Validity of Confession - Do I need to reconfess?

[Tis_Bearself]

OP: Here is the actual, currently in force, CCC page on Confession.
You would do well to refer to this and not to the Baltimore Catechism.

http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p2s2c2a4.htm

 

[porthos11]

porthos11:

Fr Ruggero held opinions that were not always in confirmity with proper Catechesis and I had no qualms disagreeing with him even if he is a priest. A lot of nonsense comes from priests

Persons who are not priests do not have training or expertise on this matter of personalized confession.

Moreover, posts such as this one you made foster a general distrust of the clergy which is not helpful to the Church at all.

I think this person should either trust his priest, or if he is really bothered he should go to confession to a different priest, and tell this whole story, including the fact that he made an Internet post and got told by some member of the laity that the priest was “wrong” according to the Baltimore Catechism. Which, by the way, was replaced by the current catechisms in use.

I know you’re a fan of Don Ruggero, but I am not. I am not part of the pray, pay, and obey club. I have taken the time and effort to learn the faith because my priests have failed me in that regard. I have been on the receiving end of nonsense from priests (not necessarily the priests here, even Don Ruggero). I do not care how many years priests spend in seminary or school. A lot of heresy has come out of seminaries and universities, and I do not automatically trust priests just because they are priest. Fr. James Martin is a priest. Fr. Richard McBrien is a priest. There is no way on God’s green earth I will entrust the care of my soul to the likes of them.

Priests can be wrong, and laity should be strong in their faith to know when they are being given a disservice by their clergy. Priests should be accountable to the flock whom they serve, just as they are to their bishops. It’s not that I automatically distrust priests. It’s just that I do not automatically trust anybody. In this world where only the Magisterium is our clear beacon of truth, every human being, priest, bishop or otherwise, earns my trust. I do not give it unconditionally to anybody.

As for the current catechism superseding the Baltimore, not in moral teachings, which are unchangeable. Besides, the current Catechism only reinforces what has been said here and in Canon Law: integral, individual confession is still required.

The OP’s priest is wrong here. And I stand by it.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

This has nothing to do with me liking or not liking Don Ruggero. I’d say the same even if it was a priest I didn’t like posting.

Your posts on this are about on the same level as a non-lawyer posting that a lawyer is wrong and citing a provision of the Constitution, or a non-doctor posting that a doctor is wrong and citing some medical text.

If an ordained priest wants to come on here and challenge what the other priest did, fine, I will be all ears.
However, as I said, you do not have the training or expertise to challenge the priest on this matter; you are citing an outdated Catechism that is no longer used; and you are fostering distrust of the clergy with your general statements about priests.

I realize this is not just you, but a whole cadre of Catholics running around acting this way and I can even understand to some extent how it happened, as in the past some priests have said and done questionable things. However, the OP apparently has a regular confessor who he sees as a good and holy man, and is asking whether he can trust him. You are willfully interfering with a trust relationship.

At most you should say “Perhaps get a second opinion”, not tell him that his regular confessor is wrong and distrustworthy. Even if the regular confessor was somehow wrong in his advice, the OP would not be in danger of hell for having relied on the advice in good faith in this situation.

 

[porthos11]

This has nothing to do with me liking or not liking Don Ruggero. I’d say the same even if it was a priest I didn’t like posting.

Your posts on this are about on the same level as a non-lawyer posting that a lawyer is wrong and citing a provision of the Constitution, or a non-doctor posting that a doctor is wrong and citing some medical text.

If an ordained priest wants to come on here and challenge what the other priest did, fine, I will be all ears.
However, as I said, you do not have the training or expertise to challenge the priest on this matter; you are citing an outdated Catechism that is no longer used; and you are fostering distrust of the clergy with your general statements about priests.

I realize this is not just you, but a whole cadre of Catholics running around acting this way and I can even understand to some extent how it happened, as in the past some priests have said and done questionable things. However, the OP apparently has a regular confessor who he sees as a good and holy man, and is asking whether he can trust him. You are willfully interfering with a trust relationship.

