the sins of the past.

 

[CarrieH]

I do not deny there may be several levels in understanding this sacrament, but in recent years perhaps too much is made of “therapy” and too much disparging of traditional" confession.

I knew one priest who would tell me about certain sins: “That’s not a sin, you couldn’t help it. After all, look at how you were raised,” and stuff like that. OK, so maybe it wasn’t a mortal sin, but I still sinned in what I did (mainly being critical of others, having come from a home where we kids were harshly criticized to the point of emotional abuse). It doesn’t matter if I sinned completely on my own or if the man in the moon suggested it – if I sinned, I sinned and it needs to be confessed along with the number of times. “Babying my ‘inner child’” doesn’t absolve me of my sins – confession does!

 

[DebChris]

I knew one priest who would tell me about certain sins: “That’s not a sin, you couldn’t help it. After all, look at how you were raised,” and stuff like that. OK, so maybe it wasn’t a mortal sin, but I still sinned in what I did (mainly being critical of others, having come from a home where we kids were harshly criticized to the point of emotional abuse). It doesn’t matter if I sinned completely on my own or if the man in the moon suggested it – if I sinned, I sinned and it needs to be confessed along with the number of times. “Babying my ‘inner child’” doesn’t absolve me of my sins – confession does!

A friend of mine used to say “The past is a reason, not an excuse.” I read the same thing in your post.

 

[Sr_Sally]

This is the way our priest has counseled us to confess. If we have mortal sins to confess, he says that venial sins should not also be included so as to not “dilute” your contrition. I would think this may be where the laundry list idea comes in–confessing a string of things with perhaps little thought to the seriousness of them and with a perhaps sincere but diffuse contrition.

People who confess frequently often stop committing mortal sins. Sometimes they just list a whole lot of venial sins without much thought. I think the OP is talking about confessing fewer venial sins, but going more deeply into the causes so they can be rooted out.

It’s an orderly way of advancing in virtue. Rather than confess every tiny transgression you can think of from the last two weeks (or whatever time period), you can choose to concentrate on getting rid of one or two of the recurring sins at a time. This is called the particular examination of conscience. With the advice of your confessor, you choose your area of concentration. Every day you check on yourself to see how you’re doing. At your next confession, you confess your failures in this area (along with any mortal sins or venial sins that took you by surprise and horrified you). Your can discuss why and how you succeeded and why and how you failed and get good advice from the priest. When you have made substantial progress, or even conquered this sin, you move to the next one. Eventually, you work on the acquisition of virtues in your particular examination.

For example, if I regularly snap at or interrupt my spouse, I might choose to work on this as my particular examination of conscience. I will pray about why I snap at him and may discover impatience rooted in pride. I will make a resolution to give due consideration to his ideas, letting him finish speaking before I cut him off. Some days I will succeed, and some days I will fail. I will bring it to confession and discuss it with the priest. I may discover that my husband is right about certain things because I’ve given him a chance to express himself. I will grow in humility. When I no longer interrupt him regularly, I will choose another thing for my particular examination and start the process over again.

I believe it was St. Josemaria Escriva who said that the general examination of conscience (looking for all your sins) was a defensive weapon (your shield) and the particular was an offensive weapon (your sword) in the war against evil.

Betsy

 

[CarrieH]

This is the way our priest has counseled us to confess. If we have mortal sins to confess, he says that venial sins should not also be included so as to not “dilute” your contrition. I would think this may be where the laundry list idea comes in–confessing a string of things with perhaps little thought to the seriousness of them and with a perhaps sincere but diffuse contrition.

Or maybe people do that because they are particularly ashamed of certain sins, esp. the sexual stuff. If they “hide” those in the midst of some venial sins, they don’t stand out as much, sort of like when one is at the store and hiding certain “personal care” items in the shopping cart by tucking them under the bathroom tissue and paper towels. I know that I have been guilty of both of the above at various times.

 

[Joe_Kelley]

I think it was in the movie Stone Killers that the Mafia Don confesses to being late to mass once, swearing twice and other sins too numerous to mention which include having just wiped out his opposition}.