Confessing our sins is hard.

Satan doesn’t want us doing it, so he makes us feel uncomfortable. Not with our sins, but with the thought of admitting to them out loud. To a person. He persuades us to postpone our visit to the priest again and again, until finally we’re convinced we don’t need to go at all.

Thus the devil wins.  We lose God’s precious friendship, and if we've committed a mortal sin we put our souls in eternal danger. We ignore His call to come back, no matter how grave the sin we’ve committed. We miss out on His Divine Mercy, which is only available before we die. After that comes judgement.

It takes real courage to fight against the Evil One and step into that confessional. 

The Humility Aspect 
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Our disposition when speaking to God should always be one of total humility, in recognition of His Goodness and our fallen nature, and of Him as Our Creator.

People tell me that they can talk to God directly and don’t need the mediation of a flawed human being. This reasoning allows them to side-step the uncomfortableness of a physical meeting, thereby avoiding the humility that Confession entails.

Is it easier to confess aloud to a living human being or privately to God? It takes a great deal more humility to do so person-to-person than to have a conversation in one’s head. And how often does a person really confess their sins without a nudge from Holy Church to do so?

During Confession, I am talking to God. The priest is acting in persona Christi, like the Apostles, the first priests.  “If you forgive anyone's sins, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven. (John 20:23).” See also Matthew 16:19 and 18:18.

Many think that Confession gives Catholics a clean slate to sin again. But the opposite is true: the more often we go to Confession, the less likely we are to sin. Confessing to a priest takes great humility, and that humbling experience is a very strong deterrent against sinning in the first place.
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You can’t say that of those who don’t frequent the confessional.

You’re not that Special 
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Proud beings that we are, we worry about scandalizing the priests with our sins and are afraid they’ll look at us differently once we’ve confessed them. But our sins are not original: the priest has heard them all before. None of us is that special.

And, as an appointed minister of Christ, the priest’s job is not to keep a running tab on our misbehavior. He forgets it as soon as confession is over, just as Christ does (remember, the priest is in persona Christi).

Although each of us is important in God’s eyes, we need to remember that we are also part of God’s plan for salvation and fulfill our role by following His Will not ours.
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But God is not looking to crush our freedom and make us feel bad. What He wants is for us to live the fullest life possible. This means ridding ourselves of our sins, and Confession is the sacrament He gave us for doing it.

​The Amazing Takeaway 
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There is a deep peace that comes from admitting one’s imperfections to Someone higher than us, Who understands us better than we understand ourselves.

Christ said of the woman who anointed His feet: “Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven--as her great love has shown. But whoever has been forgiven little loves little" (Luke 7:47).

The worse our sins are and the more we appreciate our unworthiness before God, the greater will be our love for Him because of His incredible forgiveness. Some of the greatest saints started out as the greatest sinners. God’s Mercy is unfathomable, but it is there for all of us, if we reach out to Him with repentance in Confession.

It is impossible to describe the sheer joy of receiving absolution in the confessional. I feel an overwhelming sense of Christ’s love when I come away from my encounter with Him. I am once more in friendship with Him and often cry from the sheer happiness of it. Many of my friends have the same reaction. As a forgiven person, I want to try my best not to sin anymore and ‘to avoid the near occasions of sin.’

The worst feeling in the world for me - as a Catholic who was away from the Church for over twenty years - is to lose my sense of being in friendship with Christ. If I sin grievously, I instantly lose that precious gift and need to repair it as fast as I can. Thankfully my local church takes confession before every weekday Mass, and I am able to quickly restore my relationship with God and receive the Eucharist.


As Father Phil Bloom writes in his great article on Confession:
“Some people have considered confession to be a kind of "psychiatry for the masses." Carl Jung … speculated that the confession of sins accomplishes much of what psychiatry does. …..(But) the sacrament of penance is not about feeling better, it is about receiving the Holy Spirit.”

And only the promptings of Holy Spirit give us the courage to go through with it.

Further Reading:
 
What Is the Sacrament of Confession?
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Confession of Sins

Our previous parish priest exhorted us to look up, not at the ground. 

If we persist in staring down, that’s where we’re going to end up. Elevating our thoughts towards Heaven prevents us from becoming despondent and downhearted.