At most you should say “Perhaps get a second opinion”, not tell him that his regular confessor is wrong and distrustworthy. Even if the regular confessor was somehow wrong in his advice, the OP would not be in danger of hell for having relied on the advice in good faith in this situation.

I stand by the conclusion I have drawn and the advice I have given. Priests are not above criticism or correction.

 

[runningdude]

I trust the priest who told me that I’m good but the two priests contradicting each other has me questioning this.

You have to pick one priest and stick with that choice. Each priest can advise you based only on what you tell them, and each priest will have an incomplete picture of what you told the other. This will leave you vulnerable to conflicting advice.

To address a bit of background, Canon law is writen in favor of the penitent, and in favor of salvation. To invalidate a confession you would have to be confessing minor sins to dodge a major sin. Think confessing to using “birth control” to avoid confessing to getting an abortion, to use an extreme but realistic example.

Mere errors or omissions are not invalidating in an of themselves. Examine your conscience carefully - did you withhold that serious sin by calm and deliberate choice, or were you nervously confessing years of sins and overlooked an embarrassing one you’d rather not think about.

If the latter, the correct course is to mention it as a forgotten sin in your next confession. The priest can the give you proper guidance.

If truly the former, then the proper recourse is to confess the deliberately withheld sin, and seek the priest’s guidance on making a good and proper confession.

 

[CilladeRoma]

There is a lot of “projection” in your post @porthos11.

No doubt that there are some priests who are not quite as orthodox as others, but at least one of the priests you name is a priest in good standing with his order and the Vatican. You may not like him, or others who do not share your philosophy & theology, but I agree with @Tis_Bearself that you are doing a grave disservice to the OP and the Church by encourageing the second guessing of clergy based on hearsay.

 

[porthos11]

There is a lot of “projection” in your post @porthos11.

No doubt that there are some priests who are not quite as orthodox as others, but at least one of the priests you name is a priest in good standing with his order and the Vatican. You may not like him, or others who do not share your philosophy & theology, but I agree with @Tis_Bearself that you are doing a grave disservice to the OP and the Church by encourageing the second guessing of clergy based on hearsay.

I do not really care if a priest is in good standing or not. I do care if he is orthodox in his teachings and beliefs. “Good standing” is only one factor, and there are many priests in good standing who probably should not be. There are many priests in good standing who spout nonsense and heresy from the pulpits, and I’m sick of it.

There is no hearsay because the OP is a direct party to the situation and I presume his account is complete.

Because I assume his account is accurate and complete, I firmly stand by the conclusion that his priest has erred and that in his case, a re-confession is due. I am not going to treat priests as immune from criticism and correction. If there’s any material detail that’s missing from his account, he’s welcome to state it. But he has already gotten a second opinion that he should re-confess. And further, I am not going to tell the OP to not re-confess when I am convinced it is necessary for him.

I’m just a layman, but a layman who has taken pains to know truth from falsehood, and I will not be dazzled by seminary and degrees. I will be dazzled by someone’s faithfulness to the Magisterium.

 

[PJM]

Hello fellow Catholic brethren,
I made an account just to ask this question.
Back in August 2017, by the grace of God I returned to my Catholic Faith and decided it was time to confess my sins of roughly 4 years. I wrote a list of all my sins, confessed them but was so ashamed of one mortal sin that in an act of foolish pride, I willfully omitted the sin. I felt so guilty for not confessing the sin, I returned a few days later and told the priest that I willfully withheld this mortal sin. I confessed and received absolution. Just the other day I heard that if a mortal sin is withheld with full knowledge, that confession is invalid. I just asked my priest today and he said that I do not need to reconfess the sins from my first confession. Is this true? If possible, I would greatly appreciate quotes from the Catechism of Canon Law or any authoritative text if possible. Thanks!

Colin
JMJ

YES what the priest shared is TRUE

Be at PEACE, God is on your side.

By the way; if you have any questions’ you’d care to discuss, send me a PM and we can discuss them.

