Confession Refused

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TerryPaul

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We had an weird experience today.

We took our son to confession and the priest asked what sins did he have?

We told the priest that our son has a few things to confess but disobedience was one of the sins. The priest then said that it was not a sin for it were not morally wrong.

He then said for us to ask another priest.

Is he right?
 
Why was he asking you what sins your son had to confess? That alone seems very weird. Second if he was right, why would you have to ask another priest? Perhaps it is better that your son didn’t have confession with this priest. Think of all the undermining of your teaching that would happen in the confessional with a priest telling your son that disobedience isn’t a sin. :banghead:
 
Thank you.

You have a great answer.

When it happened today we were so upset and angry!

I felt like we were in the Twilight Zone! No Priest has ever asked us what are sins are before confession so that he can asses if we need confession or not!

My wife and I actually discussed if there were anyway the Priest were right! Until, "Honour thy mother and thy father " quickly popped into mind!

But these days so many people are re-writting the meaning of Jesus’ words that we can be tricked unless we know our Faith in such detail! And I do know the Faith well I think until something like this happens again.

You are so right, our son could have come out thinking that disobedience is not a sin and he might never have told us and carried on and we would not have known what were really going on inside of him and then he would have passed the mistake on to his brothers and sisters!

Thank you again!

God bless,
TJ
Hollywood, CA
 
I agree. Something was not right there. Just go find another priest.
 
Ditto to the rest. The Holy Spirit did you a HUGE favor today my friend!!!

Go find another priest your son can confess to who understands the 10 Commandments are not an optional program for traditionalists only.
 
I find the whole scenario unusual. Isn’t a boy supposed to confess his own sins rather than a priest and his father discussing what he should be confessing?

People aren’t required to confess their venial sins these days unless they trouble the sinner (ie,that’s all of us) or if the venial sins lead to something else. I’m just thinking that the priest may have meant that the sin of disobedience of a child would be classified a venial sin. The priest suggesting you could see another priest was probably a courtesy in case you didn’t like what he had to say.

I wouldn’t criticise any priest but it might have been a better move for all concerned if he had just heard the boy’s confession.
 
You know, there are more weird details on the priest’s part that I left out as charity.

Tonight, I told my close friend and he then told me that he has has similar experiences at that church. I asked him why he never told me and he said because he didn’t want to criticize either.

I am thankful for your replies for these types of things get me crazy / confused.
 
TerryPaul said:
You know, there are more weird details on the priest’s part that I left out as charity.

Tonight, I told my close friend and he then told me that he has has similar experiences at that church. I asked him why he never told me and he said because he didn’t want to criticize either.

I am thankful for your replies for these types of things get me crazy / confused.
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Sometimes what we see as charity on the part of an oddity really can help others!!! 🙂 Glad to hear your friend told you he’s had similar experiences with this priest. Not sure what the process would be for reporting such a thing, but since it’s happening to more than 1 person, you may want to consider that.

Praying for you and your family to find a better solution!
 
Good Morning,

You’ve all been so kind and supportive. It’s true that “a kind word turns away wrath” and “love covers a multitude of sins”.

So please pray for my family and I as we are having such struggles with many things and I guess what happened yesterday with the priest made me crazy for I guess I feel that if a priest in a Church won’t help us then what??? You know?

God bless,
tj
 
TerryPaul said:
We had an weird experience today.

We took our son to confession and the priest asked what sins did he have?

We told the priest that our son has a few things to confess but disobedience was one of the sins. The priest then said that it was not a sin for it were not morally wrong.

He then said for us to ask another priest.

Is he right?
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If he is not old enough to do reconciliation by himself, he should not have been there at all. You have no part in his confession! You don’t tell him what to confess nor do you tell the priest what he is confessing! What in the world??? YOU are establishing what his sins have been? That is for HIM to do, not YOU!!!

Big time boundary violations. The priest should have kicked you out and kept your son to confess whatever is on HIS heart, not yours. Holy Moley.
 
To: TheRealJuliane,

Have you not read the Bible, the Catholic Catechism and the Papal Encyclicals on how it is a parents “sole duty” to raise the children the Lord has give them by giving them instruction “night and day”!?

I asked, on these boards, the question, if the priest had the right to refuse my son confession?

My son came to us and asked for confession and so we took him to Church and when the priest behaved the way he did, my son were shocked and could not speak so we the parents spoke for him!

Your comments violates the “Law of Love”, read St. Paul 1 Corinthians 13 on what love is!
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I guess this is what I get for putting “pearls before swine”.

Your comments are enough for me to cancel my membership on Catholic Answers and never return again.
I came here with a burden and from your comment am leaving worse than I came.

Theologically, I know your wrong but it’s the hatred that comes through you that scares me and reminds me “The Devil is the prince of this world”!
 
Apparently I’m just not getting it. If a boy wants to go to confession, at least in my parish, he just gets in the confessional line, and goes into the confessional when one side becomes available. What is said in the confessional is between the priest and penitent, not the parents. Parents might bring him to the church, or even be in the confession line with him, but that’s the extent of it.
 
JimG said:
Apparently I’m just not getting it. If a boy wants to go to confession, at least in my parish, he just gets in the confessional line, and goes into the confessional when one side becomes available. What is said in the confessional is between the priest and penitent, not the parents. Parents might bring him to the church, or even be in the confession line with him, but that’s the extent of it.
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This is how it works in our parish too. I’ve never even HEARD of a priest asking the parents about a child’s sins or what they plan to say in confession. In fact, when I went through classes before receiving reconciliation for the first time, (we were in 2nd or 3rd grade at my parish) all of us kids were told that there was no reason for us to discuss our sins with our parents, and that if they asked us, it was ok to tell our parents (or anyone other than the priest, for that matter) that our sins were between God and ourselves.

