Are you always free to confess anonymously behind a screen?

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Canon law gives both the penitent and the priest the option to choose to have the confession behind a screen. In other words, if you want to go to confession behind a screen, the priest must honor your wish, and if the priest wants to do the confession behind a screen, you must also accept it. So, for a confession to be face to face, both the penitent and the confessor must be OK with that.

Now, in some particular cases this rule will be very difficult to fulfill, like some of the examples mentioned above, where it can be physically impossible to perform the confession that way. In those cases, you may put up with the inconvenience of confessing the other way, that you are not so comfortable with. Or, if there are very serious reasons why you don’t want to do a confession face to face, you may want to postpone it for a better opportunity, and if the reasons are really serious Our Lord will understand.
 
frjuan said:
if you want to go to confession behind a screen, the priest must honor your wish, and if the priest wants to do the confession behind a screen, you must also accept it. So, for a confession to be face to face, both the penitent and the confessor must be OK with that.
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My understanding is that a penitent may go face to face only if the confessor first permits that option. That is: A priest has the right to insist on a fixed grate between himself and the penitent.
(I cannot say that I know any who do so, though I am acquainted with one or two who have …um… confessed to me that they are more comfortable with and prefer the grate)
 
Aha, looks like we agree, don’t we? For the confession to be face to face, both penitent and confessor must be OK with it; in case either of them wants to do it behind a screen the other must honor that wish.
 
Father Juan, welcome to the forum! I hope we don’t drive you away with our bickering. 🙂
 
As a kid, my decision to avoid one priest was not possible because the nun in our school always sent me to him. She would see which line was longest, and then she would send me and others to the other line.

This priest told me I would go to Hell when I die. He scared me.

I used to blame myself for everything, even if it wasn’t my fault.
 
woolycaterpillar said:
As a kid, my decision to avoid one priest was not possible because the nun in our school always sent me to him. She would see which line was longest, and then she would send me and others to the other line.

This priest told me I would go to Hell when I die. He scared me.

I used to blame myself for everything, even if it wasn’t my fault.
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I’m so sorry you had this experience. It is no wonder that his line was always so short.
 
woolycaterpillar said:
This priest told me I would go to Hell when I die. He scared me.
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That’s awful that he would say this to children (and perhaps awful if he said it to adults also, though sometimes they benefit from having the fear of God knocked into them). I wonder if that’s how he himself was raised as a child, so he thought it was appropriate to inflict the abuse on the next generation. Or was he mentally ill, or just on a power trip.

It sounds like you managed to get past the bad experience. I hope you can set it aside and maybe even pray for that priest because he sounds like he needs it.
 
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i prefer confession behind the screen

but i’ve gotten very comfortable w/ face to face
 
woolycaterpillar said:
As a kid, my decision to avoid one priest was not possible because the nun in our school always sent me to him. She would see which line was longest, and then she would send me and others to the other line.

This priest told me I would go to Hell when I die. He scared me.

I used to blame myself for everything, even if it wasn’t my fault.
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I knew a Jesuit priest who in his youth had the same experience as you .

He would go to confession and from what the priest said to him would leave thinking that he was doomed to go to hell .

One day he plucked up courage and talked to his brother about it . His brother had had the same experiences as he .

He responded to a vocation to the priesthood . He said that his primary intention in becoming a priest was not to celebrate Mass but to hear confessions , and to ensure that as far as he was able no one would go through experiences similar to his .

Needless to say he made a great confessor . The line in front of his confessional was always the longest .

I hope you have got over your bad experiences woolycaterpillar .

May the Lord grant you the peace and healing you need .
 
Yes, I have to wonder how many thousands, or millions, of people (especially children) were told they were going to go to hell. But didn’t Saint Padre Pio say things like that? Don’t know if he said them to children…
 
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