Confession via IT or Telephone?

[Cradle]

I don’t understand why you can’t just talk to a priest at another parish and schedule confession with him… We’re not tied down to our area parish, especially for something as important as a sacrament.

And let me venture a guess as to why Confession (and all the other sacraments) cannot be done over the internet or video or phone. A sacrament effects grace through the matter involved, and if that matter is not present, how can the grace be conveyed? The matter, you, and the matter, the priest, need to be both physically present as channels for God’s grace; with telecommunication devices you are not both present, ergo the matter required is missing. Does that make any sense?

 

[johnnykins]

What about those of us who are under a terrible time constraints and time pressures in business that we genuinely do not have time to receive absolution as we are invariably required to work when we would rather be going to confession. Is there any such thing as ‘Confession via telephone’ or ‘On Line’!

You know I remember back in the pre-VII days that one confessionals in my Parish had a phone for the hard of hearing - hard wired to the priest right there. I can’t see how that is substantively different from calling the priest down the road.

I don’t know of anyone doing confession like that, but I’m not convinced it’s either illicit or invalid.

If I were you I’d try to talk with your priest.

Also, if you are told over the phone that you are OK for communion, (assuming the priest knows everything) - go ahead and receive - you could fall into scrupulosity if you’re not careful.

 

[Brenda_V]

You know I remember back in the pre-VII days that one confessionals in my Parish had a phone for the hard of hearing - hard wired to the priest right there. I can’t see how that is substantively different from calling the priest down the road.

I can. The phone in the Confessional is hardwired directly to the Priest - a phone from down the road is not and can easily be tapped into!

I don’t know of anyone doing confession like that, but I’m not convinced it’s either illicit or invalid.

I don’t know anyone who needed to use this special device either as it is for the hard of hearing so the Priest didn’t have to yell making the confession no longer private. Again, this is a special device that looks like a phone for all intents and purposed but has a speaker in it that allows the hard of hearing to hear what the Priest is saying - it is not an ordinary phone.

If I were you I’d try to talk with your priest.

Good advise. If your Priest won’t make an appointment with you for Confession then perhaps it is time to find another Praish close by and see if that Priest will make an appointment with you.

Also, if you are told over the phone that you are OK for communion, (assuming the priest knows everything) - go ahead and receive - you could fall into scrupulosity if you’re not careful.

Here of course the most important part of this advise is in the paranthesis - assuming the priest knows everythig!

You may need to be more insistant about an appointment but so be it . You surely know if you need confession and absolution as long as you are not being scrupulous and if you are, then you need spiritual direction so it sounds like you need to have an appointment with a Priest one way or the other.

Your question OP though has been answered - no, you can not confess over a phone or the internet.

Brenda V.

 

[jmcrae]

Where do you live? Do you not consult a Doctor by telephone?

Have you never been diagnosed via the telephone?

Where I live, a doctor can’t get paid unless he sees the patient in person. I have also never heard of a doctor answering his own telephone - they have telephone operators for that, who then schedule appointments.

In an occupation where one serves the weak and vulnerable, it is arguably a dereliction of duty to say ‘oh well, my needs come first’.

There’s a line you could use on your priest, if he is insisting that he can only hear Confessions for 30 minutes a week. He should be hearing Confessions any time someone needs their Confession heard, within reasonable limits.

You can also go to any priest. Try your Cathedral or a downtown parish church - normally the Cathedral and the churches downtown will have Confessions available more frequently than the ones out in suburbia.

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

What about those of us who are under a terrible time constraints and time pressures in business that we genuinely do not have time to receive absolution as we are invariably required to work when we would rather be going to confession. Is there any such thing as ‘Confession via telephone’ or ‘On Line’!

Sacraments, are, of their very nature​

• 1. Acts of persons
• 2. Acts of the public worship of the Church
• 3. Acts of Christ the High Priest

• so one can’t celebrate a sacrament if one is not present to do so; & a recorded voice would in principle be as efficient as a human person, if there were confession by telephone. But the social character of the sacraments has to be preserved intact, so that’n not allowed.

It may be worth emphasising that this a matter, not of canon law alone, but of the nature of the Church’s worship; the canons are provided to protect the worship of the Church, which is worship, by human persons, of God Who is Supremely Personal. The sacraments are not just “things the Church does” - they have a specific character, & for very good reasons, which are can be traced to the Revelation of God in Christ.

 

[Sixtus]

What is more important- your soul or the money? That is all I have to say about that. What a horrid excuse-

I work roughly double the hours my employer pays me for, so do not see the point of the first part of your arguement.

If ‘supervising a vulnerable adult who cannot be left on their own because they would be put at risk’ is a horrible excuse, then I feel sorry for your construing.

