Wrong words in absolution

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Optimus_Prime

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I went to confession to a nice Nigerian priest today. Instead of “I absolve you…” he said “I forgive you…”. So I nicely asked him, if he would repeat the absolution with the word “absolve”. In his kindness he did but it came out like this “May God absolve of all your sins…”.

I did not ask for a third try as I did not want to insult him and he was clearly intending to absolve me. I believe this was a language barrier and not an attempt to change the words on purpose.

So… am I absolved?

Dave
 
While the good Fathers in “Ask an apologist” would affirm that this is valid, I personally do not accept stuff like this. So while I would not necessarily abstain from Holy Communion on this account, for my next confession, I would find another confessor, relate what happened, repeat the previous confession and accept a proper absolution.

I raised the exact same question (“I forgive…”) with an FSSP confessor, and he said it was dubious. I therefore repeated the previous Confession.

God forgives, but the priest himself absolves, as he is also exercising a juridical power of the Church. That’s why mucking around with the essential words of absolution is absolutely unacceptable.
 
I cannot speak to a validity of a Confession, but as a multi-lingual person I can tell you that there are many languages that do not distinguish between the words “forgive” and “absolve”.
 
porthos11 said:
While the good Fathers in “Ask an apologist” would affirm that this is valid, I personally do not accept stuff like this. So while I would not necessarily abstain from Holy Communion on this account, for my next confession, I would find another confessor, relate what happened, repeat the previous confession and accept a proper absolution.

I raised the exact same question (“I forgive…”) with an FSSP confessor, and he said it was dubious. I therefore repeated the previous Confession.

God forgives, but the priest himself absolves, as he is also exercising a juridical power of the Church. That’s why mucking around with the essential words of absolution is absolutely unacceptable.
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I don’t think that this priest was necessarily “mucking around” with the words. It seems like it was a language barrier.
 
porthos11 said:
While the good Fathers in “Ask an apologist” would affirm that this is valid, I personally do not accept stuff like this. So while I would not necessarily abstain from Holy Communion on this account, for my next confession, I would find another confessor, relate what happened, repeat the previous confession and accept a proper absolution.

I raised the exact same question (“I forgive…”) with an FSSP confessor, and he said it was dubious. I therefore repeated the previous Confession.

God forgives, but the priest himself absolves, as he is also exercising a juridical power of the Church. That’s why mucking around with the essential words of absolution is absolutely unacceptable.
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Instead of this strict legalistic approach, which is a matter of what the poster prefers, move on rejoicing in the goodness an mercy of God!

It is not the role of the laity to pronounce ecclesiastical right or wrong based on preference.🤷
 
If the confession was valid on your part (contrite heart and did not intentionally omit any mortal sins) you were absolved of your sins the first time.

Be at Peace.

God Bless
 
Neofight said:
Instead of this strict legalistic approach, which is a matter of what the poster prefers, move on rejoicing in the goodness an mercy of God!

It is not the role of the laity to pronounce ecclesiastical right or wrong based on preference.🤷
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Fortunately, laity these days know the thing called proper form and matter, and when they are not being administered a sacrament according to what is rightfully theirs.

This is not a matter of “preference”. The Church says to say “I” (not God, not Jesus, but “I”, the priest) “absolve” (not forgive, not remit, not loose, but “absolve”, which carries both forgiveness and remittance of sin along with the juridical reconciliation with the Church). You don’t mess with sacramental form. Period.

No penitent should ever be subjected to doubt as to whether his absolution was valid or not. The onus is on the priest.
 
DeniseNY said:
I don’t think that this priest was necessarily “mucking around” with the words. It seems like it was a language barrier.
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Of course, I did not mean that as a direct accusation of this particular priest, only the general principle of changing the form.
 
brad90956 said:
If the confession was valid on your part (contrite heart and did not intentionally omit any mortal sins) you were absolved of your sins the first time.

Be at Peace.

God Bless
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AMEN.

We present ourselves. We confess. the LORD forgives.
 
Optimus_Prime said:
I went to confession to a nice Nigerian priest today. Instead of “I absolve you…” he said “I forgive you…”. So I nicely asked him, if he would repeat the absolution with the word “absolve”. In his kindness he did but it came out like this “May God absolve of all your sins…”.

I did not ask for a third try as I did not want to insult him and he was clearly intending to absolve me. I believe this was a language barrier and not an attempt to change the words on purpose.

So… am I absolved?

