Restitution for Damages

[PeteZaHut]

About a year ago, a scraped bumpers in a parking lot when a parked car of my church parking lot. Stupidly, I didn’t leave a note and left. I immediately regretted it and went to confession about it.

It was dark, so I wasn’t sure exactly how much damage was done, though I know it was little. I little bit of paint was scaped off my car and the paint looks kind of smudged. It is barely noticeable. I assume the same thing happened to the other car; although, some of my paint could have made a mark on the other car.

I’ve never seen the car again. My parish is big. There is no real practical way for me to contact the person to pay for it. The damage on my car was so small that I didn’t even think even consider repairing mine.

Do I owe restitution to some kind of charity or to the church collection? How much should I give?

 

[Newbie2]

No.

Unless that was given to you as a penance.

At this point, there’s not much you can do about the other car, unless you happen to find it/the owner some day at church. You were forgiven, and it’s difficult or impossible to make restitution to the car owner. There’s no way of telling that you didn’t just smudge the other car, so trying to figure out how much it would’ve cost to fix the other car is, methinks, pointless.

Just because you don’t ***owe ***anything, though, that shouldn’t hold you back from a work of charity, if you feel so inclined. The amount? Whatever you think.

Perhaps there’s a special need in your parish; a fund for the hungry or homeless, etc.