Confessor Shopping

[CThomas]

Is it permissible under Catholic doctrine to “shop” for the most permissive priest as confessor on the theory that even erroneous absolvement by a priest is effective? If you could find a priest who would erroneously absolve very serious sins on an insufficient basis, may you select the priest for confession on that ground? If not, I’d also appreciate hearing the rationale. (The question, it seems to me, ties into broader issues such as private interpretation and deference to one’s priest.)

Thanks, and best regards.

CThomas

 

[CThomas]

Apologies – I somehow managed to post this in a forum section I had no idea I was in. I’ll re-post in Apologetics, where I intended it to go. Sorry for the confusion.

CThomas

 

[Michael_Francis]

This was moved because it is not apologetics.

 

[Corki]

Is it permissible under Catholic doctrine to “shop” for the most permissive priest as confessor on the theory that even erroneous absolvement by a priest is effective? If you could find a priest who would erroneously absolve very serious sins on an insufficient basis, may you select the priest for confession on that ground? If not, I’d also appreciate hearing the rationale. (The question, it seems to me, ties into broader issues such as private interpretation and deference to one’s priest.)

Thanks, and best regards.

CThomas

You are free to choose a Confessor that meets your needs. Many people “shop” for an orthodox confessor so I guess shopping for a heterodox one is the same thing.

I don’t know how a priest would “erroneously absolve” serious sin. Under the principle of binding and loosing, any priest can absolve any sin that is not reserved to the Bishop or the Holy See. Even a “conservative” priest would not withhold absolution due to the seriousness of the sin.

Now there are some sins the priest doesn’t have the power to absolve such as desecration of the Eucharist. So if you were confessing one of those sins, you could go to a priest willing to say the words but I don’t think the absolution is valid in that case.

 

[nsper7]

Why would a person want to go to a heterodox priest knowingly?

 

[LilyM]

See, if you’re consciously ‘shopping’ for a priest to tell you what you want to hear, then it must mean that you know that he may well not represent the broad consensus of church teaching and opinion on the matter on which he advises you.

So you’d be obliged in such a case to make a thorough study of church teaching, including perhaps consulting more than one priest, to properly form your conscience on the particular issue. And if after this, your properly formed conscience tells you something is a mortal sin, then it is, regardless of whether a priest (who is not a mind reader) tells you differently.

And you’d probably be obliged to at least attempt to confess it every time you went to see that priest, no matter whether he persists in telling you it’s not a sin. Otherwise you’re knowingly omitting a mortal sin in the confessional.

So there’s ultimately nothing to be gained by ‘confessor shopping’ in the sense you put it. As for the absolution - the priest absolves you of ‘all your sins’, so it’s a general absolution, not (apparently) simply reserved for those things that he thinks are sins. After all, ultimately only you and God know whether you’ve sinned in a particular behaviour or not.

 

[Joe_Kelley]

I think that shopping may get one a confessor who will say that certain things are not sins. In which case he will not absolve them; so one has gained nothing there.

I think the intended question is if one can find a priest who will say that something is not a sin, is one then justified in not confessing it? Can one claim ignorance? I think it is doubtful; it is most vincible ignorance.

 

[CThomas]

Thanks Joe, and all. To be clear, and for purposes of full disclosure, I am not a Catholic and was posting the question primarily to try to flesh out the implications for Catholic doctrine, not as a practical question for my own life. (Hence my initial posting in the Apologetics section.) Let me step back and ask the question that I thought I knew but that your hesitation suggests I should get clarification. I thought it was crystal clear in Catholic doctrine that if I as a layman get erroneous advice from my priest that engaging in conduct X is not a sin and that if I fail to confess X on that basis, then his erroneous advice to me is nonetheless effective, and that I won’t go to hell on the basis of X for having relied on the priest’s advice. Is that not true, or is it unclear?

Thanks again to all and best regards.

CThomas

 

[CThomas]

Why would a person want to go to a heterodox priest knowingly?

nsper7, to be clear, there could be significant reasons why someone might want to shop for a heterodox priest if (a) one is Catholic, (b) Catholic doctrine permits reliance on doctrtinal advice of a priest even where heterodox, and (c) the heterodox approach is more permissive than the orthodox in allowing conduct in which one wishes to engage.

CThomas

 

[LilyM]

Thanks Joe, and all. To be clear, and for purposes of full disclosure, I am not a Catholic and was posting the question primarily to try to flesh out the implications for Catholic doctrine, not as a practical question for my own life. (Hence my initial posting in the Apologetics section.) Let me step back and ask the question that I thought I knew but that your hesitation suggests I should get clarification. I thought it was crystal clear in Catholic doctrine that if I as a layman get erroneous advice from my priest that engaging in conduct X is not a sin and that if I fail to confess X on that basis, then his erroneous advice to me is nonetheless effective, and that I won’t go to hell on the basis of X for having relied on the priest’s advice. Is that not true, or is it unclear?

