PENANCE/CONFESSION/RECONCILIATION—Why do we keep changing the names???

 

When I was growing up, my mother sent my three brothers and me to Confession every two or three weeks—whether we thought we needed it or not!  I would pore over the huge list of possible lapses given in my prayer book and end up with a list that I kept hoping I wouldn’t forget before I said them all to the priest in the “box.”

 

Since Vatican II we speak of  P/C/R as a sacrament of healing and forgiveness, but the sacrament has a LONG history in the Church which is most interesting.  In the early Christian communities it was presumed that, once persons committed themselves through the sacrament of Baptism to following Jesus, they would live exemplary lives.  Human nature being what it is, such was not always the case   If a person seriously violated their baptism through apostasy (denying one’s faith), adultery, or murder, he/she would be required to do public penance, and then, after a designated period of time, he/she could again join the community for Eucharist.  During this time the sacrament was known as Penance.

 

In the late sixth and early seventh centuries the Irish monks (who provided spiritual direction) began to deal with penitents privately.  Those who confessed their sins would be given absolution immediately and a penance to perform later—prayers, works of charity, money for the poor, etc.  The sacrament was then thought of as Confession. Initially, the Church resisted this new practice but gradually accepted it as the general way the sacrament was to be celebrated. This continued until the time of Vatican II.

 

One of the first documents to come out of the Second Vatican Council was the Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy which stressed the importance of the sacrament as one of healing and forgiveness; hence we now speak of it as the sacrament of Reconciliation, meaning reconciliation with God and with the church community (which is better or worse for our being part of it). 

 

The document proposes three methods of receiving the sacrament: 1) privately (in confessional with screen or face-to-face); 2) in a communal service with individual confession and absolution; 3) in a communal service with general absolution.  The last is to be used only in cases where the numbers of persons approaching the sacrament are too many for the priest(s) available.   

 

Another change not expressed (to my knowledge) in the document itself is the content of one’s celebration of the sacrament.  When the changes first came out, I remember reading or being told that instead of a “laundry list” of my faults I should select one or two areas of my life than I need to change and make this the content of the sacrament.  Rather than focusing on laws I may have violated, I focus on: what is my relationship with God, with other persons—family, friends, neighbors, coworkers.  Do I treat each person with respect and dignity?  Do I carry out my responsibilities to each one?  In the church vestibule there is an excellent handout, “Understanding Sin Today” that you might want to pick up which develops this concept more fully than I can do here.

 

Sister Marie, O.P.

 

P.S. If there is a desire in you to learn more about such topics as this as an adult, consider signing up for the next series of “Being Catholic—Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow” which begins in March.