Thank you for all who contributed. Our Priest has assured me that actually, it is nigh impossible to commit a mortal sin so there is actually rarely if ever a need for personal confession. It is just that I was educated into and belong to the old school, whereby my conscience tells me that actually, it is much easier than our priest implies to commit a mortal sin.

I am also of the belief that ‘if I judge myself unworthy to receive the Blessed Sacrament’ then I am unworthy.

I haven’t been to Holy Communion since Christmas. The mass is a very important part of my life. It is so frustrating.

I have decided to overcome the problem by ‘pulling a sicky’. I feel mean as that means someone else is going to be very stressed doing their job and mine as well while I am feigning sickness in order to get the time off to go to confession. But, I also have a feeling of guilt that that is wrong, even though I DO work well in excess of my salaried hours.

This Saturday praise God, I will be reconciled with His Holy Church.

Thank you for all the advice. God bless you all

 

[meeshy]

I know a priest who gives confession over the phone. Namely, cell phone.

Peace,
Meeshy

 

[Robert902]

What prohibits me from confessing my sins directly to my Father in heaven; in Jesus name? I can find nothing in the Bible (KJV) that tells me that I cannot do this. Actually the Bible teaches that “there is one moderator between man and God, and that is the Christ Jesus.”
The veil in the temple was torn, when Jesus died on the cross. So now, because of Jesus work on the cross, we have access to God ourselves, through Jesus Christ.

God Bless,
Robert
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Eph 5:20-21 “Test all things, hold fast what is good.”
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

 

[johnnykins]

I can. The phone in the Confessional is hardwired directly to the Priest - a phone from down the road is not and can easily be tapped into!

So what - people overhear confessions, too. Sometimes deliberately. Your point is inapt.

I don’t know anyone who needed to use this special device either as it is for the hard of hearing so the Priest didn’t have to yell making the confession no longer private. Again, this is a special device that looks like a phone for all intents and purposed but has a speaker in it that allows the hard of hearing to hear what the Priest is saying - it is not an ordinary phone.

It is effectively a telephone. Again, your point is not apt.

Good advise. If your Priest won’t make an appointment with you for Confession then perhaps it is time to find another Praish close by and see if that Priest will make an appointment with you.

yep.

Here of course the most important part of this advise is in the paranthesis - assuming the priest knows everythig!

But that is always the case - bad confessions happen, too.

You may need to be more insistant about an appointment but so be it . You surely know if you need confession and absolution as long as you are not being scrupulous and if you are, then you need spiritual direction so it sounds like you need to have an appointment with a Priest one way or the other.

Or perhaps a phone call to him

Your question OP though has been answered - no, you can not confess over a phone or the internet.

Brenda V.

Perhaps I missed it, but I’ve seen nothing but unsupported opinions on the topic - including my own musings on the topic. You’ve been answered, we just don’t know if the “answers” are right.

I would also add, that I think you are possibly “present” when on the phone since the necessary verbal interplay can take place.

I’ve seen nothing here to convince me it might not be OK.

Does anyone have any documents, cites or ruling that address this issue?

 

[VociMike]

Perhaps I missed it, but I’ve seen nothing but unsupported opinions on the topic - including my own musings on the topic. You’ve been answered, we just don’t know if the “answers” are right.

vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/pccs/documents/rc_pc_pccs_doc_20020228_church-internet_en.html

 

[Tantum_ergo]

Here is one problem: Jurisdiction. From New Advent:

As regards penance, the case is different: “because the nature and character of a judgment requires that sentence be pronounced only on those who are subjects (of the judge) the Church of God has always held, and this Council affirms it to be most true, that the absolution which a priest pronounces upon one over whom he has not either ordinary or delegated jurisdiction, is of no effect” (Council of Trent, Sess. XIV, c. 7). Ordinary jurisdiction is that which one has by reason of his office as involving the care of souls; the pope has it over the whole Church, the bishop within his diocese, the pastor within his parish. Delegated jurisdiction is that which is granted by an ecclesiastical superior to one who does not possess it by virtue of his office. The need of jurisdiction for administering this sacrament is usually expressed by saying that a priest must have “faculties” to hear confession (see FACULTIES). Hence it is that a priest visiting in a diocese other than his own cannot hear confession without special authorization from the bishop. Every priest, however, can absolve anyone who is at the point of death, because under those circumstances the Church gives all priests jurisdiction. As the bishop grants jurisdiction, he can also limit it by “reserving” certain cases (see RESERVATION) and he can even withdraw it entirely.

In the case of the internet or telephone, how is one to regulate whether a person is in the jurisdiction of the priest to whom he confesses?