Dave
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Yes you are absolved. No question. It would be scrupulous to believe otherwise
 
From the catechism:

2111 Superstition is the deviation of religious feeling and of the practices this feeling imposes. It can even affect the worship we offer the true God, e.g., when one attributes an importance in some way magical to certain practices otherwise lawful or necessary. To attribute the efficacy of prayers or of sacramental signs to their external performance, apart from the interior dispositions that they demand, is to fall into superstition.

The priest isn’t executing a magical incantation, he’s exercising the authority Christ gave to the priesthood. In my humble opinion, if he told you that your sins were forgiven then your sins were forgiven. If they weren’t he would have told you that, why they weren’t, and what you would need to do to obtain forgiveness. Again, I’m not an expert so just my opinion.
 
Yes. He had the authority and the intent. God is not holding you over the flames of hell due to word use or spelling errors.
 
godisgood77 said:
Yes you are absolved. No question. It would be scrupulous to believe otherwise
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Absolutlely! The priest might have said the wrong word, but his intention was to absolve you and that’s what matters. God knows that and you did not have to ask again for the priest to correct the words IMO. I feel that you still do not feel comfortable with his second attempt and like things orderly and I understand that, but in this case, move on. This is not going to be the only “mishap” in your life.
 
Yes. He had the authority and the intent. God is not holding you over the flames of hell due to word use or spelling errors.
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Exactly. You went to confession. You confessed your sins to the priest. God is not in the “gotcha game”. He already knows your sins, your heart and your intentions. He is not going to hold back his mercy and forgiveness over a language barrier or a misspoken/incorrect word from one of His priests.
 
Optimus_Prime said:
I went to confession to a nice Nigerian priest today. Instead of “I absolve you…” he said “I forgive you…”. So I nicely asked him, if he would repeat the absolution with the word “absolve”. In his kindness he did but it came out like this “May God absolve of all your sins…”.

I did not ask for a third try as I did not want to insult him and he was clearly intending to absolve me. I believe this was a language barrier and not an attempt to change the words on purpose.

So… am I absolved?

Dave
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Like everybody said, yes.

Language can change but Jesus intent does not. He forgives if you come for Confession to his priest. More important is you - are you contrite, are you remorseful, are you sincere? If you do, and you confessed your sins - consider yourself forgiven when the priest says so, God’s forgiveness does not depends on slip by your priest.
 
Seems to me we are introducing topics which are beside the point. For example, nobody is questioning the OP’s contrition or the fact that God can and does forgive sins outside of confession or even within confession when the priest does not absolve (for whatever reason). The topic of “magic” and superstition is an interesting one…it seems to me that we can depend on “magic” when we say that the priest’s words don’t really matter. But, again, this is all beside the point. The OP asked if he was absolved by the priest, not if he was forgiven by God.

There are various opinions about this question (is the meaning of “forgive” essentially the same as “absolve”…in English, anyway…). Knowledgeable persons say they are not essentially the same. Others say they are. I know of no official response from a competent authority.

Dan
 
dans0622 said:
Seems to me we are introducing topics which are beside the point. For example, nobody is questioning the OP’s contrition or the fact that God can and does forgive sins outside of confession or even within confession when the priest does not absolve (for whatever reason). The topic of “magic” and superstition is an interesting one…it seems to me that we can depend on “magic” when we say that the priest’s words don’t really matter. But, again, this is all beside the point. The OP asked if he was absolved by the priest, not if he was forgiven by God.

There are various opinions about this question (is the meaning of “forgive” essentially the same as “absolve”…in English, anyway…). Knowledgeable persons say they are not essentially the same. Others say they are. I know of no official response from a competent authority.

Dan
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“Competent authority”.
Is given by Christ. The priest has it.
🤷
 
My priest says “god forgives you”…don’t know if it’s wrong but frankly I don’t care. God has forgiven me and he’s not gonna be like “oops, he said it wrong! Maybe another time, honey” 🤷 It’s not something we should worry about really…
 
porthos11 said:
This is not a matter of “preference”. The Church says to say “I” (not God, not Jesus, but “I”, the priest) “absolve” (not forgive, not remit, not loose, but “absolve”, which carries both forgiveness and remittance of sin along with the juridical reconciliation with the Church). You don’t mess with sacramental form. Period…
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FYI, the Byzantine Catholic Churches use “You are absolved”, and that is a valid Sacramental form.

And in the Chaldean Church, the words used are " I forgive" (in Arabic) as the normative form.

So when you mean “The Church”, are you referring to customary practices within one Particular Church, or are you referring to the Catholic Church as a whole.

If you are referring to the Church as a whole, the Church has a wide variety of valid Sacramental forms for absolution.
 
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