Episode 38: Confession and a Lenten Check In

Thriving in the Trenches a Catholic Podcast

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (1Jn 1:9) This week Megan and Becky explore the beauty and necessity of the Sacrament of Healing we call, Confession. With a heavy emphasis on the Catechism, the gals discuss many of the reasons why we need the Sacrament while also sharing personal experiences and reader questions and comments. Reconciliation seems be one of the most misunderstood and the least sought out Sacrament in the Church. Why? Are we being exhorted to go? Do we understand the great power of absolution and the Mercy and Grace that is poured out on us? Do you want to grow in holiness and reject sin? Then the confessional should be a regular stop in your journey. Please consider supporting our Podcast Show Notes:

• “According to the Church’s command, “after having attained the age of discretion, each of the faithful is bound by an obligation faithfully to confess serious sins at least once a year.”56 Anyone who is aware of having committed a mortal sin must not receive Holy Communion, even if he experiences deep contrition, without having first received sacramental absolution, unless he has a grave reason for receiving Communion and there is no possibility of going to confession.57 Children must go to the sacrament of Penance before receiving Holy Communion for the first time.58″ CCC 1457
• “It is called the sacrament of conversion because it makes sacramentally present Jesus’ call to conversion, the first step in returning to the Father5 from whom one has strayed by sin.
• It is called the sacrament of Penance, since it consecrates the Christian sinner’s personal and ecclesial steps of conversion, penance, and satisfaction. CCC1423
• It is called the sacrament of confession, since the disclosure or confession of sins to a priest is an essential element of this sacrament. In a profound sense it is also a “confession” – acknowledgment and praise – of the holiness of God and of his mercy toward sinful man. CCC1424
• It is called the sacrament of forgiveness, since by the priest’s sacramental absolution God grants the penitent “pardon and peace.”6
• It is called the sacrament of Reconciliation, because it imparts to the sinner the love of God who reconciles: “Be reconciled to God.”7 He who lives by God’s merciful love is ready to respond to the Lord’s call: “Go; first be reconciled to your brother.”8CCC 1423 and 1424
• “Confession to a priest is an essential part of the sacrament of Penance: “All mortal sins of which penitents after a diligent self-examination are conscious must be recounted by them in confession, even if they are most secret and have been committed against the last two precepts of the Decalogue; for these sins sometimes wound the soul more grievously and are more dangerous than those which are committed openly.”54 CCC 1456 When Christ’s faithful strive to confess all the sins that they can remember, they undoubtedly place all of them before the divine mercy for pardon. But those who fail to do so and knowingly withhold some, place nothing before the divine goodness for remission through the mediation of the priest, “for if the sick person is too ashamed to show his wound to the doctor, the medicine cannot heal what it does not know.”55 (Council of Trent)
• An example of a Daily Examen by Ignatian Spirituality
• Laudate App for iPhone and Android – this app includes many awesome resources such as daily examen, examination of conscious for confession, an interactive Rosary, Daily Readings, the Liturgy of the Hours, the Roman Missal changes, and the NAB and Douay-Rheims versions of the Bible
• Purple Leaflet by Catholic Leaflet Missal Company
• “14 Is any among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; 15 and the prayer of faith will save the sick man, and the Lord will raise him up; and if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.[c] 16 Therefore confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man has great power in its effects.” Per the Ignatius Study Bible commentary, This command to confess to one another must be interpreted within the context of the anointing rite, where the elders (i.e. oriests) presumably hear the confession of the sick person before his sins are remitted through the sacrament.
• Jonah 3:1-10; Psalm 51: 3-4,12-13,18-19; Joel 2:12-13; Luke 11:29-32 (Readings referred to during podcast from Wed 2/21)
• “And getting into a boat he crossed over and came to his own city. 2 And behold, they brought to him a paralytic, lying on his bed; and when Jesus saw their faith he said to the paralytic, “Take heart, my son; your sins are forgiven.” Matthew 9:1-2 (the paralytic was healed through the faith of his friends who took him to Jesus when he couldn’t take himself. A beautiful act of intercessory prayer)

Call to Action –

Let us encourage one another to make regular confession more regular and therefore gird ourselves with the Grace and Mercy of Jesus Christ. Ask God to help us grow in charity through the act of fasting for another in this ministry of healing we are being called to participate.

Scripture –

“Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” How could they forgive sins if they were not confessed? They could not. This authority comes through the gift of the Holy Spirit which precedes it.” – John 20:21-23

Saint Quote –

St. Ambrose says of the two conversions that, in the Church, “there are water and tears: the water of Baptism and the tears of repentance.”