Numbers in Confession

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I was baptised last summer and I am now becomeing Catholic and I was wondering, for First Confession would I don’t think I would be able to recall eavry Mortal Sin and the Exact number, Does this pose a problem? What would I say? “Father, I screwed up in this area a bunch and in this area but, not as much and…”?
 
Montie Claunch:
I was baptised last summer and I am now becomeing Catholic and I was wondering, for First Confession would I don’t think I would be able to recall eavry Mortal Sin and the Exact number, Does this pose a problem? What would I say? “Father, I screwed up in this area a bunch and in this area but, not as much and…”?
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You know that you are responsible only for any sins since baptism, don’t you? Baptism wipes away all previous sin. Shouldn’t be that hard. And yes: you can generalize. Twice a week. Frequently. Occasionally. Two or three times. The point is to give the confessor an idea of how much hold the particular sin has on you.
 
Montie,
While it is always a good idea to do your best to be acurate, the sacrament of reconcilliation is more about examining your conscience and finding where you need to work on your spiritual growth and development. When you find your weaknesses it is easier to find a solution to repair your relationship with God which is the number one reason why you should want to go to reconcilliation. Don’t think of it as a grocery list…let’s see…I had 2 sins of lying, 4 of lustful thoughts…etc. That isn’t what will help you become closer to God. What will help you is to do a very thorough examination of conscience and look at why you did something. Hmmm, how to explain… OK, say I went into confession and confessed that I beat the snot out of my kids (hypothetical folks) 4 times. OK, I know that if I am truly repentant, I will be forgiven. But what happens if I don’t examine why, or what circumstances led up to the beatings…I will do it again no matter how hard I try not to because I have not truly examined my conscience. If I went in after a proper and extensive examination of conscience and confessed that I beat my kids because I was having a problem with my temper, or because I was having trouble separating what my parents thought was appropriate punishment from what God teaches is appropriate punishment and I have the desire to not only stop hurting them, but to submit my will over to God to help me…Then, and only then can I start to correct the behavior so that I don’t repeat the sin. Doesn’t this make more sense? It isn’t about keeping track of numbers, it is about finding a way to repair ourselves and our relationship with God. I confess that when I know I am going to reconcilliation, I usually take a full day if not more to examine my conscience. Maybe this indicates I am terribly flawed, but I prefer to think that it means that I truly want to repair the relationship and sin no more.
 
Ha. This is funny. So when I was going through RCIA and we were preparing for first Confession, we were discussing it in class and our RCIA director asked if we had any more questions about it. I raised my hand and asked “Is there a time limit?” She laughed. After class I spoke with her and she said (paraphrasing what the previous poster said) that you should confess sins that are “ongoing and continue to bother you.” You needn’t tell him about the candy bar that you swiped from the local convenience store when you were 7. But if you continue to steal to this day then it might be something that you want to discuss.
 
I was baptized very young - but didn’t make my first confession till I was almost 40. And let me tell you… I led a FULL LIFE in between. :o I took a long time in my examination of conscience, and my priest advised me to do the best I could, recall all you can, confess it all.

True repentence is what is required. I confessed everything I could remember, and I would say…** “I did x-y-z more times then I can recall, and I am truely sorry for ALL of the sins of my past - even the sins I have forgotten.”**
I spent a particular ammount of time confessing a couple of sins that really stuck with me through the years - that damaged my soul. They may not have seemed like HUGE sins, but they hung around my neck for years.
Thank God for this great sacrament.
 
Giving numbers even if you are trying to be exact is NOT a good idea or practice. If you happen to be wrong or forget the exact count then you may be guilty of lying in confession (although you may be honestly trying to remember the exact count). And of course lying in confession is NOT a good thing, even if it is by accident.

Even if I know it was only once, I would just say I was guilty of such and such a sin. If you want to say often or some times or frequently or a few times, that is okay too, but distinct numbers will more than likely be wrong especially if it is something you do fairly often. Even saying a couple of times should be avoided because a couple distinctly means 2, not more and not less than 2.
 
Numbers in confession? Is that when the priest tells you to read Numbers as your penance? 😛
 
wcknight:

Well, it is my custom to give numbers, both ballpark, and exact. Sometimes to convey to the priest the degree of enormity, because he also has to assess the proneness of an individual to a certain habitual sin so that he can recommend perhaps treatment in the secular world. And usually I’ll use terminology like “about” or “around” for this, which brings no objection and I have used this on at least 8 priests. Some figures I give in exact amounts if I’m reasonably sure just has added information for whatever it’s worth.

But I think intent is important, and saying 3 when you know you stole 6 would be lieing, but when you think you stole 3 and didn’t, then that is not deliberate lieing. It should be remembered it is Christ listening, and he knows exactly how many of what.
He’s looking for sincerity first.

Andy
 
You are certainly within your rights to try to give as accurate a count as you can remember, and the Lord knows for sure whether or not you are being sincere.

The advice I gave was as related from our pastor. It keeps you out of trouble, and even if you forget the count, it is always accurate.
 
I think keeping count helps us to see where we need help too. If I commit sin “a” five times in a week and sin “b” 30 times in a week, then sin “b” is something I need to work on. We’re talking venial sins here, any mortal sin once overrides multiple venial sins.
 
If you can say the number of times you have committed a mortal sin then that’s fine but that is more likely to be achievable if you go to Confession regularly, say once a month but if someone has not been to Confession for years or indeed is a convert who would be making a first Confession its not possible to give any sort of accuracy. It can be covered by confessing the sin and saying this happened many times. The exact count and dates of a sin are not the issue.
 
I have always been catholic but had about a 12 year period where I (to put it lightly) made St. Augustine look like a Saint before his conversion. But, I had a major conversion and after many prayers and tears I entered the confessional. I was crying so hard and begging forgiveness that the priest actually had to help me, but what was so beautiful was at the end after absolution, he said “God loves you so very much and is so happy to have you back” then he reached around the screen and handed me a St. Therese prayer card and told me to say it every day.
 
Sometimes you needn’t come up with a hard an fast number. But, you might be able to reasonably say something like : “I did X about five times a week over the past ten years.” Saves a lot of multiplication, as well as time.

I never tire of saying that confessions spanning a lot of time don’t have to take a lot of time.
 
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