Confession On my first trip to Medjugorje, I was prompted to confess two “old” sins for which I was genuinely sorry. I couldn’t do this in my home parish, but I felt I could confess in this place of great holiness. I went to confession, and as I confessed, I saw the priest smile, and his smile was not a kind smile. I was sincerely sorry for what I had done. Long story short, I did not confess the second sin because I felt that I had been treated so cruelly in the confessional. I told the Blessed Mother, that if she wanted me to confess, the only priest to whom I would confess was Father Svet who had been the spiritual director to the visionaries. The next day, as I was walking by St. James Church, I saw the priests hearing confession. I was stubborn. I walked, and as I did, Father Svet walked past me and found a place to hear confession. I jumped into his line, and as I confessed my other great sin, I was treated with the kindness and compassion of Jesus. Fast forward to the beginning of January. I had discussed the issue of old sins with my SD. He was very kind and said that I should make a list of what I wanted to confess and when I was ready I should find a confessor. I stewed after that for a couple of weeks. The “pressure” to confess stayed with me, and, finally, 3 days ago, I knew the time had come. I asked Jesus to send me to the proper confessor. I realized I probably would not have to go to Medjugore again to confess. The three priests in our church are excellent confessors. I just wasn’t sure I could confess to one of them, not because of him, but because this confession was one of the 3 most difficult confessions of my life. The other two were the ones in Medjugorje. My SD said Mass that morning. After he exposed the Blessed Sacrament was leaving the chapel, I caught up with him and asked if he would hear my confession. He said, “Of course.” I said, “Maybe you should go eat breakfast.” He said, “No, this is what we are here for, to hear your confession when you need it.” Since we had already discussed the issue of old sins, he had a good idea of what I would confess. I told him, all right, but that he would have to pretend that he didn’t know me. He just smiled. It took everything I had to stammer out my confession. It was one of the most humbling times in my life. I stammered and stuttered, and he waited patiently for me to confess. I finally spit everything out. I was completely humiliated, but I was truly repentant. My SD was very kind. He spoke with the gentleness of Jesus to encourage me and give me strength. He also gave me a significant penance. I assume those sins deserved it. He also waited, kindly, in the confessional until I left to return to the Chapel to say my penance before the Blessed Sacrament. I could not settle down when I returned to the chapel. Then as I prayed, I heard clearly in my right ear, “ God has let go of your sins, now you must let go.” At that moment, I was flooded with peace. I was able to continue with my penance. I also felt that I could never look my SD in the face again. Today, who said Mass? My SD. He saw me and smiled, and I felt complete peace. The embarrassment was gone. As Mass progressed, I realized how light I felt. I didn’t realize the weight of the sins I had been carrying around. I hadn’t even remembered these sins until two weeks ago. The weight of these sins is gone. I feel very blessed. God has granted me tremendous graces that He gave me before confession and in the confessional. Now, at my age, I finally appreciate the gift of this sacrament.
THAT should seriously go into a book. So real, so beautiful and sanctifying! Thank you so much for sharing!!
A Christmas confession story (not my own). Years ago now I read an article in The Times which consisted of various celebrities writing about their 'special Christmases'. One of them was written by a fairly well known British female writer (who name escapes me now). She said that she had been raised a Catholic but had lapsed while at university in her early twenties. She stopped praying, then Mass and quietened her conscience by reading all the anti-Christian material she could find and finally persuaded herself that it was all just a myth. One Christmas Eve (now in her late forties) she was shopping in central London and enjoying the atmosphere when she came upon a Catholic church. She thought that candles and a crib would add to the Christmas sentimentality that she was enjoying. She stepped into a stunning church building lit only by candles and, sure enough, there at the front of the church was a beautiful crib. She sat down and admired the crib, behind her were people queuing at several confessionals. She regretted for a moment that she didn't believe like all these people waiting to confess and, having had her fill of sentimental atmosphere, went to leave. As she reached the side aisle beside the confessionals, one of the doors was opened and she waited to allow the penitent to leave and then moved forward beside the open door when a pair of invisible hands grabbed her shoulders, turned her around, pushed her into the confessional and closed the door. She looked at the crucifix in the confessional, burst into tears and found herself making a heartfelt confession to the priest. When she finished, the priest said, 'I was expecting you'. She asked if he knew her, feeling that she would faint with embarrassment if he did. He said 'No', but all through Advent I have been asking the Lord to send me a Christmas gift, a long lost penitent who really needed the sacrament, you're my Christmas gift.