He's so right! When things go horribly wrong in my own life, I shuffle along feeling sorry for myself, with hunched shoulders and bowed head. Everything is doom and gloom.

What a different story when I lift up my head, straighten my shoulders and meet life head on! The physical act of standing upright brings with it a sense of determination and purpose.

Then we pray to God for help and He gives us the strength to deal with the difficulties life throws at us.

On One’s High Horse

It’s the same when you’re on a horse. No matter whether you’re riding dressage or jumping, you need to sit up straight and look ahead.

With dressage this means looking at the letter you're aiming for in a particular movement. For jumping, it means looking over the fence, not at it. You don’t want to land on the obstacle, you want to clear it. 

In both scenarios we mustn't look down, or that's where we’ll end up!

What Happens When We Fall?

When we first learn to ride, we think that not falling off makes us good riders and we're proud of ourselves.

But then comes the day when we take a tumble. The longer it has taken that day to come, the harder it is to shake off the experience and get back on the horse.

Some people never do. I often hear stories from friends about how the day they fell off a horse was the time they rode. They never got back in the saddle – they didn’t want to take the chance of falling off again.

How sad! They've missed out on so much fun.

I’ve fallen off more times than I can remember. Some of those incidents were physically painful, others just bruised my ego. Even though I never want to, I get back on the horse straight away, if I'm physically able.

If not, I would have to brand myself a coward for life. That would be way more painful.

I’m not naturally courageous. If you follow my horse blog posts, you’ll see plenty of occasions when I’m nervous and it takes a lot to get me going again. My horse, Cruz Bay and I have taken some dreadful tumbles, and it isn’t easy to get over them.

I have to work at avoiding the errors which led to those falls and not give up when I mess up. 

The Christian life requires the same attitude. 

Be Perfect as Your Heavenly Father Is Perfect

That is one tough challenge, isn’t it? Who can live up to that?

Riding has taught me that I will never be the perfect horsewoman, but I still strive to become that person. How much more vital is reaching for perfection in the Christian life!

Sadly for many, the seeming impossibility of attaining this goal is so discouraging that they don’t even try to reach it. Or maybe they work hard for a while, feel they’re making progress, then become despondent when they fall into sin again. 

Having sinned once more, they've proved they’re not perfect. So they may as well commit another, and another, until they are much further from the goal than when they started.

Christ talks about this when he mentions the man whose house is swept clean when the demons are removed. But when the man is not truly committed and doesn’t replace those demons with good living, many more come back into him than were there in the first place (Luke 11:24-46).

A Reason to Give Up?

Does that mean that it's hopeless trying to be good?

Of course not!  Christ died on the cross to make up for our deficiencies and grant us mercy when we fail: He walks with us in the good times and the bad.

If we fall into sin, we must sincerely repent and ask Him for forgiveness then pick ourselves up and walk again in the paths of righteousness.

We will fall into sin, time and time again. Way more often than the average rider falls off a horse!

Follow Your Passion

But if Christ is our passion, we get up, dust ourselves off with a healthy visit to the confessional, and resume our spiritual course. If we love Christ, we’ll be quick to apologize to the One Whose mercy is endless and Whose compassion inexhaustible.

Christ reaches out His hands to us every time we fail. 

We then mustn't sin further by refusing to trust in His mercy and forgiveness, or equate Christ’s limitless reservoir of forgiveness with the pitiful puddle that is our own version of it.  

Falling Must Lead to Getting Up

Being human, we expect to fall. Being a Christian means getting up from a fall - again and again and again.

That is where Catholics are fortunate: we have the Sacrament of Reconciliation and hear the words of the priest in persona Christi absolving us of our sins. We can receive a fresh start as often as we need it.

And for those of us who feel that we might as well take a tape recording of our sins and press ‘play’ for the priest at every confession, because the sins are always the same: would you rather have more to confess than you already have?

We must keep battling with our sins, and get up again and again and again for the rest of our lives.

Then we can truly call ourselves Christians.

I grew up unaware of Christ's fathomless mercy during my formative years. A sword hung over me - I thought God the Father and His Son were waiting for - almost wanting - me to do something wrong so they could punish me.