Thanks again to all and best regards.

CThomas

It’s not true in many cases. Say a priest gives you really obviously wrong advice - for example that cold-blooded murder for no reason isn’t sinful. Of course this ‘advice’ doesn’t mean that you can regard murder as no longer a sin thenceforth! There’s a level of commonsense that has to come into your estimation of what is sinful and what isn’t.

As a more real-life example, it’s pretty well and widely known that the Catholic Church teaches against the use of contraception, no? So if a priest tells you the opposite of that - that the use of contraception is OK - then you’d need to take it with a grain of salt and you’d be obligated to investigate further as to the teaching. Even if you ask a few priests and get conflicting advice, you’d need to investigate the teaching.

The main source of official Magisterial teaching is Church documents. Contraception is dealt with in places such as Humanae Vitae, Castii Connubii and the Catechism. From these, it should be obvious that official church teaching is actually that contraception is sinful. And knowing that, you should trust the documents which are expressive of general teaching, over the advice of an individual priest.

So we have a certain obligation to educate ourselves as to church teachings, which doesn’t simply end with asking a priest in all cases.

 

[CThomas]

Thanks, LilyM. That’s very interesting, because, if I read you right, it places a right (and indeed an obligation) on the Catholic layman to engage in private interpretation of Church documents (presumably ranging from the Bible to the Catholic Catechism to papal or council documents), and to act on the basis of one’s private understanding of the meaning of those documents if one’s priest instructs you contrary to that private understanding. Do I have that right? I’m not trying to engage in a “gotcha” or make a debating point on this – I’m just genuinely curious to understand better the Catholic view regarding the role of private judgments about Church documents.

Regards,

CThomas

 

[LilyM]

Thanks, LilyM. That’s very interesting, because, if I read you right, it places a right (and indeed an obligation) on the Catholic layman to engage in private interpretation of Church documents (presumably ranging from the Bible to the Catholic Catechism to papal or council documents), and to act on the basis of one’s private understanding of the meaning of those documents if one’s priest instructs you contrary to that private understanding. Do I have that right? I’m not trying to engage in a “gotcha” or make a debating point on this – I’m just genuinely curious to understand better the Catholic view regarding the role of private judgments about Church documents.

Regards,

CThomas

Not particularly.

Church teachings are usually reiterated in numerous different documents, and further expounded upon when Popes and Bishops make speeches about them etc. So that the correct (official) interpretation becomes pretty standard and clear. Although some will disagree, among priests it’s usually not through lack of understanding of the ‘official line’, rather through the priest’s personal judgement and view that that official teaching is wrong for whatever reason.

It’s more a matter of majority opinion and consensus among the Magisterium (Bishops and Popes) than just reading one line of one document and coming up with its meaning on your own or based on the opinion of only one or two others.

You couldn’t, for example, impose a private interpretation that where Humanae Vitae or the Catechism refers to ‘contraception’ it means only barrier methods and not chemical methods, or anything like that - the documents that teach on contraception, when taken in toto, make clear that it refers to all artificial methods.

 

[Ruthie]

if I as a layman get erroneous advice from my priest that engaging in conduct X is not a sin and that if I fail to confess X on that basis, then his erroneous advice to me is nonetheless effective, and that I won’t go to hell on the basis of X for having relied on the priest’s advice. Is that not true, or is it unclear?

Aha!

I thought your original question might relate to the sin of presumption. That’s deliberately committing a sin, knowing it is a sin, and thinking you’re OK because you can just go to confession. I.e. you can get away with it because you can confess, but you have no regret for having sinned. That invalidates the sacrament.

So, in answer to your above question, I’d say it depends. If you pick a priest because, though you know that what you want to do is a sin, he will tell you it’s not, then you are trying to get away with something. It would be a lot like the sin of presumption.

So “confessor shopping” for that reason would be wrong.

God bless you,

Ruthie

 

[Church_Militant]

Is it permissible under Catholic doctrine to “shop” for the most permissive priest as confessor on the theory that even erroneous absolvement by a priest is effective?

If you could find a priest who would erroneously absolve very serious sins on an insufficient basis, may you select the priest for confession on that ground? If not, I’d also appreciate hearing the rationale. (The question, it seems to me, ties into broader issues such as private interpretation and deference to one’s priest.)

Thanks, LilyM. That’s very interesting, because, if I read you right, it places a right (and indeed an obligation) on the Catholic layman to engage in private interpretation of Church documents (presumably ranging from the Bible to the Catholic Catechism to papal or council documents), and to act on the basis of one’s private understanding of the meaning of those documents if one’s priest instructs you contrary to that private understanding. Do I have that right? I’m not trying to engage in a “gotcha” or make a debating point on this – I’m just genuinely curious to understand better the Catholic view regarding the role of private judgments about Church documents.

