Do I commit a sin by doing that?

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LeonardDeNoblac

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I often change the place where I go to confession (there are lots of parishes in my city). That’s because I’m ashamed of repeating the same sins (I’m struggling with it, I’m getting better but the path to holiness is still long ) and I’ve not enough courage to confess them every time to the same priest. Do I commit a sin by doing so?
 
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Feeling shame for our sins is very normal, it shows you have a conscience! The only advice I have, do not put off confession because you only have access to a priest where you have confessed before. Know that he is never going to judge you, know that your sins will be something he does not even remember most times. Our sins, the ones that embarrass us the most, are actually very common and the priest hears them over and over every confession.

Sometimes Satan tries to convince us that our sins are especially super bad, they are not. Most sin is dull and common.
 
TheLittleLady said:
you only have access to a priest where you have confessed before.
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Can you be more precise, please? However, the parishes where I use to go to confession (weekly ) are three, always the same.
 
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If you are aware of grave sin and the only place that has confession today is with Fr Joe, do not stay away from confession because you have confessed to Fr Joe in the past and you are embarrassed for him to hear another confession.
 
I don’t understand why you repeat the same sins? Don’t the priest tell you how to apply the grace you receive? Have you ever gone on a Isaiah 58 fast ? Or a daniel 21 day fast?.
 
Fasting is unfeasible for me now. I’m 18, I still live with my parents for now and no one of them would support my fasting.
 
I’m from Italy. Here mealtime is different. We are supposed to eat everything we are given.
 
Here we hardly ever fill our plates. Others do that for us.
 
Luckily my diocesis allows the faithful to pray, make spiritual exercises or do acts of charity instead of fasting on fridays.
 
Fasting is not necessary.

“My sacrifice, O God, is a contrite spirit” (from Psalm 51).
 
But we were talking about fasting to overcome habitual sin.

That side-topic began with post #7:
Askme said:
I don’t understand why you repeat the same sins? Don’t the priest tell you how to apply the grace you receive? Have you ever gone on a Isaiah 58 fast ? Or a daniel 21 day fast?.
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These “trendy fasts” with Biblical names are not part of the Catholic idea of fasting.

For Catholics, fasting means eating one regular meal and two smaller meals each day. Fasting might be from social media or fasting from sodas. Your priest will tell you if he feels fasting (not meaning going without food for long periods of time) will help with habitual sins.
 
LeonardDeNoblac said:
Fasting is unfeasible for me now. I’m 18, I still live with my parents for now and no one of them would support my fasting.
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I understand entirely what the OP is saying. There are households where such things would be noticed — “you’re not eating nearly as much as you usually do, is something wrong?”. Having to say you’re fasting leads to the question “why? you’ve never done that before”, and it comes close to having to manifest your conscience to others. We never have to do that.

In those circumstances, I would find a more inconspicuous way to do penance and mortification.
 
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I actually told my mother about the abstinence obligation on fridays. Her reaction was worse than I had expected. She shouted at me that fasting (and the very concept of mortification and self-sacrifice ) is a “medieval barbarity”.
 
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LeonardDeNoblac said:
I actually told my mother about the abstinence obligation on fridays. Her reaction was worse than I had expected. She shouted at me that fasting (and the very concept of mortification and self-sacrifice ) is a “medieval barbarity”.
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Same here. I have family members who just cannot grasp the concept of doing penance, and view the Church as being pharisaical for requiring dietary penance. I get an earful of “when I was growing up, we couldn’t afford to have meat very often”. They do not have a Catholic mindset and don’t understand why the Church does this.
 
Are your relatives protestant?
My father is an atheist. My mother claims to be Christian, but accepts abortion and homosexual behaviour, told me that I am too rigid because I don’t take the Eucharist if I haven’t confessed mortal sins before, believes in universal salvation, doesn’t believe that Christ’s death on the cross was a sacrifice - nor does she believe in original sin - and thinks that truth and morality are subjective. She also says that some saints were schizophrenic and when I quoted Scripture once in order to prove that Christianity involves a serious eschatology (she doesn’t believe in any eschatology ) she called it an “idiocy” (because she doesn’t believe in the inerrancy of Scripture ). She also thinks that the Catholic Church should ordain women as priests and believes the feminist myth that the witch hunting was all about silencing free independent female intellectuals.
 
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LeonardDeNoblac said:
Are your relatives protestant?
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They are nominal converts to Catholicism who, as a practical matter, adhere to the simple tenets of the mainline Protestantism they were raised with, and even then, they only accept the parts they like. They have no concept of looking outside one’s own opinion to find truths that might challenge their preconceptions. One of them proclaims herself an agnostic. They never go to Mass, refuse to receive sacraments, and say that they will never again step inside a Catholic church because of the priestly sex abuse scandals, the greediness of the bishops and priests (as they put it), and some very real injuries that have been inflicted upon our family by Catholic clergy, laity, and institutions. (Just to be clear, those injuries do not involve sex abuse.)

I get past all this for the sake of my soul and for the glory and proper worship of God, but they cannot.
 
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Askme said:
I don’t understand why you repeat the same sins?
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You would prefer someone is always committing new sins?! Many of us struggle with habitual sin. Frequent confession of these same sins is one of the only ways we can break the habits.
LeonardDeNoblac said:
Do I commit a sin by doing so?
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No, you don’t sin by going to other priests, but as you’ve been advised above, you should take whichever priest you can as soon as you can. I’ll also add that you may be depriving yourself of spiritual guidance and benefits by not having a regular confessor that you go to routinely who will get to know your sinful habits and can help you overcome them.
 
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