I think that is how a lot of people perceive God.

A Wonderful Gift from Jesus this Sunday

Jesus offers us forgiveness constantly, but the Feast of Divine Mercy this Sunday is special.

If everyone understood what Jesus wants to give us on this day, they'd drop everything and beg for His mercy. 

Jesus told Saint Faustina that no sinner has offended God so much that he or she cannot be forgiven:  “Let no soul fear to draw near to Me, even though its sins be as scarlet.”

Jesus died horribly in order to be able to offer us His forgiveness. Why aren’t we taking advantage of His gift?

The Words of Jesus to St. Faustina

Jesus said to St. Faustina in entry 699 of her diary:

“It is My desire that (the Feast of Mercy) be solemnly celebrated on the first Sunday after Easter.”

That feast is this coming Sunday, 27th April 2014.

 “On that day the very depths of My tender mercy are open. I pour out a whole ocean of graces upon those souls who approach the fount of My mercy. The soul that will go to confession, receive Holy Communion, pray for the intentions of the Pope recite the Our Father, Creed and a devout prayer to the merciful Lord Jesus before the Blessed Sacrament (exposed or reposed) shall obtain complete forgiveness of sins and punishments.”  My italics.

Look at what Jesus is offering us and what little He asks us to give Him in return. Is it really so hard for us Catholics to fulfill those requirements?

Jesus Asks so Little of Us

If you didn’t go to confession during Lent, here’s your perfect opportunity. If you've been away from the Church for a long time – a few years or even decades – and are in need of some encouragement to go , read The Light Is On For You to be reassured of what a loving reception you can expect in the confessional.

Confession is the biggest hurdle to completing Jesus’ requirements for His mercy. He’s asking us to be humble, and that's tough. It’s difficult for us humans to get over ourselves, but we must if we are to move forwards in our spiritual lives.

Back in the Fold

Once you’ve been to confession, a powerful feeling of peace will come over you. You’ll look forward to receiving your first Communion after the long absence, and enjoy a strong sense of coming home.

If you go to Mass, but sit in your pew while others go up to receive, or walk up Sunday after Sunday with your arms crossed for a blessing – imagine how wonderful it will be to receive the Body and Blood of Christ again!

I went through that experience after being away from the Church (and Mass) for over twenty years. A tremendous sense of serenity filled me after my ‘first confession’ and I was so excited to receive Communion again.

I had not appreciated until then just how much I’d missed the Mass. I knew this was where I truly belonged, and I’m confident you will, too.

Get ready to receive Our Lord this coming Sunday!

Hurry Before This Offer Expires!

Once we die, Jesus becomes the Just Judge.  We can no longer prevail upon His mercy and forgiveness - it is too late.

Can any of us afford not to take Him up on His offer? 

When life is going badly and there seems no way out, it's easy to fall into despair.

Yet Christ's Easter message is: "Don't despair!" 

Repeat After Me..

We proclaim that message every time we recite the Apostles' Creed: Jesus "rose from the dead and is seated at the right hand of the Father....I believe in the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body and life everlasting."
 
There's no despair here.

But perhaps constant repetition has dulled our attentiveness to the reality of what we're saying: that Jesus suffered horribly for our sakes so that we might rise up from death and  have eternal life.

We are made in God's image and destined to be with Him in heaven. Christ asks us not to let earthly setbacks throw us into misery and distract us from that goal.

God loves us. If he puts suffering our lives, it's to turn our thoughts away from the world and back to Him and His infinite mercy.

But  fighting off despair and trusting in God's mercy is tough.

Judas Versus Peter

Despair is Satan’s most powerful weapon against God. He rejoices whenever he succeeds in separating us from our hope in Christ (see 'Hope versus Hope' in my last post). He thus sabotages our salvation and adds our souls to the ranks of those destined for hell.

Judas of Iscariot committed the ultimate sin when he despaired of forgiveness for betraying Jesus, thus cutting himself off from future happiness with God.

Peter denied knowing Christ three times, after having just said that he loved Him and would do anything for Him. But in contrast to Judas, he wept bitterly and repented over his betrayal. 

This humble admission of guilt and belief in Christ’s forgiveness wiped his slate clean. Peter's faith and hope restored his good standing with God and ensured his redemption.

