Cancelled confessions?

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Just trying to get a feel for things.

In two of the local parishes that I visited today, confessions were cancelled this week, next week and the week after. (April 14th)

I also recall last Advent confessions were cancelled for 4-5 weeks in many of the local parishes.

Is this becoming common in other places? I will not get to see my priest until tomorrow, but I know he doubles his time in the confessional the week before Easter, not gets rid of it all together.
 
I don’t know why they would cancel them. Our parish increases confession times in the week before Easter.
 
what probably happened is that if the regular time for confession in your parish is Saturday afternoon, that time has been cancelled, and that extra times for confession have been scheduled for the period of Lent up to Holy Week, or you have been invited to participate in a communal penance service at a neighboring parish, where your priest and others will be offering confessions.

I can’t think of a good reason why they would be cancelled 4/14 unless your pastor will be out of town.
 
puzzleannie said:
what probably happened is that if the regular time for confession in your parish is Saturday afternoon, that time has been cancelled, and that extra times for confession have been scheduled for the period of Lent up to Holy Week, or you have been invited to participate in a communal penance service at a neighboring parish, where your priest and others will be offering confessions.

I can’t think of a good reason why they would be cancelled 4/14 unless your pastor will be out of town.
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There have been communal penance services, but that is not a good reason.

There were about 40-50 people in line for confession, it was 10 past when the priest was supposed to arrive, so a man called him and told him such. The priest then told him that confessions were cancelled for the day, as for the next two weeks. So he told us all to go home, even though there was about 50 sinners there needing to be reconciled to God.

That is what I just don’t get. So I drove to another parish. They had a sign on the door stating for 3 weeks there will be no confessions. It literally said “No Reconciliation.” Very fitting, I thought. While I was standing there at least 10 people came up, sighed and turned around and left. (I was having a conversation with a man who was upset that they did this, AGAIN, just like for 4-5 weeks during Advent).

I went to a parish this evening, where confessions were also cancelled for a few weeks, but I pulled the priest aside after Mass and he heard my confession. So I am just wondering if anyone has had this experience before, or if it is a growing trend, etc.
 
You might write to the Bishop and ask which churches in your area still hear confessions and when?
 
Unfinished said:
There have been communal penance services, but that is not a good reason.

There were about 40-50 people in line for confession, it was 10 past when the priest was supposed to arrive, so a man called him and told him such. The priest then told him that confessions were cancelled for the day, as for the next two weeks. So he told us all to go home, even though there was about 50 sinners there needing to be reconciled to God.

That is what I just don’t get. So I drove to another parish. They had a sign on the door stating for 3 weeks there will be no confessions. It literally said “No Reconciliation.” .
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this I do not understand, esp. 1st paragraph. No priest has the right to refuse a penitent who requests confession, although he may say, Mass is starting now, but I will come back to the confessional after Mass, for instance. Call the bishop on this one esp. if regular posted times have been cancelled without a good reason (like sudden death of a priest, which actually happened in my last parish).
 
Unfinished said:
There have been communal penance services, but that is not a good reason.

There were about 40-50 people in line for confession, it was 10 past when the priest was supposed to arrive, so a man called him and told him such. The priest then told him that confessions were cancelled for the day, as for the next two weeks. So he told us all to go home, even though there was about 50 sinners there needing to be reconciled to God.

That is what I just don’t get. So I drove to another parish. They had a sign on the door stating for 3 weeks there will be no confessions. It literally said “No Reconciliation.” Very fitting, I thought. While I was standing there at least 10 people came up, sighed and turned around and left. (I was having a conversation with a man who was upset that they did this, AGAIN, just like for 4-5 weeks during Advent).

I went to a parish this evening, where confessions were also cancelled for a few weeks, but I pulled the priest aside after Mass and he heard my confession. So I am just wondering if anyone has had this experience before, or if it is a growing trend, etc.
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Canon Law requires that the Sacraments be available for those who present themselves properly disposed. If there were 50 people at the church waiting for Conferssion the priest should have made himself available in some manner,
 
Br.Rich_SFO said:
Canon Law requires that the Sacraments be available for those who present themselves properly disposed. If there were 50 people at the church waiting for Conferssion the priest should have made himself available in some manner,
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Unfortunately, what priests should do and what they actually do is quite different around here sometimes. 😦

I have spoken with the Bishop previously about this, I suppose I will follow up tomorrow.
 
Unfinished said:
Just trying to get a feel for things.

In two of the local parishes that I visited today, confessions were cancelled this week, next week and the week after. (April 14th)

I also recall last Advent confessions were cancelled for 4-5 weeks in many of the local parishes.