Regards,

CThomas

No, it is not. Such a confession would be invalid and without merit of absolution. Remember that God knows the heart and our intention.

I think that you are over reaching in that only a poor excuse for a Catholic would do such a thing. In this case, aren’t you creating a hypothetical bad Catholic and trying to use that as a fallacious measuring stick to infer something that doesn’t really exist?

Why would one even assume or posit that such a thing might occur anymore than I might posit that Protestants of whatever stripe might do something similar in “church shopping” or “preacher shopping” in order to salve their consciences about a similar moral problem for similar reasons.

In both cases their attempts to rationalize away their moral failings are nothing more than a further sin.

In the final analysis, this would be something akin to those n-Cs who rationalize some sort of sin by saying that they are “Once Saved, Always Saved” and need only confess their sins to God and then carry on in their lifestyle. We both know that there are some individuals who might do that, but that faithful n-C believers will surely counsel them about that, right?

In the same way, the Catholic Church has always taught that we all must insure that we have a correctly formed conscience and confess accordingly.

Only a fool thinks he can play moral games with the Almighty.

Galatians 6:6 And let him that is instructed in the word, communicate to him that instructeth him, in all good things. 7 Be not deceived, God is not mocked. 8 For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap. For he that soweth in his flesh, of the flesh also shall reap corruption. But he that soweth in the spirit, of the spirit shall reap life everlasting. 9 And in doing good, let us not fail. For in due time we shall reap, not failing. 10 Therefore, whilst we have time, let us work good to all men, but especially to those who are of the household of the faith.

I think that it is unwise to ever compare the best of either group of Christians with the worst of the other since neither is exemplary of what their respective faiths stand for.

 

[DominicVobiscum]

Now there are some sins the priest doesn’t have the power to absolve such as desecration of the Eucharist. So if you were confessing one of those sins, you could go to a priest willing to say the words but I don’t think the absolution is valid in that case.

I have never heard of sins that the priest couldnt absolve.

 

[PhilotheaZ]

I have never heard of sins that the priest couldnt absolve.

It is my understand that any priest (with appropriate faculties) can absolve any sin (assuming in his judgment there is true repentance).

However, in some cases, the lifting of a penalty (e.g., excommunication) can be reserved to the Holy See.

 

[puzzleannie]

Is it permissible under Catholic doctrine to “shop” for the most permissive priest as confessor on the theory that even erroneous absolvement by a priest is effective? If CThomas

this used to be common practice among young married couples when HV was promulgated, and everywhere I went there were women who could tell you what parish and what priest to go to for confession who would absolve the sin of using ABC or even getting a tubal or vasectomy. Was it permissible? That sure is debatable. More important, was it permissible for the priest to lie to a penitent in that situation on the rationale of “being pastoral”.

Where was the bigger sin, the priest with the power of the confessional leading the penitent deeper into sin, or the penitent trying to play the numbers with a sacramen? leave God to sort that one out but even without engaging in pries or parish shopping, I have a lot of residual anger for priests in my younger generation who lied to us about this and sexual sin in general.

 

[PhilotheaZ]

everywhere I went there were women who could tell you what parish and what priest to go to for confession who would absolve the sin of using ABC or even getting a tubal or vasectomy. Was it permissible? That sure is debatable. More important, was it permissible for the priest to lie to a penitent in that situation on the rationale of “being pastoral”.

These sins can be absolved, as can any sins, providing there is true repentance. In the case of artificial birth control, this would include the intention to discontinue its use.

In the case of a tubal or vasectomy, they can certainly be absolved if there is true sorrow.

 

[CThomas]

Thanks again to everyone for the hlep with this. I confess (pun intended) that I’m still a little unclear on the extent to which a private individual is permitted (or obligated) to assess based upon his private interpretation the “clear” meaning of Church documents in determining whether to comply with the advice of a priest, and how this fits in with the Church’s general teaching on private interpretations. There seems to be a real tension there based on what I’m hearing.

I appreciate it.

CThomas

 

[CThomas]

Aha!

I thought your original question might relate to the sin of presumption. That’s deliberately committing a sin, knowing it is a sin, and thinking you’re OK because you can just go to confession. I.e. you can get away with it because you can confess, but you have no regret for having sinned. That invalidates the sacrament.

Ruthie

Ruthie, this is a complete tangent that really has little to do with my original question, but I was curious. I think that if I were Catholic I would sometimes be very worried about this issue. We all fall short and engage in sinful conduct sometimes (hence the whole practice of Catholic confession, of course). It seems to me that it would be very difficult to always be sure that if you slipped and committed a sin you did not have at the back of your mind the knowledge that confession was a means for absolving the sin once committed. Speaking only for myself and my sadly inadequate spiritual state, I think I would be very concerned that I might now and then engage in a sinful act that I knew could be forgiven through confession afterward and where that knowledge at some level influenced me. Is that ever a concern for you as a Catholic?

Regards,

CThomas