Confessional screen - anonymity?

[AMDGtoo]

Early on? My impression is that private confessionals date to the 16th or 17th Century?

Not according to any history I have read.

Well, although we know that the early Church practiced public Confession, in 1215 the Fourth Lateran Council made regular private Confessions the Church norm.

I guess someone confused “private” with “anonymous”.

 

[jmcrae]

Early on? My impression is that private confessionals date to the 16th or 17th Century?

Origen, writing in 240 AD, mentions the privacy of the Confessional in his homily on Psalm 37.

Not according to any history I have read.

My source is The Faith of the Early Fathers, edited by William Jurgens, Volume 1, page 204, paragraph 485a.

 

[AMDGtoo]

Origen, writing in 240 AD, mentions the privacy of the Confessional in his homily on Psalm 37.

My source is The Faith of the Early Fathers, edited by William Jurgens, Volume 1, page 204, paragraph 485a.

No one is arguing with you. I just said that someone must have confused “private” (Church norm) with “anonymous”.

 

[jmcrae]

No one is arguing with you. I just said that someone must have confused “private” (Church norm) with “anonymous”.

We must have been posting at the same time - I was responding to the same person that you were.

 

[tee_eff_em]

Origen, writing in 240 AD, mentions the privacy of the Confessional in his homily on Psalm 37.

My source is The Faith of the Early Fathers, edited by William Jurgens, Volume 1, page 204, paragraph 485a.

I see no indication of privacy/anonymity?

*For I confess my wickedness *(1). We have often spoken a denunciation of our wickedness: that is, we have often made a confession of sin. Look, then, to what Divine Scripture teaches us: that sin is not to lie hidden within us. Perhaps there are some who have an undigested mass of food shut up within them, or an abundance either of a humor or phlegm remaining in the stomach where it weighs upon them heavily and to their discomfort. If they vomit it out, they experience relief. It is the same way with those who have sinned. If, indeed, they conceal their sin and keep it within them, they will suffer an internal urging, and may come close to being suffocated by the phlegm or humor of sin. If, however, a man in such circumstance becomes his own accuser, as soon as he accuses himself and confesses, he vomits out his fault and puts in order what was the whole cause of his illness.

tee

 

[jmcrae]

I see no indication of privacy/anonymity?

tee

Keep going - it’s in the next section.

“Only be careful and circumspect in regard to whom you would confess your sins. Test first the physician to whom you would expose the cause of your illness. See whether he knows to seem weak with one who is weak, to weep with one who weeps, and whether he is acquainted with the art of consoling and comforting. Finally, when he has shown himself to be a physician both learned and merciful, do whatever he might tell you and follow whatever counsel he may give. If after much deliberation he has understood the nature of your illness and judges that to be cured it must be exposed in the assembly of the whole church, follow the advice of that expert physician, and thereby others may perhaps be able to be edified, while you yourself are the more easily healed.”

From this, I deduce that Confession was made privately to the priest first, and then, only on the advice of the priest, confessed publicly to the whole assembly during the Penitential Rite at Mass.

So, the custom of making public confessions during the Penitential Rite has since been replaced with the Confiteor, (“I confess …” recited in unison) but the custom of private confessions to the priest beforehand was already in place, even at the same time that we still had the public confessions.

 

[tee_eff_em]

Keep going - it’s in the next section.

“Only be careful and circumspect in regard to whom you would confess your sins. Test first the physician to whom you would expose the cause of your illness. See whether he knows to seem weak with one who is weak, to weep with one who weeps, and whether he is acquainted with the art of consoling and comforting. Finally, when he has shown himself to be a physician both learned and merciful, do whatever he might tell you and follow whatever counsel he may give. If after much deliberation he has understood the nature of your illness and judges that to be cured it must be exposed in the assembly of the whole church, follow the advice of that expert physician, and thereby others may perhaps be able to be edified, while you yourself are the more easily healed.”

From this, I deduce that Confession was made privately to the priest first, and then, only on the advice of the priest, confessed publicly to the whole assembly during the Penitential Rite at Mass.