Judas allowed Satan to deceive him into despairing of Christ's love: Peter believed in Our Lord’s mercy and was granted it.

Who would you rather be?

But What Use Is God's Mercy When I'm Suffering? 

Blessed Sopocko, confessor and spiritual director of St. Maria Faustina Kowalska has this to say about despair in his book God is Mercy (Marian Press, 1965, p. 81):

“Despair is passion arising in us because of the impossibility of escaping evil. The name covers not only the feeling of despair itself, but also the inclination to it. ... It is opposed to hope and trust, so much so that while hope enlightens, despair kills. ... (my italics)

“The causes of despair can vary. Temporal or spiritual misfortunes, incurable illness, loss of respect and honor, financial ruin, threat of inevitable danger, etc. Under the influence of such disasters there follows a terrible depression which takes away all energy, paralyzes the nerves, renders clear thinking impossible, and even impedes breathing and the normal circulation of the blood, so that the brain is not supplied sufficiently with oxygen and ceases to function sufficiently. ...

“If we search for the very first, deepest cause of despair, we always find a lack of trust in the Mercy of God. ...”  (My italics)

(Taken from What Is Divine Mercy? By Dr. Robert Stackpole)

But why is it that when things are going badly, we find it the hardest to trust in God?

Because we want control over our lives. We want to know exactly what lies ahead, we demand concrete proof that our bad situation will end and quickly.

‘Show, don’t tell!’ is the usual advice to story writers and we feel the same way about God. Don't tell us that all will be well, through the Scriptures, don't tell us that we must trust in You: show us a reason to trust you by performing a miracle!

For some reason, God's amazing miracle of resurrection on Easter Sunday often isn't good enough for us. We're doubting Thomases who want to see it for ourselves, not have to believe writings from 2000 years ago.

Unfortunately faith means believing without seeing, and we must have blind faith if we’re to attain the goal for which we were made, namely to be with God in eternity.

Dispelling Despair Through Divine Mercy
 
Since despair comes from believing things will never get better and that we are alone in our misery, the antidote is complete trust in God’s love for us. (See 'Christ's Strategy' in my last post.)

Dr. Stackpole says, regarding the benefits of trusting in God:

"It opens the door to all the graces and blessings He wants to give us.” (My italics.)

We mustn’t hang ourselves with despair, like Judas. Instead we must trust in God’s mercy and be raised from misery to happiness.

....Which Leads Us to Divine Mercy Sunday

This weekend, Catholics will celebrate Divine Mercy Sunday (Feast of Mercy).

God’s mercy is not confined to this one day of the year – it is available every single day of every year! – but there are certain graces to be obtained on that day.

Here is entry 699 of St. Faustina Kowalska’s diary, in which Christ makes clear his desires for Divine Mercy Sunday. This entry is very long, but if you read it, you'll feel overwhelmed by Christ's love for you.

My daughter, tell the whole world about My inconceivable mercy. I desire that the Feast of Mercy be a refuge and shelter for all souls, and especially for poor sinners. On that day the very depths of My tender mercy are open. I pour out a whole ocean of graces upon those souls who approach the fount of My mercy. The soul that will go to Confession and receive Holy Communion shall obtain complete forgiveness of sins and punishment. On that day all the divine floodgates through which graces flow are opened. Let no soul fear to draw near to Me, even though its sins be as scarlet. My mercy is so great that no mind, be it of man or of angel, will be able to fathom it throughout all eternity. Everything that exists has come forth from the very depths of My most tender mercy. Every soul in its relation to Me will contemplate My love and mercy throughout eternity. The Feast of Mercy emerged from My very depths of tenderness. It is My desire that it be solemnly celebrated on the first Sunday after Easter. Mankind will not have peace until it turns to the Fount of My Mercy.

(Even if you've not been to Confession for 60 years or more, you may feel that it's worth going now, before next Sunday. :) I promise you, priests are kind in the confessional: they are there to help us make a good confession, not beat us up over our sins!)

Christ also revealed to St. Faustina the extraordinary graces available to those who devoutly receive Holy Communion on Divine Mercy Sunday:

I want to grant a complete pardon to the souls that will go to Confession and receive Holy Communion on the Feast of My mercy (1109).  