Is this becoming common in other places? I will not get to see my priest until tomorrow, but I know he doubles his time in the confessional the week before Easter, not gets rid of it all together.
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What is really worrying is that it looks like they were cancelled without any prior warning, if that many people showed up.* And* that it was the Saturday times too - those confession times are absolutely crucial since most people have trouble making time during the week.

Definitely get in touch with the Bishop.
 
That is really shocking. Confession has never been cancelled here, ever. During Lent there are always more opportunities for confession, and our parish bulletin makes a point of listing the confession times for neighboring parishes, so that no one is left without the opportunity.

It seems like there is something seriously wrong in your area if this is happening regularly and at multiple parishes. Surely there should be some way to hold these priests accountable.
 
I agree with Lily, confession should definitely be offered when they say it’s going to be offered. It’s so hard for people to get there during the week. I just can’t see a reason for this. I went to confession today (oops yesterday, Saturday), I would’ve been in major distress if it hadn’t of been offered.
 
I went to confession last night before mass - confession times are 4:00 to 4:45 every Saturday prior to mass. Long line (which surprised me) but I waited patiently (I arrived about 4:10). I was #5 in the line, a person came out saying only 3 more could be heard! There was no offer to come back after mass. I guess this is a trend as the guy behind me said he has had this happen to him 3 times in the past. When he came in he asked me if only one priest was hearing confessions (we have 2 priests in our parish).

I kneeled down the 20 minutes or so before mass and asked for forgiveness, especially for being upset for being turned away for confession the week before Easter.

I realize the constraints of time in a priests world but a big problem in Catholicism is the lack of people receiving the sacrament of confession. Luckily there are 2 more times this week that they are hearing confessions.
 
My priest is occassionally bad about cancelling scheduled Confessions and not telling anyone. He’s even worse about adding them after morning Mass on Fridays and not telling anyone until Friday morning Mass (and sometimes this unannounced addition causes the other unannounced cancellation!). But to call request the Sacrament … he’ll drop almost everything to make sure he can honor your request.

That said, father is terrific about scheduling extra time for Confession the last two weeks before Christmas and Easter.

In the weeks before Easter, I am often busy at the public school I teach at with kids participating in contests or having to be present at parent/teacher conferences. Father had three different times this week (including the normal Saturday time) for Confession. I couldn’t make any of them. I called him at a break during our conferences, and asked how long that evening’s communal penance service would last and if a priest could see me after for Confession. He told me there would be no problem.

There must have been poor attendance at the communal service, because 20 minutes before it was supposed to end, Father appears at conferences (which were also poorly attended) to let me know (quite subtly, no one suspected why he came to talk to me – it could have easily been about music for Palm Sunday) that he had held one of the local priests to hear my Confession, and to just come to the rectory when I was finished … and not to rush and worry about getting there too late.
 
40-50 people in line for confession?

I don’t mean to be rude or anything, but statements like this make me a little suspicious, especially if this is an American parish.

Jim
 
JimR-OCDS said:
40-50 people in line for confession?

I don’t mean to be rude or anything, but statements like this make me a little suspicious, especially if this is an American parish.

Jim
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This parish has over 4,000 families in it.

It is huge. Plus, it is the week before Easter, so all the Catholics who never confess but once a year, and wait till the last minute, were there.
 
Our parish has about 3500 families. When I arrived, before the priests, for confession yeaterday there were already 20-30 in line. By the time I leve there were well over 50.

We have three priests, but a visiting priest set up over in a corner to help speed things along, but the lines were growing.

We have had a couple of Penance services and several extra confession times, at various times of day, in preparation for Easter. Last chance will be this Tuesday evening.
 
Unfinished said:
Just trying to get a feel for things.

In two of the local parishes that I visited today, confessions were cancelled this week, next week and the week after. (April 14th)

I also recall last Advent confessions were cancelled for 4-5 weeks in many of the local parishes.

Is this becoming common in other places? I will not get to see my priest until tomorrow, but I know he doubles his time in the confessional the week before Easter, not gets rid of it all together.
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This is sad…

Our parish is actually increasing the times for confession. Our priest decided on this last year sometime. In fact, we have it several times a week other than the weekend Masses. And we always have it 30 min prior to the 3 weekend Masses. We also have communal penance services at Advent and Easter and on Saturday there will be confessions heard for an hour or so before the Easter Vigil.
 
We are having a Diocesan wide confession day on Monday. All Parishes from 3-9pm. Many of the religious orders pitch in and participate on that day. I know some parishes cancelled the Sat. confessions because of it.Perhaps that was going on in your Diocese, call and find out.
 
JimR-OCDS said:
40-50 people in line for confession?

I don’t mean to be rude or anything, but statements like this make me a little suspicious, especially if this is an American parish.

Jim
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During Lent and sometimes Advent as well, for a large Parish this is not that surprising a number.
 
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