Mortal sin/confession

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Hi. I have a question about confession.
If someone has made bad confessions (more than one), does he have to say how many times he has recieved other sacraments since then, or just what they are? What if he doesn’t think of that at the time? Is the confession still valid? I have been worried about this, and it has been at the back of my mind ever since.
 
Serious sins need to be confessed in number and in kind. However, if you forgot to do so, your sins are forgiven anyway. You just had to do the best you could at the time to make an honest and complete confession. Any sins we forget to mention are forgiven anyway.

It is entirely possible that your priest confessor could tell from the rest of what you were saying about how long this had been going on. He would have asked you if he needed further clarification.

Be at peace!
 
if you cannot remember time and number of sins, just say so, for instance, I made a bad confession in 2006 and every confession and reception of communion since then has therefore been a sacrilege, for which I am truly sorry. then say your other sins, going back to your last good confession, and as always, end your confession with, “for these, and for all the sins of my past life, I am heartily sorry.” bingo. receive absolution, make a good act of contrition. all is forgiven and absolved. a confession where you genuinely forgot to mention is NOT a bad confession, as long as the act of forgetting was not a deliberate mind-game. all sins are forgiven, even those we forget to mention, in confession.
 
If you forgive to confess a mortal sin in one confession, you have to do it the next (although I think it’s hard to forget something really serious).
 
tessi said:
If you forgive to confess a mortal sin in one confession, you have to do it the next (although I think it’s hard to forget something really serious).
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If you honestly forgot, you should mention that, but an HONEST memory lapse does not lead to an invalid confession or to more sin. Intentionally not confessing one does.
 
puzzleannie said:
if you cannot remember time and number of sins, just say so, for instance, I made a bad confession in 2006 and every confession and reception of communion since then has therefore been a sacrilege, for which I am truly sorry. then say your other sins, going back to your last good confession, and as always, end your confession with, “for these, and for all the sins of my past life, I am heartily sorry.” bingo. receive absolution, make a good act of contrition. all is forgiven and absolved. a confession where you genuinely forgot to mention is NOT a bad confession, as long as the act of forgetting was not a deliberate mind-game. all sins are forgiven, even those we forget to mention, in confession.
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I have a question about this, Last year I started living out my faith, and started this off by going to confession, but I forgot to confess that my previous confession was a bad confession (it didnt even cross my mind) does that mean my sincere confession was not valid? The next time I went to confession, I mentioned it though since I had remembered. Im getting worried now, that I may have been living in a state of mortal sin for the past year without knowing it, because according to the quote above me the part where it says " I made a bad confession in 2006 and every confession and reception of communion since then has therefore been a sacrilege, for which I am truly sorry." would that mean that me going to confession sincerely, but forgetting to mention that my previous confession was a bad one was invalid?
 
also, during that sincere confession a year ago, when I said how long it had been since my last confession, I mentioned the most recent one which was invalid, however I didnt know/recall it at the time, so would mistaking the true time between good confessions invalidate a confession or be a sin?
 
Forgetting to mention something does not make a bad confession. You are fine. Trust in God’s mercy! As long as you were sincere and did the best you could in your confession, YOU ARE FORGIVEN. Trust in God’s mercy!

There is a danger in rehashing old confessions in your mind, worrying about whether they were valid. You could become scrupulous (a hypersensitive conscience, seeing sin where there really is none — if you think this describes you, find ONE good priest confessor, share your concern with him, go to him all the time, and obey his instructions).
 
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