Whoever approaches the Fount of Life on this day will be granted complete forgiveness of sins and punishment (300).  

The soul that will go to Confession and receive Holy Communion will obtain complete forgiveness of sins and punishment (699).

Click here for further information on how to prepare for Divine Mercy Sunday 

Are God’s Graces Confined to Catholics?

No!

I know that we Catholics are considered arrogant because we believe that Catholicism is ‘the one, true faith.’
 
We make no apologies for this belief.
 
Christ instituted the Catholic (i.e. universal) Church 2013 years ago. All other Christian faiths are man-made spin-offs. (I now cheerfully await an onslaught of angry comments!) The Sacraments of our faith make the Christian life easier for Catholics.  We certainly don't believe that non-Catholics are doomed to the eternal fire of hell.



The important thing is to trust in God’s mercy and humbly ask Him to forgive our sins. Christ longs for us all to come to Him – Catholics and non-Catholics alike.

We will stop feeling despair when we realize that Christ is always walking with us.


Postscript: Whenever I find myself teetering on the edge of despair, I quickly recite this prayer, over and over again:

‘Eternal God, in Whom mercy is endless and the treasury of compassion inexhaustible, look kindly upon us and increase your mercy in us, that in difficult moments we might not despair nor become despondent, but with great confidence, submit ourselves to your Holy Will, which is Love and Mercy itself.’ Diary 950

I hope it helps you, too.

My non-Catholic husband looks at me in bewilderment whenever I tell him I’m going to confession. Why go to a priest when you can just confess your sins to God?

Yes, that would be much easier than going through the indignity of telling another human being what I’ve been up to!

But confession is more than simply relating our sins.

I Don’t Need to Be Humble – or Do I?

If we’re really sorry for our sins, we must be humble enough to admit we sinned in the first place. It takes a lot of humility to verbalize our trespasses to another person. Telling God about them in the privacy of our thoughts is just too comfortable.

Plus, we’re not confessing to an ordinary person: the priest is Christ’s minister on earth. So we are telling God about our sins, but in a more humbling situation.

Absolution

After confessing, we ask for God’s forgiveness, which the priest is able to grant through the act of absolution. Receiving absolution is a wonderful sensation. It’s hard to convey just how liberating it is, being allowed to turn over a new leaf.

Remember when, as a little kid, you did something wrong and were scared of how your parents would react? You put off telling them what you’d done for as long as you could! Then you finally screwed up enough courage to tell them.

Do you recall the great relief when your parents forgave you? That feeling of having the slate wiped clean? You may have had to atone for your behavior, but it was out in the open. You harbored no evil secrets, and felt at peace again.
 
The other name for confession is ‘reconciliation’ – reconciling us with God our Heavenly Parent.
 
You don’t look forward to going to confession, but you're sure glad you went!

Permission to Sin all Over Again?

Many non-Catholics suspect confession makes us think it ’O.K.’ to sin again. We’ll always be forgiven, so what’s there to stop us being repeat offenders?

But it's embarrassing to have to confess our sins over and over again! The very fact that we Catholics have to ‘tell all’ is a big deterrent. Once that slate is wiped clean, we try to keep it that way. We won’t succeed completely – we’re only human - but we’re encouraged in our daily struggle not to sin.

State of Grace

Another reason to keep that slate clean is in order to stay in a state of grace. Otherwise we're unable to receive Communion. Receiving our ‘daily bread’ in the form of Communion is vital to a Catholic.

The Long-Time Absentee

Our priest is a great one for encouraging those who’ve been away from the sacrament of confession to come back to it. He’s not going to judge or criticize anyone. He’s there to forgive.

He recently gave a sermon at another parish, explaining that if he persuaded enough penitents to come to confession to him that day he’d be given a cruise to the Bahamas. (Humor is a great trademark of many priests, today, thankfully!)

An old man entered the confessional later and put his hand over the priest’s, saying: “Father, I’ve just upgraded you to first class. It’s been seventy years since my last confession.”

It’s never too late to humble ourselves and seek God’s forgiveness. That is, before we die and that chance is gone.