Setting aside theological aspects and simply looking at spiritual, lets look a little closer at the Sacrament of Reconciliation and using it frequently. What does it do for us with regards to venial sins?
If I simply remove venial sins through an act of contrition or some other means besides confession, I miss the one thing that the Sacrament of Penance offers: Counsel.
Example 1::
I am in formation to be a Secular Carmelite. There are requirements that I engage in 30 minutes of mental prayer daily, and do the Divine Office morning and evening, and that I have some kind of daily marian devotion, such as the Rosary or Angelus, and lastly, 15 minutes minimum of spiritual reading. Mass is highly recommended for those capable of attending. As you can imagine, with work it is not easy for everyone to find a Mass that doesn’t conflict with work. Without Mass, these requirements add up to a minimum of 1.5 hours per day, if not a few minutes more - a serious adjustment for anyone (which, in the context of adding up the hours I was watching TV weekly, suddenly does not seem like much).
I struggle with getting all of these things in daily. If I blow off a Rosary, or my morning prayer, I don’t commit a grave sin because there is no grave matter. However, what it amounts to are matters of virtue. Virtue opposes venial matters.
One thing that I have noticed is that if I get up earlier, in time to make 6:00am Mass at a nearby parish, I then have roughly 50 minutes in which to get in 20 of the 30 minutes of mental prayer, my divine office, and my rosary, all it leaves me for evening, is 10 minutes of mental prayer, evening prayer of divine office, and 15 minutes of spiritual reading.
However, I like to hit the snooze - again, and again, and again … until it is too late to make that 6:00am Mass.
I’ve been going weekly to bi-weekly for confession to work through the process of finding just the right schedule that will enable me to get all of these things in on a regular basis. As my pastor, a diocesan priest who is also a third order carm, told me, “Original sin makes it easier to hit the snooze instead of arising on the first ring. A good remedy is a clock with no snooze. I’m not telling you that you must get one, but consider it a suggestion”
Well, I’ve bought the thing a two weeks ago and it is sitting there waiting for me to get it running. I have tried all this week to allow myself only one hit of the snooze on my clock-radio and failed more than 50% of the days. Now, if I really want to get through this, I must follow his “suggestion”.
Example 2:
Moderation Issue: Too much time on computer, especially in Catholic forums (2-3 hours daily culminating in 14-21 hours weekly). Finally recognized that this kind of time on computer should not be a reason why I miss or am late for morning prayer, or skipping my rosary or mental prayer. This was a hard one as I was severely addicted to hanging out in the forums. I feared he would tell me to shut down the computer for a time, but he did not. He merely counseled me in the virtue of temperance and provided good suggestions. I have had great success rooting this one out, now spending far less time on the forums and more time praying.
Of course, he has given me much more counsel and on other matters far more private that were venial in nature. That is the beauty of frequent confession is that once you get to a point that you are committing few grave sins, you can chip away at imperfections and these are often built in, well in-grained things that are difficult to root out without a “coach”.
So, my question would be, are you interested in simply removing venial sin by one of the methods you mention and moving on, or are you looking at rooting out and working through those things less pleasing to God? What would have happened if I had simply said an act of contrition or some other non-sacramental manner of dealing with venial sin? I can answer that because I tried … for many, many months on my own before I finally realized, I had to humble myself and acknowledge these weaknesses. What I learned from the experiences is that God gives us a boost of extra grace for raising these kinds of issues, which are not necessary. It seems almost immediatlely I had the strength to work through that which seemed impossible prior to confession.
That is what we must ask ourselves when dealing with venial sin. The more habitual something is, the harder it is to root out and the better it is to have that counsel.