I have been so moved by confession these days. I was one of those people who never felt the need to confess to a priest. I was full of pride and thought why do I need to talk to him when I can just talk to God. Boy was I wrong!! I remember going to confession for the first time in like 7 years this summer. It was amazing. I confessed to a lot but still held the deep deep secrets and sin in. I started to confess every couple of weeks and I remember praying to God to help me reveal all the old sins to confess. I truly believed that my sins were absolved but I still wanted to confess those old deep secrets. I was terrified but decided to make a list. I also decided that if I was going to do this I was going to have the courage to face my confessor and humble myself completely embarrassed in my sin. It was so hard but I got through it and all those burdens were gone. I thought for sure I would have some extremely hard penance but I did not. I think this good priest realized that coming to him face to face with my long list was time served so to speak. Now I try to go every 2 weeks and it is an amazing feeling. I have been talking to my devout friend about confession for some time. He admitted that he had not been in a long time but knew he really wanted to go. I offered to go with him at any time to be there if it would help him in any way. Long story short, last Thursday night, I was away on business and out of nowhere I receive a text from him saying that he was sittin gin the church absolved of all his sins and he thanked me for staying on him. It brought me almost to tears of joy! What amazed me about his story of this confession is that there was a priest that he just did not care for and did not want to go to but felt a strong urge to go to this priest. This priest was the priest he ended up needing to go to. He said when he first sat down face to face, the priest held his hands and this prayer or words just came out of his mouth to the priest before he began confessing. He did not even know where it was coming from or what he was saying but it brought the priest to tears and then he confessed. There is so much power to confession!!
Confession was the hardest thing for me when I returned to the Church 25 years ago, and only in the last year have I tried to go every two weeks. Besides the more obvious benefits, it becomes painfully obvious, every time, how much pride I'm still lugging around. (At times, my pride has even kept me from sin, because I dreaded the humiliation of confessing it!) I beg the Lord every day to pull up my pride by it's bitter roots, no matter how much it hurts. Pride is the one thing that could ever lead to me dissapointing the Lord when it matters most. It could even lead to the loss of my soul! Oh, Jesus, meek and humble of heart, make my heart like unto thine. Amen.
The exorcists say that the demons can only accuse those present at an exorcism of unconfessed sins, they are totally unaware of any that has been repented and confessed. And so it will be at our last hour, the demons will be there, hoping to get us to despair of our salvation but they can't accuse us of anything that has been confessed and repented, they simply do not know that such sins ever happened. Saint Leopold Mandic, patron of penitents, pray for all of us on this forum to be enlightened to every past unconfessed and serious sin and to make a full and heartfelt confession of these, and all our other faults in this season of Advent.
Kathy, this is exactly what I said to my friend that I mentioned here. I told him that I could literally go to confession every day just to confess how much pride I too am still lugging around. I see it everywhere in me now and it is becoming clearer which is a great start to finally beat this oldest sin that Lucifer himself even fell for. No wonder he tries to get us most with his own sin. How interesting when you think about it. He falls for pride and though he uses it against us so we will fall too.
Thanks for starting this great thread. I have a recent confessional event I was waiting to get the chance and courage to write about. It was a Saturday last October and I was on the way to confession, I felt the courage to finally confess two sins I had on my mind for a long long time and failed to confess many times. So I did just that, prayed my penance and it went better than I expected. I felt forgiven and a great weight lifted from my shoulders. Anyway next morning, I was up really early with two toddlers who could not sleep and we were in my parents house. My mother got up to let me have an early morning nap and she took over. So I did that... then I had one of the most amazing dreams of my life. I was at mass said by Padre Pio, it was beautiful. It was in a medium sized hall, no special decor maybe a little run down but a decent rectangular type hall. The alter was beautiful and he said mass facing the crowd. Then the part that helped me wake up and really felt forgiven happened. After the mass I was in a circle of people maybe about five I think most of them were familiar to me, not completely sure but in the circle across from me was Padre Pio and he reached across and shook my hand and smiled. In the dream it was a beautiful experience and felt real. I awoke, and felt a divine peace that I have only really felt two other times in my life and it lasted a few hours. I had no worries and was really came and serene. I felt because of confessing those two sins Padra Pio was happy with my progress. I don't have a spiritual director and was praying for direction for a while which I think leads to what happens next. So next morning I was back in my own house before I got up I felt an unusual presence and then smelt the most amazing odour of sanctity in the room, that instant I thought it must be Padra Pio and maybe he is helping me as a spiritual father. For me confessing my sins alone was a great weight lifted and enough to really help me in my faith and defeat of sin and feeling of grace. Maybe the other stuff was just my imagination but I am going to believe it is real and now feel a very close presence of Padra Pio and great ease in asking of his intersession.
