Jumoke Fashola hosts the Sunday morning Inspirit slot on BBC London. One of the topics this morning was the question of whether it is possible to trust someone with your most intimate secrets. As part of the discussion, they wanted a Catholic priest to explain the meaning of confession. I got the invitation on Thursday, and spent an hour yesterday evening thinking about how you would open up the idea of confession to a very mixed London audience.
Confessions room at Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris
The mood of the programme is certainly not anti-religious (and Jumoke spoke about her memories of going to confession as a girl at a convent school), but I couldn’t assume people would know much about confession beyond what they had seen in the movies. I knew that one of the questions would be about the link between therapy (or simply ‘getting something off your chest’) and confession; but how would you explain in ordinary language that the sacrament of confession is far more than a helpful chat with a trusted friend or therapist?
You can listen to the conversation here:
CLICK HERE TO LISTEN [Too late!!]
My interview starts at 2:18.24 and runs to 2:27.15. I think the iPlayer link lasts for a week, until about 11 Dec.
Bridges and Tangents 
Dear Fr Stephen,
This is the second thing today that I have listened to on the sacrament of confession and reconciliation. Our homily covered the healing of the Lords forgiveness just today.
Imagine the possibilities of this beautiful sacrament reaching those who feel unloved. Those who are homeless. Those who have left homes and lives because they couldn’t belong to their old lives any more. Those who are seemingly unlovable. I think of the old ‘Cardboard city’ etc.
Imagine the grace of God working through those who are not Catholic by baptism. Those that attend the soup kitchen or night shelters. Imagine that hope, that healing, that forgiveness, that unburdening, that Love. The Love that Jesus spiritually anointed the common people with that healed them, when they had absolute faith in Him.
I am not allowed to take this sacrament. I don’t need to. I go direct to Him. He teaches me to live in Truth with all. And he gives me my penance when I fall short. I am so lucky. It is a blessing that there are Catholic priests that can minister this precious sacrament to the people. Imagine if it was not limited to those who were just by fortune or virtue Catholic.
“His Mercy is far more powerful than any thing we can do”.
A very timely post for me Fr Stephen. Thanks to you too Mags, your comment speaks to me.
I think it’s so important to remind people that God’s forgiveness / love is hu……………..ge ..!
We live in a world where so often everything has a price, prid pro quo, finite love, and so on that we forget / don’t realize that God’s love is NOT of this world. But something extraordinary.
Also, that God is NOT the accuser in our guilt. God makes us guilty through conscience, yes. But it is a healthy kind of guilt, designed to get us back on track as soon as possible. There is, also, negative guilt which doesn’t derive from God. A guilt that wants us to make us feel so miserable that we think we’re beyond God’s forgiveness and grace (either that or that other terrible condition: that we shouldn’t feel guilt at all – just as bad).
The fact that we exist at all (as opposed to not existing) and the fact that God became man and died on a Cross for our benefit only are examples of His massive love and forgiveness.
When going into a confessional we must remember / think of a God who isn’t some petty-mind Zeus figure, but as our ultimate Dad (or Mum – actually, even more than than Dad or Mum) whose love and forgiveness is ma …………………. ssive ..! (and i think the dots express much more accurately the size and nature of God’s love than any dry, theological treatise or whatever).
Apologies for going over the top. But confession is just so important (and, sadly, think of all the misery in the world because people are ignorant of God’s great love and forgiveness – how we must pray for others, regarding this, as well as actively spread the Good News of Christianity in whatever way we can).
And that confession is, ultimately, about restoring us to the grace of God – the magic of God, the magic of God’s love, the magic of God’s creation / existence, the magic of living in God) – bit like having surgery in order to get rid of a diseased part of the body, so that we can go on to live and enjoy life in God.
Short primary source explanation of confession:
The Catechism of the Catholic Church says in paragraph 1446 that, “Christ instituted the sacrament of Penance for all sinful members of his Church: above all for those who, since Baptism, have fallen into grave sin, and have thus lost their baptismal grace and wounded ecclesial communion. It is to them that the sacrament of Penance offers a new possibility to convert and to recover the grace of justification. The Fathers of the Church present this sacrament as “the second plank [of salvation] after the shipwreck which is the loss of grace.””
According to Pope John Paul II the Catechism of the Catholic Church “is given as a sure and authentic reference text for teaching Catholic doctrine.”
We are all sinful members of His Church, but some were Christened into the C of E, not by choice. I have since been received into the Roman Catholic faith and know the beauty of this sacred sacrament first hand. I wish it could be taken to my brothers and sisters who Love their Lord as much as I.