It is well within the priest’s authority to tell you to buy something.
I told you to provide proof of the contrary, and I provided proof in documentation instead. You didn’t.
Here’s a little story:
Many years ago, during the time of the Protestant Reformation, there was a great saint living in Italy called Philip Neri. He was a wonderful priest and he helped many people to be good Catholics, during that time, when so many Catholics were losing their faith.
One day a woman came to see St. Philip Neri. She was known for her wicked tongue and she used to gossip about other people, telling all the bad things they had done. This indeed was very wrong because when she talked to someone about the faults and sins of another person, that person would many times be looked upon as a bad person, by other people!
St. Philip gave the woman some money and asked her to go to the market and **buy **a chicken that had just been killed and to pluck all the feathers off, as she walked home with the chicken.
The woman was proud of the fact that St. Philip had asked her to do something for him. She went to the market, bought the chicken, and on her way home she picked off every single feather and made that chicken as clean as a whistle! Then with a smile she handed the chicken to St. Philip Neri.
He thanked the woman and then said, “Now go back once more, and gather up all the feathers of the chicken you just plucked!”
The poor woman didn’t smile anymore. She said, “But that is impossible, Father! The wind has scattered the feathers in every direction!”
Then St. Philip scolded, “Let this be a lesson to you, for it is exactly the same with your wicked words. Just as the chicken feathers have been scattered by the wind in every direction, so have your wicked words been scattered in every direction by other people, repeating your stories!”
'If anyone has blasphemed against God or His Blessed mother or any other saint, he must appear at the door of his parish church seven Sundays in a row without cloak or shoes, wearing a leather strap or cord around his neck. For these seven weeks he should eat only bread and water for six days a week (Sunday excluded) and must not enter a Church. On Sundays he must feed the poor (at least one beggar), but if unable to do so he should be given an appropriate substitute penance. If he refuses this penance he is forbidden to enter a church and upon his death should be denied a Christian burial."
“If the penitent who confesses perjury appears wealthy he should be referred to a magistrate who should fine him 40 sous or at the very least 20 sous.”
“Penitents who preach rebellion against their bishop, their pastor, or their fathers should be sentenced to a monastery for the rest of their days.”
St. Charles Borromeo, Bishop, “Instructions to Confessors” 1572 A.D.
There are standard penances that existed from the beginning of Christian history, and only recently during these weak times have fallen out of use. They’re found in ‘penitentials’ and are rather consistent from the very beginning.
Just because priests don’t exercise their power and you can go parish shopping, doesn’t mean that power doesn’t still exist.
And that God isn’t behind the scenes taking notes.