He who covers his sins will not prosper, but whoever confesses and forsakes them will have mercy. -Proverbs 28:13
right up to a few weeks ago I always worried about not confessing sins I had forgotten I had committed and there were a lot i know. Someone here put up the story of Claude Newman and his conversion. I will never be able to thank you enough for posting that. When I read what the Blessed Virgin had explained to him about confession and the Priest being the telephone between him and God, I started to cry with relief. Every time the Priest had included all my sins even those I could not remember that was God. That s why I could not remember them. They were gone. After years of worrying I was worrying about nothing. God is so good that sometimes I dont realise just how good he is.
I just thought of something the Priest as a telephone between us a God is so good an example. Who would try to talk to their best friend long distance without a telephone.
The enemy always accuses. In the last couple of months I've been needled by doubts about unconfessed sin. I've started praying intensely before confession, pleading with the Holy Spirit to reveal to me everything I need to confess. This gives me great confidence - how could He resist such a prayer???
Double AMEN! Kathy, So true! Guilt, rather than repentance, and discouragement, are two of JoeJerk's key weapons. Sometimes I'm nagged by thinking of sins I might not have confessed, and this, after I've made about seven general confessions over the years. I believe the source of such impressions can be attributed to the devil if guilt and worry predominate. The Holy Spirit might nudge me for the sake of humility, but never JoeJerk. By the way, Geralyn and I went to the Sacrament yesterday. I love going during Advent because the confessional lines are always longer. Mercy, Lord, more mercy! Safe in the Flames of the Sacred Heart!
Ok so this is a longer story that I will try to shorten. I finished reading Elizabeth Kindelman's diary on Sunday and one of the things I really wanted to do was the Monday fast for the souls in purgatory. I have a special calling I feel for these souls and was thrilled to find this devotion. Our Mother told Elizabeth on August 15th, 1980 she is asking for priests, consecrated souls and anyone else how was able, to fast on Mondays on bread and water. She promised, "If priests observe this Monday fast in all the holy masses they celebrate that week, at the moment of Consecration, they will free innumerable souls from Purgatory." Elizabeth asked how many were meant by innumerable. The Lord then responded, "So many that it cann be expressed in human numbers." Consecrated souls and the faithful who keep the Monday fast will also free a multitude of souls each time they receive Communion in that week. The Lord then said, "The Church and the whole world are in danger. You cannot change this situation. Only the Holy Trinity through the unified intercession of the Blessed Virgin, the angels, the saints and the souls in purgatory, can help you." Our Lady explained the fast in the following way. We can eat abundant bread, with salt. We can take vitamins, medicines, and what we need for health. We can drink abundant water. We should not eat to enjoy. Whoever keeps the fast should do so until at least 6:00pm. In this case, they should recite five decades of the rosary for holy souls. On Monday I did the fast. I do not share these things with you all for any reasons of pride or "look at me" and had to ponder this a bit before sharing because I feel some of the things we do should be personal but at the same time I feel that many of the devout are disciples and surely the disciples shared things among themselves to help in their understanding of things and help with the faith so that is why I am sharing. I wish to seek some guidance from you all on this. That day I decided to go to a different mass than normal and found myself at a mass in a small chapel with only 6 other people there (so 7 in total plus the priest). It was a wonderful, personal mass. The priest asked us in the room for prayers during the intercession which I loved and have never seen before. This mass reminded me in a way of what it could be like once the church has to go into hiding underground for a bit. During communion he had only two large hosts that he consecrated and broke to distribute to the 7 in the room. I think I was last or second last to receive and was amazed that when I got to them he handed me half of the large host. It was like Our Lord was giving me the largest piece during my fast. I felt in my soul after that he was saying, "Don't worry, I will feed you!" It was a wonderful experience. On Tuesday I went to mass again because of the promise of the fast so I wanted to go to communion as many times this week as I could. I planned on going to confession after mass on Tuesday. All during mass I was examining my conscience and thinking of all these things I wanted to talk to Jesus about in the confessional. I told him how frustrated it is to prepare in this manner for confession and yet when I get in there I lose my focus and forget to say so many things that I wanted to. After mass I was waiting for the priest to come to the confessional still in the pew. It was taking a longer time than normal. While doing this again I felt this stir in