God Bless you, and thanks for asking

Patrick {PJM}

 

[edward_george1]

I think that here, as with so many other things, the answer is somewhere in the middle. It is technically correct that a willfully withheld unconfessed mortal sin can invalidate a confession. However, it is hard to tell from the original post whether that’s what went on here–even the OP posts with some measure of doubt in recounting something that happened a good while ago. I barely remember the last time I went to confession, like a week and a half ago, much less a confession I made in August, and I definitely don’t remember how I was feeling or what my mental disposition was like with any of my confessions. So it’s possible that the OP was not as culpable for withholding the sin as he might be remembering. Sometimes after the fact anxiety can make things seem worse than they really are.

So all that said, while it is technically correct that, absent any other circumstances, willfully withheld mortal sin invalidates a confession, it is impossible for us on the internet to know what really went on. I would advise the OP to follow what his confessor said, and to be at peace. It is better to deal with these things in person, with a priest, than to put one’s own motivations and one’s own priest’s pastoral care on trial on the internet among strangers with no intimate knowledge of the situation. It’s better not to continue letting this get to you. It sounds like there was sufficient doubt and uncertainty that it shouldn’t have been a problem, so I would follow what your priest said and move on.

-Fr ACEGC

 

[AlbertDerGrosse]

Are you a canon lawyer? I ask because if you are I’ll graciously defer to your expertise. If you aren’t, then you and I as unqualified schmucks are about to get into a whole bunch of canon law proof texting, which just like scriptural proof texting does more of a service to our rhetorical egos than the truth.

That being said, here are my amateur impressions:

It seems to me you’re imputing invalidity to the Sacrament here due to the obligations of the penitent being impeded by the actions of the confessor. The obligations of the two are not identical and their relationship to the validity of the Sacrament are important to understand.

I understand that penitents are obliged to make an integral confession. A penitent who deliberately chooses not to enumerate his sins, or who is not genuinely contrite for his sins, or who has no purpose of amendment, or who deceives/lies to his confessor, or who deliberately withholds sins, invalidates his confession. A penitent who comes to the Sacrament with contrition and a firm purpose of amendment, ready and willing to make an honest, full, integral confession but is impeded by the priest from doing so has not invalidated his confession.

Furthermore the obligation of making an integral confession does not oblige the priest! In terms of the priest all what is required is faculties to hear the confession and the proper form of absolution. It would seem to me that at best you could argue that this priest acted imprudently, or even illicitly. But you’ve yet to demonstrate that the priest invalidated the Sacrament since the obligation to make an integral confession rests only with the penitent, an obligation the penitent satisfied through intention.

Perhaps there are other canons the expound on this and I’m missing some vital detail that isn’t present in canons 959-997 (in the section on the Sacrament of Penance)? If so, and you know of them, I’d be happy to read them. While we’re at it, are there any canon lawyers left on CAF? I would really like to hear a professional’s opinion on this.

 

[porthos11]

You and I both, and, no I am not a canon lawyer, so everything I say is grain of salt.

My only concern for the OP is is first confession, not subsequent ones wherein he’s being stopped by his confessor. Those remain valid because those are not his doing. Grace-wise, because his confessor has stopped him, he is not guilty of a chain of invalid confessions. I believe, however, his confessor errs in stopping him, again, assuming the OP’s account is complete and accurate. He may be a raving scrupulous and just not telling us, in which case, his confessor is probably doing what’s appropriate. But if he is not scrupulous, then my position stands.

I’m just standing by my position that the sins left out from the first confession still require direct remittance because that first confession was sacrilegious. He still needs to find the opportunity to confess them.

But no, I’m just a schmuck, not a canon lawyer.

And CAF is now complaining that I’m dominating the thread.

 

[Canvas]

One thing I did notice when I was reading the thread—a slight correction to your posts—one thing that must be present is a sin to absolve. Simply saying “I’m a sinner” is normally not enough. You have to confess at least one sin for the Priest to absolve you in ordinary circumstances. I remember this from when my normal Confessor was explaining the rules of the Sacrament to me (i am scrupulous and I suffer terrible doubts sometimes).

