{"id":386,"date":"2010-12-11T08:38:41","date_gmt":"2010-12-11T13:38:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=386"},"modified":"2010-12-11T08:38:41","modified_gmt":"2010-12-11T13:38:41","slug":"penance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/penance\/","title":{"rendered":"Penance"},"content":{"rendered":"

What comes to mind when you hear the word penance<\/em>?\u00a0 We often think of penance<\/em> as the “punishment” we receive when we go to Confession.\u00a0 That would be true but that definition of penance needs to go a little deeper.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The purpose of penance<\/em> is not simply punishment.\u00a0 To understand this, let’s look at the sacrament as a whole.\u00a0 It is most commonly called Confession.\u00a0 <\/em>Of course, confessing our sins is an important part of the sacrament but it is not the only part.\u00a0 There are four parts to the sacrament:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Contrition – we need to be sorry for our sins and have a genuine desire to do better.<\/li>\n
  2. Confession – Of course, God already knows what we have done but as a sign of our contrition, we are called to speak aloud our sins, admitting our faults and admitting we need\u00a0God’s help to do better.<\/li>\n
  3. Penance – Penance is not so much a punishment but an expression of our desire to change and do better.<\/li>\n
  4. Absolution – Absolution is God forgiving us through the words spoken by the priest.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    So, along with Confession <\/em>as a common name for the sacrament, we also call it the Sacrament of Penance<\/em>.\u00a0 The official name of the sacrament is the Rite of Penance<\/em>.\u00a0 That is not meant to put all the focus on the penance we receive.\u00a0 The word ‘penance’ comes from a Greek word, metanoia<\/em>, which means conversion<\/em>.\u00a0 Conversion is what the sacrament is all about.\u00a0 We are called to reflect upon our sins in an examination of conscience and then come to the sacrament to reconcile ourselves to God\u00a0and desiring true conversion so that we can stop sinning.<\/p>\n

    I have heard stories of people who, before Vatican 2, would go to Confession at least monthly, if not weekly, to confess their sins, even if they didn’t know of anything they had done wrong.\u00a0 Now, the pendulum has swung the opposite way and most people, it seems, seldom go to Confession.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0<\/p>\n

    I think one reason is a better understanding of the sacrament and contrition.\u00a0 <\/em>If you don’t know of anything you have done wrong, then how can you be sorry for it?\u00a0 (Actually, we can be sorry for sins we are not aware of but that is a definite sense of being sorry) \u00a0I think this idea is why the pendulum of how often we go to Confession began to swing.\u00a0 But it swung too far.\u00a0 It seems that people have gone from thinking that every little bad action is a sin to thinking nothing is a sin.\u00a0 We still sin.\u00a0<\/p>\n

    Other people have stopped going to Confession because, they say that, they don’t need\u00a0 a priest to confess their sins.\u00a0 They confess they directly to God.\u00a0 (I wonder how many of these people really do confess their sins directly to God).\u00a0 Going to a priest for confession can seem awkward to say the least.\u00a0 We don’t like to admit our faults to other people.\u00a0 But there is a therapeutic value to doing this.\u00a0 Some see it as an opportunity to “get things off their chest.”\u00a0 Sometimes talking about our sins can give us a new understanding of why we sin?\u00a0 Then, that new understanding can lead us to real change.<\/p>\n

    Regarding the topic of confessing our sins to a human person (the priest) let me say this as a priest – I view hearing confessions as an enormous responsbility given to me by God.\u00a0 Does hearing Confessions seem to become “routine” at times?\u00a0 Yes, but I remind myself when a person comes to confess, it is God who becomes present in a powerful way.\u00a0 I remember what the priest who taught this sacrament in seminary said, ‘if you ever start to feel worthy and routine about hearing confessions you need to take a retreat or something.’\u00a0 It is not something I take lightly.\u00a0\u00a0 Hearing\u00a0Confessions reminds me of my own sins and\u00a0what I need to do better at.<\/p>\n

    I always pray before I hear confessions for the grace to be a minister of compassion and forgiveness.\u00a0 May God give you a heart filled with contrition that you may always open yourself to the grace God offers in this sacrament.<\/p>\n

    Peace,<\/p>\n

    Fr. Jeff<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    What comes to mind when you hear the word penance?\u00a0 We often think of penance as the “punishment” we receive when we go to Confession.\u00a0 That would be true but that definition of penance needs to go a little deeper.\u00a0 The purpose of penance is not simply punishment.\u00a0 To understand this, let’s look at the …<\/p>\n

    Continue reading ‘Penance’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[11],"tags":[58,61,59,60],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/sMTPk-penance","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/386"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=386"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/386\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":387,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/386\/revisions\/387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}