That whole situation does seem strange to me. The priest should have never asked the parents about the son’s confession in the first place.
 
The OP has accused me of “hatred,” because I told him it is more than irregular for the parents of a boy to be with him in confession. I don’t even know and cannot picture such a scenario! First Reconciliation is done as part of preparation to receive the Eucharist, and the child is prepared to do his own examination of conscience, not given what he should be confessing (disobedience) from his parents!

I have no idea what the OP is looking for, but I am not going to stroke him and pretend that this is OK with the Church. Confession is a private matter between a person, the priest, and God and does NOT EVER involve having the parents ask the priest to deal with an issue.

I do suspect that the priest told the parents they cannot decide what the boy is supposed to be confessing. My priest would never agree to confession on those terms.
 
I’m just going to make a wild guess as to what happened, based on the limited information that you provide:

Maybe the priest felt that you drag your son to confession and make him confess being disobedient when your son isn’t really sorry. He thinks that you’re using confession as a way to guilt your son into being better behaved. So he decided that this is an abuse of the sacrament and doesn’t want to be a part of it anymore.

Just a wild guess from limited information! Don’t take it personally if its wrong!
 
TheRealJuliane said:
The OP has accused me of “hatred,” because I told him it is more than irregular for the parents of a boy to be with him in confession. I don’t even know and cannot picture such a scenario! First Reconciliation is done as part of preparation to receive the Eucharist, and the child is prepared to do his own examination of conscience, not given what he should be confessing (disobedience) from his parents!

I have no idea what the OP is looking for, but I am not going to stroke him and pretend that this is OK with the Church. Confession is a private matter between a person, the priest, and God and does NOT EVER involve having the parents ask the priest to deal with an issue.

I do suspect that the priest told the parents they cannot decide what the boy is supposed to be confessing. My priest would never agree to confession on those terms.
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I think you are making assumptions that can not be fairly assumed. It is possible that they made an appointment for confession and they drove their son to church and were going to sit in the church to pray while they waited for their sons confession to be over, or maybe they were all going to go to confession, and the priest came up to them and asked.

No where did the OP say that they were in the confessional with their child. No where did the OP state that he decided what sins his child needed to confess. It is rather possible that the child asked for forgiveness from the parents and then asked for confession, and that the priest put the parents in a very awkward position by asking this very inappropriate question.

I still say this is a blessing, if the kid had actually confessed disobedience and the priest told him it was not a sin, it could really harm his spiritual development.
 
jilly4ski said:
I think you are making assumptions that can not be fairly assumed. It is possible that they made an appointment for confession and they drove their son to church and were going to sit in the church to pray while they waited for their sons confession to be over, or maybe they were all going to go to confession, and the priest came up to them and asked.

No where did the OP say that they were in the confessional with their child. No where did the OP state that he decided what sins his child needed to confess. It is rather possible that the child asked for forgiveness from the parents and then asked for confession, and that the priest put the parents in a very awkward position by asking this very inappropriate question.

I still say this is a blessing, if the kid had actually confessed disobedience and the priest told him it was not a sin, it could really harm his spiritual development.
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Yes. But of course the OP is asking us to make a judgment or assumptions about the priest without
much clarifying information. Here is the post in its entirety:
TerryPaul said:
We had an weird experience today.

We took our son to confession and the priest asked what sins did he have?

We told the priest that our son has a few things to confess but disobedience was one of the sins. The priest then said that it was not a sin for it were not morally wrong.

He then said for us to ask another priest.

Is he right?
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“We took our son to confession and the priest asked what sins did he have?” is immediately followed by “We told the priest that our son has a few things to confess but disobedience was one of the sins.”

I have a hard time imagining how that scenario could even have developed. Perhaps the OP has some prior history with this particular priest.
 
This is now even more twisted than the actual event!

The Fact:
  1. Went to Church for noon Mass.
  2. After the Mass, our son asked us if he could go to confession.
  3. So we asked the priest if he had some time to give one of our children confession.
  4. The priest asked us outside of the confessional what our son had to confess which has never happened to us before.
  5. We were shocked but out of our “obedience” we tried to give an answer; after all he is a Priest! And it is written, “let your “yes” mean “yes”.”
  6. The priest then stated that “disobedience” etc. were not sins. I were taught they were and I were only asked last month in confession if I obeyed my parents even though I am 42 years old and my father has passed away! (It’s all part of the 4th Commandment.)
  7. We were shocked and the priest said he would not give our son confession although he had other sins to confess besides “disobedience” and then the priest suggested that we ask another priest in the same church to give him confession.
In the end, we didn’t know what to think so I asked my question here but it’s been a mistake as my words, meaning, intent are all being twisted and poorly understood.

I am a scriptwriter in Hollywood and have little problem getting my points across except here for some reason.

So please, no more. Please just let this thread end. ok?

I feel like this has turned into the “Devil’s Playground” and no Godly thing will come of it now so please let’s stop…

God bless,
TJ
 
The parents were wrong in discussing their son´s confession. The Priest should have told them this. Confession is private no matter what age. When you talk to a Priest in confession it´s really between just you and God. Obedience is a grave matter depending on the circumstances. Knowledge of this grave matter is suspect when dealing with a child´s disobedience. Again. It should have been a private confession. No parent should tell a Priest what sins their children have committed. God bless:thumbsup:👍👍
 
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