From further in New Advent:
(

In I Reg., III, v, n. 13 in P.L., LXXIX, 207); Pope Leo the Great (440-61), who is often credited with the institution of confession, refers to it as an “Apostolic rule”. Writing to the bishops of Campania he forbids as an abuse “contrary to the Apostolic rule” (contra apostolicam regulam) the reading out in public of a written statement of their sins drawn up by the faithful, because, he declares, “it suffices that the guilt of conscience be manifested to priests alone in secret confession” (Ep. clxviii in P.L., LIV, 1210).

The priest, you see, is the key. Not just his ‘voice’ or a presence somewhere. . .otherwise, ‘written’ confession/absolution letters would be permitted, and clearly they are not. Further, the penitent must meet with the priest, face to face, in secret confession.

So: There is no jurisdiction for ‘internet’ or ‘phone’ confession. There is the requirement for penitent to confess to the priest, alone, in secret confession.

 

[jmcrae]

I know a priest who gives confession over the phone. Namely, cell phone.

Peace,
Meeshy

Unfortunately, a great many of our dear priests seem to have slept through their Seminary classes on the nature of this important Sacrament.

 

[DL82]

vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/pccs/documents/rc_pc_pccs_doc_20020228_church-internet_en.html

Nothing in this web-link explicitly says “you can’t receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation by phone/internet”. In fact, it encourages the Church and priests to explore the new opportunities provided by the internet.

Surely the issue of the priest being present is simply in the sense that he can’t leave a tape recorder in the confessional and hear confessions later, or leave an empty confessional with written instructions on penance provided you confess to the empty chair. In a telephone conversation (but NOT in an e-mail) you are both present in the faculties that matter to confession, i.e. your memory, intellect, prayers and ability to communicate, there is direct contact and interaction. Am I missing the point?

 

[jmcrae]

What prohibits me from confessing my sins directly to my Father in heaven; in Jesus name?

Obviously, we do this with the help of the priest in the Confessional, as well as outside of the Confessional.

If someone is replacing God with the priest in the Confessional, he is completely missing the point. Fortunately, in this case, the priest will correct him and teach him how to say his prayers.

I can find nothing in the Bible (KJV) that tells me that I cannot do this. Actually the Bible teaches that “there is one moderator between man and God, and that is the Christ Jesus.”

The priest doesn’t actually get up on the Cross and die for our sins in the Confessional. He’s not a “mediator” - he is an intercessor and a helper. Because of the graces of his ordination, he is authorized to speak the words of forgiveness that Christ gives to us when we make a good Confession of our sins. But they are Christ’s words, not the priest’s words. It is Christ, acting through the priest, who forgives our sins.

 

[VociMike]

Nothing in this web-link explicitly says “you can’t receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation by phone/internet”. In fact, it encourages the Church and priests to explore the new opportunities provided by the internet.

*Similarly, as noted above, the virtual reality of cyberspace has some worrisome implications for religion as well as for other areas of life. Virtual reality is no substitute for the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, the sacramental reality of the other sacraments, and shared worship in a flesh-and-blood human community. There are no sacraments on the Internet; and even the religious experiences possible there by the grace of God are insufficient apart from real-world interaction with other persons of faith. *

 

[meeshy]

Nothing in this web-link explicitly says “you can’t receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation by phone/internet”. In fact, it encourages the Church and priests to explore the new opportunities provided by the internet.

Surely the issue of the priest being present is simply in the sense that he can’t leave a tape recorder in the confessional and hear confessions later, or leave an empty confessional with written instructions on penance provided you confess to the empty chair. In a telephone conversation (but NOT in an e-mail) you are both present in the faculties that matter to confession, i.e. your memory, intellect, prayers and ability to communicate, there is direct contact and interaction. Am I missing the point?

I was thinking that in order to receive the blessing that comes from the priest making the sign of the cross while he gives absolution, we have to be in front of him.

But I remember a really long time ago, someone asked a question in EWTN, whether or not they receive the Pope’s blessing by watching him on t.v. and making the sign of the cross as he blessed the faithful present in front of him.

The answer given was “yes.” I guess it has to do with spiritual communion.

It’s a really complex subject and it would be great if we could find examples of saints giving (or receiving) long-distance confession. How about Padre Pio? Didn’t he know the penitent’s confession before they even came into the confessional?

I will definitely read the documents. This is an interesting topic for our time.

Peace,
Meeshy

P.S. I know that in court, a judge will often not accept a written statement from a witness who is not in front of him, because he sometimes would like to question the witness about certain things in the statement. I suppose this would be true of any written confession, also. The priest sometimes needs to ask us more than we have divulged.

 

[VociMike]

More, this from the USCCB:

*The Secretariat for the Liturgy has received several inquiries concerning the celebration of the sacraments via various types of electronic communication. The celebration of the Sacrament of Penance via telephone, participation in Mass via television or the celebration of the Sacrament of Confirmation via video conference have on occasion been proposed. However, electronic communication via telephone, television, video conference or internet is not sufficient for the celebration of the sacraments. The celebration of the sacraments requires the physical and geographic presence of both the gathered faithful and the bishop, priest, deacon or other presiding minister.