my soul to get up and leave the church and to come back to my office to write out my confession and then return today to confess to my normal confessor (the priest I always go to is not there on Tuesdays and I typically love to confess on Wednesdays because that is also the day that after mass there is perpetual adoration so I love to confess and then do my penance before the Lord in adoration). So this is what I did. Before I left I asked the Lord to give me a great penance for these suffering souls in purgatory and I would gladly do it for them. I came back and began to write my confession that turned into a 3 page letter to Jesus. After and all last night I struggled with the fact of was I really going to read this letter to Father/Jesus today. At one point last night I decided I would not only to quickly change my mind again. Today I still struggled with actually going about doing it even all through mass. Finally mass was over and I decided that I just had to do it. I got in line and I was last and remained last in line. There were only 3 people in front of me and all of them seemed to be taking much longer than normal. Finally it was my turn. I prefaced Father will all that I have just told you and then asked him if it would be ok if I read this letter of confession to Our Lord. He said yes and I began. I felt even during it that it was taking a long time and I hope that Father was ok with this but then remembered that this was Jesus I was talking to now. I finished the letter of confession and awaited my penance. I was stunned and in shock when upon finishing I received no comments, no penance and was completely absolved. I have gone to this same priest face to face for the past year and a half now about every 2 or 3 weeks and always get wonderful advice and penance and absolution. I could not believe that he said nothing this time and had no penance for me and just went to absolution. After I left I went before the Lord with confusion and proceeded to consecrate myself and family to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary. This was at the end of my letter and I did not feel compelled to read this part to Father in the confessional and instead waited to do it before the Lord. While driving back to work I felt confused and a bit troubled. I could feel the evil one whispering in my ear, about how the priest and the Lord did not care for me and this confession. I could feel him telling me that I did this all for me and my own pride, etc. I quickly shewed him away and went to my trusted friend and disciple here at work to ask his opinion of it. He was so happy for me and for sharing and said to not be troubled by this for Jesus absolved me with no penance because of my total surrender and humbling of myself before Him in a manner I have never done before. It made me feel so much better but yet I still want to share this with all of you and find out if anyone else has ever had something like this happen to them before? Confession without penance? What do you make of it? Thank you and as always God Bless You!
It is hard for me to wrap my mind about this, but Jesus truly is present to us in the confessional in a marvelous way. My weirdest confession experience - about 5 years ago, I went confession before Mass and confessed that I was drinking wine every day, and too much. The priest actually screamed at me, "Get professional help!!!" No other penance! I prayed about this, and went to the doctor (nurses are famous for trying to fix ourselves - I hate to go to the doctor). I was diagnosed with diabetes!!! When I began the oral medication to bring down my blood sugar, the instructions were, "do not drink alcohol while taking this medication." I investigated it and discovered that alcohol lowers the blood sugar. Drinking with the medication could make the blood sugar go too low! I was drinking wine to make myself feel better, and it was actually working, because it was bringing my blood sugar down! After getting on the medication, my passion for wine dwindled away. So, the humiliating experience of being yelled at during confession,(and this had to be heard by everyone in the cathedral!), led to an incredible improvement of my health! I wonder if the priest thought, "What came over me?" Maybe he had to go to confession after that?
Wow that's a tough confession experience alright! Never experienced that, but it turned out great in the end. I was at confession yesterday, I try to go once a fortnight. Confessions are on weekdays 3-5pm. There was one other penetant there. I was second to go in, and as I said my prayers afterward, I could see the priest behind the glass door of the confession box, just sitting there praying. Two things hit me: 1. Who or what is he praying for? I wondered how much evil in the world is being mitigated by his prayers, how many souls will be converted by his prayers. ( This priest is especially holy). 2. What an incredible vocation. To spend most of your afternoons in a small room praying and listening to people's hardships, it amazes me every time I think of it. It must take a lot of patience sometimes. What great people they are. I immediately prayed for him, and all other priests too. Long gone is the time where priests were guaranteed a life being looked after by the parishioners. It's a lonely, intimidating life for them now. Amazing people.
