Worried about a VERY HONEST confession

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Make a plan to go to confession at least once a month. That way you’ll really be working on advancing in holiness. Missing Mass on Sunday through your own fault is a mortal sin, so you must start to attend Mass every Sunday. Work as well on daily prayer, in particular the Rosary. If you stay close to the sacraments and prayer you won’t go wrong.
 
thanks for the advice. Definitely need to start attending Mass more regularly and confession must be common too.

Priest is just off the phone with me - I’m meeting him at 6:15 tonight so that gives us 45 minutes until Mass begins.

50% nerves 50% excitement at the moment.
 
I know exactly how you feel. I am on my way to converting to Catholicism. I am terrified to make my first confession, mostly because of the sins I committed and experiences with the pastor at my current church. Many priests will be sensitive and kind. I personally know two wonderful priests. I also recommend telling the priest that you are nervous, and if he had any decency he will help you feel at ease. I talked to my priest and felt so much better about confession.Good luck!
 
Just under an hour until I go to confession.

Starting to get a bit anxious which I suppose is normal but I have to do this for the sake of my soul.
 
taribomckay said:
On another note if anyone can help me become a more consistent attendee and help me grow in faith that would be most welcome.
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A good scripture to take notice of:
Luke 15:7
Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.
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Heaven is rejoicing today that you have returned to the sheepfold of Christ. The surest way to fall in love with God again is to go spend time in His presence. When we are in love, we want to spend every waking moment with them. Call your parish, or check in the bulletin when they offer Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament - our Lord Jesus present to us, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity.

Then, just go and sit silently in His presence. Contemplate Him in His sacramental Presence. Lay out before Him your doubts, fears, anxieties. Then, be as patient with Him as He has been with you.
“When you become aware that He is there, you will be changed.”
  • Fr. Benedict Grosechel, C.F.R. (R.I.P.)
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I would imagine you’ve done nothing so bad or unusual that the priest has not heard it before in Confession. I’m not trying to deny your uniqueness as an individual, but I think most priests, particularly those who have been in the profession a long time, have heard virtually everything.
 
When I returned to the Church, I was VERY nervous about confession

So I printed out a list of sins (the list I used was both mortal and venial) and checked off all the sins I had done.

I went into the confessional (behind the screen) and said “Bless me Father for I have sinned, it’s been 20 years since my last confession. If you don’t mind, I have a list that I’m going to read from.”

And I took it from there.

The priest was awesome and welcomed me back. But most of all, I truly felt the Holy Spirit come down upon me and heal me of my sins. I literally felt the temperature drop 10 degrees during the absolution & I felt a literal weight being lifted from my shoulders.

That confession was truly amazing and affected me in so many ways.

God bless you and pray you have a wonderful Confession.
 
The anxiety is tough, I feel it every confession. What has helped me is making a list of the sins on my phone so I don’t forget any and more importantly, so I don’t intentionally skip any.

My biggest problem is going to confession and being genuinely sorry then doing the same sin or sins again rather quickly. I feel embarrassed to return to confession a week later so I usually wait a month.

But I also find the anxiety is a motivation for me to try and fight the sins I struggle with so that I don’t fall to sin again and have to go through all the anxiety again
 
Dolphin said:
I feel embarrassed to return to confession a week later so I usually wait a month.
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That’s why I go behind the screen. The embarrassment doesn’t exist because the priest doesn’t see me. And I’m not worried about the people who see me in line because they are in line too. And when you go enough, you start to see all sorts of people in line, including parish staff, people who work for the diocese, seminarians, etc.
 
I’ve never seen a priest in line for confession. I assume they schedule private session?
 
Put simply, pride conceals, justifies and holds tightly to sin, while humility repents of them, exposes and confesses them.
 
My favorite part of confession (aside from the mercies of course) is when the Priest offers some advice 🙂
 
Dolphin said:
I’ve never seen a priest in line for confession. I assume they schedule private session?
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I think priests TYPICALLY confess to their regular confessor who they meet with on a regular basis. So I would imagine they mostly do that via appointment. However, I would not be surprised to see a priest in a confession line at a pilgrim Church (for example in Rome, Fatima, Lourdes, Our Lady of Guadalupe Basilica, the Holy Land, etc).

I would also guess that when priests have roomates, they quickly grab on of the other parish priests to hear a quick confession when needed.

However, as I said, I have seen a seminarian in line for confession. But he also mentioned to me in line that the priest we were both in line for was his confessor.
 
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hi everyone, just back from Confession and the Mass that followed.

Before confession, I spent a bit of time alone in the Chapel praying. The Priest was great and I think I told him everything that I wanted to.

Here begins a fresh start with my sins absolved. Mass was great and I even did the readings tonight.

Thanks everyone on here for your help and advice.
 
I have when I was on sacristy duty. A priest from another parish asked me when Father X would arrive. And I have seen our bishop step out of the confessional room. (He could have talked about other things with the parish priest though.)

There has also been a priest in the diocese ending Sunday Mass with saying that “Now that we are starting Lent there are extra hours for hearing Confessions.”. Then he turned to his fellow brother priests in the religious order saying “And you my brothers, are the first ones I want to go to Confession!” One of the fellow priests replied with a grin on his face: “Do we do as we usually do? Swop places when we have confessed?”. 🤣 That was one of the best ways to ease the parishioners into going to Confession.
 
Amen! Praise God!

Now, lest you become disappointed when you fall (we all do - every day), remember that God desires that we struggle toward perfection - not that we actually attain it.

Sin, confession and absolution might be likened to when we took our first steps as babies. We wobbled, we advanced slightly, we fell . But, and this is crucial: we did not remain on the floor in defeat. We struggled (then with our parents’ help) got back to our feet and tried again.

Today, we have our Divine Parent to help us struggle back up and take those steps.
 
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Faith is a virtue, and we require grace and help from our Lord to not only increase it but even to keep it. I would start by telling you to pray to our Lord (or even better His Blessed Mother) to help you grow in Faith.

The following article gives reasons of why Mass is so important. If you want to go to Heaven we can’t miss Mass without a good reason.

https://www.michaeljournal.org/arti...ttend-sunday-mass-if-you-want-to-go-to-heaven

How would we expect to keep a good friendship and closeness with anyone if we never care to visit them or talk to them? Well, the same is true of Jesus, how could we expect to develop a better relationship with Him if we never take the time to meet with Him?
 
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