Liturgical celebrations depend upon the physical presence of the gathered faithful. While the Ceremonial of Bishops enthusiastically recommends large diocesan liturgical celebrations the emphasis is always placed on the invitation to the faithful to gather. Indeed, the idea of gathering of the members of Christ’s faithful in one place is fundamental to the celebration of the Liturgy.

The faithful from different areas of the dioceses should be invited to gather and, as far as possible, the priests should join them. To encourage and make more convenient gatherings of the faithful and the priests, arrangement should be made for gatherings of this kind at different times in the various parts of the diocese." (Ceremonial of Bishops 13)
Thus the ritual for the Sacrament of Confirmation calls for the entrance song to take place “after the people have assembled.” The clear presumption is that the people are physically present and in the gathering are enabled to enter into a relationship with each other and the priest in the sacramental action.

Liturgical celebrations require the physical presence of the bishop, priest, deacon or the approved presiding minister. The multiple dialogues between priest and people which are at the heart of all Christian liturgy require the physical presence of “the bishop, either in person or through the priests who are his helpers.” ("episcopo sive per seipsum, sive per presbyteros adiutores ipsius."General Instruction of the Roman Missal 59)

The General Instruction of the Roman Missal, number 5, states that “It is of the greatest importance that the celebration of the Mass, the Lord’s Supper, be so arranged that the ministers and the faithful may take their own proper part in it and thus gain its fruits more fully.” The part of the priest celebrant would seem to be characterized first by his physical presence in order that he might enter into the necessary relationships with the gathered faithful and their God which form the basis of Christian worship. Electronic projections appear to lack a capacity for communication on the level of word, action and physical perception which are natural to those who are physically present.

Some might suggest that an electronic “presence,” especially when oral and visual communication is made possible through electronic means, is sufficient. While the use of media can lessen the impact or temper the limitations of distance and time, it also affects the way things are perceived. What people come to know and experience is not reality as such, but what they are shown. (cf. The Pontifical Council on Culture’s recent instruction Towards a Pastoral Approach to Culture, no. 9).

The liturgy, however, requires a full, conscious and active participation which demands the presence of the whole person in contact with the reality (not merely an image or concept) of the saving presence of Christ. A “live” telecast of an event allows a limited kind of “presence” for the viewer, but the viewer is very aware that he or she is not “really there” in the same manner as those physically present at the event. Effective participation and communication require that one be “present at” and “present to” the reality to be experienced.

As regular participants in video conferences report, electronic communication is incapable of transmitting the full range of human communication. As the ancient maxim ubi episcopus, ibi ecclesia implies, true “presence” is physical and geographical by definition.
*

 

[Sixtus]

What would happen if when the NASA astronauts land on Mars, or go to a land station on the moon and a Catholic Astronaut decides he needs confession.

It all seems rather simple except that the world, will be able to listen to his ‘private’ confession.

Actually in my case which started this thread, I was mysteriously invited by our Priest outside from Work time. I thought it was very good of him as he administered the Sacrament on Holy Saturday, which of course is not approved of by the Church.

So, he had gone to some lengths to ensure I was able to receive Our Blessed Lord at the Vigil and again tomorrow at the Mass of the Day.

 

[kangnamdragon]

Where do you live? Do you not consult a Doctor by telephone?

Have you never been diagnosed via the telephone?

In an occupation where one serves the weak and vulnerable, it is arguably a dereliction of duty to say ‘oh well, my needs come first’.

We have access to the sacrament for half an hour a week. That occurs right in the middle of my work shedule when I am responsible for working with vulnerable ‘at risk’ adults.

I merely ask if it is possible.

I have been trying to get to the sacrament for several weeks now. Our PP is very busy working in a very damanding and very large parish. I have asked for a private appointment but our PP is not too keen on that. He has assured me I am ok, but I feel the need to be absolved, healed and made clean. The Sacrament is also in my experience a great way to get strengthened by the Spirit to resist future occasions of sin.

I merely ask if it is possible, I am not looking for philosphical sarcastic or derisory replies, just pragmatic ones

You can be diagnosed over the phone, but not treated.

 

[Sixtus]

When the Pope gives his Easter blessing to the world, however one receives it: live, via television, radio or video, one still participates in spirit and one still receives this blessing.

The Sacrement is still the Sacrament. So long as there is a physical reality of presence between the Confessor and penitent then it is valid if that is the only channel available to receive it.

You do not have to see the priest nor the priest the penitent. The Sacrament is still valid. But Ordinarily, ‘person to person’ ‘face to face’ is the correct order.