There are exceptions, though, like imminent danger of death or various other extraordinary circumstances.

 

[Tis_Bearself]

Thank you, Father.

A follow-on question: If I possibly may have made an “incomplete” or “invalid” confession 20 to 40 years ago, but do not remember exactly whether this happened or not, or the details of what was confessed and what might not have been confessed, but starting 2 years ago I went back to confession, confessed all the sins I could remember, continued to go twice a month, and confessed additional “old” sins from 20-40 years ago when one of them pops into my head and bothers me, do I have to confess that I may have made incomplete confessions 20-40 years ago? I am not certain that this happened, but it seems like a possibility since I wasn’t very good at going to confession in those days and tried to avoid going because it created a lot of anxiety.

I am presuming I don’t have to go back and rack my brain trying to remember what I said or didn’t say in confession back in 1979 as it would be very hard for me to remember at this point.

 

[porthos11]

I think that here, as with so many other things, the answer is somewhere in the middle. It is technically correct that a willfully withheld unconfessed mortal sin can invalidate a confession. However, it is hard to tell from the original post whether that’s what went on here–even the OP posts with some measure of doubt in recounting something that happened a good while ago. I barely remember the last time I went to confession, like a week and a half ago, much less a confession I made in August, and I definitely don’t remember how I was feeling or what my mental disposition was like with any of my confessions. So it’s possible that the OP was not as culpable for withholding the sin as he might be remembering. Sometimes after the fact anxiety can make things seem worse than they really are.

So all that said, while it is technically correct that, absent any other circumstances, willfully withheld mortal sin invalidates a confession, it is impossible for us on the internet to know what really went on. I would advise the OP to follow what his confessor said, and to be at peace. It is better to deal with these things in person, with a priest, than to put one’s own motivations and one’s own priest’s pastoral care on trial on the internet among strangers with no intimate knowledge of the situation. It’s better not to continue letting this get to you. It sounds like there was sufficient doubt and uncertainty that it shouldn’t have been a problem, so I would follow what your priest said and move on.

-Fr ACEGC

And as always, Fr. Edward gives the wisest answer.

OP, if there’s anything, this is the answer to take to heart.

 

[edward_george1]

What is generally advised in this case is to make a single “general confession.” General confession DOES NOT look like “I committed X sin 35,642 times, etc,” but rather is, as the name suggests, “general,” as in “I committed X sin frequently during my college years,” or “I committed Y sin on a weekly basis for such-and-such a period.” This is one area where specificity is actually not wholly necessary, but the idea is to account for one’s sins for his whole life, or at least back to the period of the last certain confession, as best as one can in general.

That said, and this especially goes for those who struggle with scruples or anxiety or anything like that, A GENERAL CONFESSION IS NOT SUPPOSED TO BE A REGULAR PRACTICE. A GENERAL CONFESSION SHOULD ONLY BE MADE AT THE ADVICE OF ONE’S CONFESSOR OR SPIRITUAL DIRECTOR. I have only personally done it twice, once before diaconate ordination, and once before priestly ordination. So there are two instances in which it is indicated: before a change in one’s status in the Church, particularly for those being ordained or professing religious vows, and when there is reason to believe that one has made an invalid confession long in the past, and thus has incurred a chain of invalid confessions. But this is only to be done if there is certainty that that first bad confession was, in fact, a bad one.

But I post this with the utmost caution to those who are scrupulous–there are many people whose scruples get the better of them and who constantly think every confession was invalid and who make general confession after general confession. THIS IS NOT HEALTHY OR NECESSARY. This is why one should ask the advice of his confessor or parish priest and proceed according to his advice in this area.

-Fr ACEGC

 

[Tis_Bearself]

I did that “general confession” thing when I went back to confession in 2016 after having been away for 18 years (and had committed some pretty big sins over that period of years that I remembered pretty well).