So, the custom of making public confessions during the Penitential Rite has since been replaced with the Confiteor, (“I confess …” recited in unison) but the custom of private confessions to the priest beforehand was already in place, even at the same time that we still had the public confessions.

A fair deduction, I suppose. But I do not dispute private confession.

Rather, my posts have been in regard to *confessionals *and particularly, the reason for the fixed grill therein. I maintain that the reason for them is not anonymity.

tee

 

[ElizabethPH]

A fair deduction, I suppose. But I do not dispute private confession.

Rather, my posts have been in regard to *confessionals *and particularly, the reason for the fixed grill therein. I maintain that the reason for them is not anonymity.

tee

Then what’s the reason for them? Or did you say?

 

[ElizabethPH]

Why?

Some confessionals do not even have doors, let alone a door-with-a-window! (Here is a photo of one such at the Vatican)
If that should fail, a Google image search for “vatican confessional” or “open confessional” should yield more.

tee

I have been to several parishes that have no doors but there is always a partition with a screen or slats or something to keep from being seen by the priest. I was just at one. It was just out in the open in the church with a partition with slats. Others kept they’re distance as not to over hear. I used to go to Mass in an old mission that only had a partition there is not even a door for the priest like the picture shows in your example. But one still doesn’t see the priest nor does he see you.

So what is the point if it’s not anonymity?

 

[tee_eff_em]

My understanding is that the grill or screen was introduced to prevent solicitation. (And as much to protect penitents against actual instances of the crime as to protect priests against false accusation)

I used to go to Mass in an old mission that only had a partition there is not even a door for the priest like the picture shows in your example. But one still doesn’t see the priest nor does he see you.

Yes, I saw one at Mission Dolores, San Francisco – My guide said that the screened sides were (originally) for the benefit of women, but that men still confessed face to face with the priest (male/male solicitation being presumably unthinkable in SF at the time of its construction).

tee

 

[jmcrae]

My understanding is that the grill or screen was introduced to prevent solicitation. (And as much to protect penitents against actual instances of the crime as to protect priests against false accusation)

Yes, I saw one at Mission Dolores, San Francisco – My guide said that the screened sides were (originally) for the benefit of women, but that men still confessed face to face with the priest (male/male solicitation being presumably unthinkable in SF at the time of its construction).

tee

Unless it were also anonymous, how would it prevent solicitations? One can just as easily say, “Meet me at Timmy’s for a double-double” through a grill, as face to face.

 

[tee_eff_em]

Unless it were also anonymous, how would it prevent solicitations?

I believe the Church uses the term “solicitation” in a more technical and/or euphemistic way than we may be accustomed. cf. Solicitation.

I do not have primary sources at hand, but Google book search has been helpful. cf. The History of the Confessional, John Henry Hopkins (p 199) and History of Sacerdotal Celibacy in the Christian Church, Henry Charles Lea (p 499ff).

tee

 

[ElizabethPH]

So this ‘solicitation’ is the reason for the screen today?

How did men evolve into the use of the screen?

 

[mercygate]

Byzantine Tradition is to confess face to face in front of the Iconostas, in plain view of everyone. True, not one comes close, and one confesses quietly to the priest. It is truly humbling.

When I was an Episcopalian, that’s how my confessor did it. It really gives you a chill when the priest kneels beside you and recites that Byzantine formula, confessing himself to be a sinner.

I used to make my confessions at the altar of one of those apsidal chapels at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York. My confessor and I were occasionally the highlight of one of the many bus tours traipsing through the place. :bigyikes:

 

[mercygate]

I thought that it was in part because some of the noble women in the middle ages objected to the priest knowing their identity.

Historically, it is my understanding that the “phone booth” confessional was a development of the counter Reformation in an attempt to make the ordeal less hair-raising.

 

[mercygate]

Unless he turns and looks at the door to see who is coming in he would not see you. But if he did turn his head it would look right through the screen which is way too flimsy.

I just prefer kneeling to receive absolution. Sitting in a chair is too chit-chatty for me, but that’s a personal preference.

~Liza

Hey! I do that, too! My confessor meets me in his office (yuk) but that’s what you get when you do this monthly by appointment. No anonymity.