I didn’t ask any advice of a spiritual director first, or even know I was making a “general confession”, I just went in a confessional one day and got it overwith. I presume I did it okay because the anonymous priest (I went to the nearest cathedral so I could have an anonymous priest behind a screen) seemed okay with it. I haven’t needed to do that since, except when I remembered one or two sins from the distant past. Going every 2 weeks means you remember recent sins much better.

 

[AlbertDerGrosse]

My only concern for the OP is is first confession, not subsequent ones wherein he’s being stopped by his confessor. Those remain valid because those are not his doing. Grace-wise, because his confessor has stopped him, he is not guilty of a chain of invalid confessions. I believe, however, his confessor errs in stopping him, again, assuming the OP’s account is complete and accurate. He may be a raving scrupulous and just not telling us, in which case, his confessor is probably doing what’s appropriate. But if he is not scrupulous, then my position stands.

I’m just standing by my position that the sins left out from the first confession still require direct remittance because that first confession was sacrilegious. He still needs to find the opportunity to confess them.

I think I’m misunderstanding you (or the OP, or this whole thread for that matter).

Confession #1: OP comes back after a long time away, confesses some sins, but not all sins. He deliberately withholds sins. This confession is completely null and void. He also incurs another mortal sin: sacrilege for this deliberately bad confession.

Confession #2: OP realizes the error of his ways, comes back and confesses to that sin of sacrilege, tries to re-confess all the other sins from that last confession (because the entire thing was invalid) but is prevented from doing so by the second confessor. He is given absolution after this second confession.

It sounds like you’re now saying Confession #2 was valid, and that the OP was indeed absolved and upon leaving the confession was indeed in a state of grace even though he ought to have been allowed to enumerate all the sins from the first confession. Is this correct?

You also seem to be saying that even though he is indeed absolved and in a state of grace the sins mentioned in his first confession still require remittance, which would imply that he’s actually not in a state of grace and that the second absolution was not valid. It can’t be both X and ‘not X’ simultaneously, so what am I missing here?

 

[edward_george1]

Yeah, remembering old sins happens, but I wouldn’t worry about them. If you just forgot to confess them, you may bring them up out of humility, but it’s not worth letting it become a temptation to continue worrying about them. All the Lord asks of us is that we do our humble best.

-Fr ACEGC

 

[Jump4Joy]

Don’t feel too bad. Confession becomes harder as an adult honestly. It’s good you reconfessed. I thought you could. I did.

 

[porthos11]

I think I’m misunderstanding you (or the OP, or this whole thread for that matter).

Confession #1: OP comes back after a long time away, confesses some sins, but not all sins. He deliberately withholds sins. This confession is completely null and void. He also incurs another mortal sin: sacrilege for this deliberately bad confession.

Correct.

Confession #2: OP realizes the error of his ways, comes back and confesses to that sin of sacrilege, tries to re-confess all the other sins from that last confession (because the entire thing was invalid) but is prevented from doing so by the second confessor. He is given absolution after this second confession.

Correct.

It sounds like you’re now saying Confession #2 was valid, and that the OP was indeed absolved and upon leaving the confession was indeed in a state of grace even though he ought to have been allowed to enumerate all the sins from the first confession. Is this correct?

Correct

You also seem to be saying that even though he is indeed absolved and in a state of grace the sins mentioned in his first confession still require remittance, which would imply that he’s actually not in a state of grace and that the second absolution was not valid. It can’t be both X and ‘not X’ simultaneously, so what am I missing here?

Incorrect. He remains in a state of grace, but still with the obligation to confess those sins. Just like forgotten sins. There is a difference between forgiveness and absolution. Absolution is a juridic act of the Church, and all remembered mortal sins need to be remitted directly by this juridic act, by the power of the keys.

A person who is aware of mortal sin not yet directly remitted (e.g. forgotten, or a case like this one), does not retroactively go back into mortal sin. That’s why he does not need to rush to Confession just for these. He can just mention them at his next regular or necessary confession.

However, now that Fr. Edward has chimed in, it would be best for the OP to heed his advice.