Readings: Leviticus 19, 1-2, 17-18; Psalm 103, The Lord is Kind and Merciful (the best); 1 Corinthians 3, 16-23; Matthew 5, 38-48.
Homily
“So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.” But we are not, and so the Sacrament of Penance, the fourth in the list as we learned it!
So far we have discussed the first three sacraments, Baptism, Confirmation and Eucharist, and come to the understanding that they are best identified as Sacraments of Initiation. Moreover, in their original expression, they would all have been celebrated as one sacrament.
As we received the sacraments as children, we almost received them in this order. Except that Penance was dropped in before we made our First Communion, and so intruding in the sequence.
Today I want to try to cover, briefly, the history of the sacrament of Penance. The very early Christian community didn’t have the sacrament. The thinking was quite simple, if one repented and believed in Jesus and was baptized, one would not sin again!
This early community was a very close community, and was also being persecuted for its faith, and so they knew each other very well and we have several references in Paul’s letters to the need to throw someone out if they sinned.
By the year 150 we do find that the communities recognize three sins, which required special handling; murder, adultery and heresy. For this there began a practice of what we will call “Canonical Penance”. It was not pleasant!
Since it seemed inconceivable that a baptized person would sin, then they were excluded from the community. They had to perform all kinds of public penance, wear special clothes and fast; and maybe, after many years of this, they might be welcomed back into the community on Holy Thursday. And by the way, you could only ask for forgiveness once in your lifetime! And so began the practice of “death bed” forgiveness.
Baptism was generally recognized as the sacrament for having sins forgiven, and so it became common to delay receiving baptism until one was an adult and past the youthful years of indiscretions. This almost ended the life of the sacrament of Penance.
But then along came the Irish Monks!! Sitting around in their monasteries, they began to talk with one another and there developed the practice finding a “Soul Friend” or Anam Cara to tell ones sins to. This was the beginning of Confession as we know it, but there was still one missing ingredient. Absolution.
This action did not get officially added until the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215. But back to the Irish Monks. They ended up bringing Christianity back to Europe since it had been all but wiped out there by invading barbarians.
To help with this type of confession, they began to develop penances appropriate to the sin and thus developed books with prescribed penance. And these penances were extremely harsh, no three Hail Marys for the Irish!
Of course given man’s ingenuity, the next thing we find is that those with some money could hire others to do the penance for them!
It was Peter Lombard in the twelfth century who first listed Seven Sacraments, with penance being number four, and it was also in this century that we first meet the famous words “Ego te absolvo” which were quickly defended in the next century by St. Thomas Aquinas as the only way to have sins forgiven.
By the time the Reformation came some four centuries later, we find the Council of Trent only further declaring that this was the way penance always was and would always be celebrated!!
Now in our time, with the aid of better church history, the Second Vatican Council began to restore the communal aspect of the sacrament, and focused on Reconciliation rather than on penance and confession.
That effort has tended to fall on barren ground as two things have happened. One was that we all stopped going to confession altogether and, secondly, it seems that the current hierarchy are bound and determined to undo much of what Vatican II introduced.
Why did we stop going to confession? I believe there are a couple of reasons. Traditionally people were not well educated and therefore took everything which the church said without question.
In the last century, most of us have been educated at least to secondary level and a large number thru third level. We are able to think for ourselves. The push by Vatican II towards ‘personal responsibility’ in our relationship with God further aided this.
Right after Vatican II came the Encyclical Humane Vitae, on birth control, which most adult Catholics choose to ignore. Follow that with the current pedophile crisis and who wants to confess to a priest!!
But as I said at the very beginning, we do sin. So now what can we do about it? Well recall that penance is not the only sacrament in the business of forgiving sins. Baptism does, so does the Sacrament of the Sick, (more about that sacrament on another Sunday) and so does the Eucharist.
Recall that there are numerous times in our celebration when we acknowledge our sinfulness and even hear the words “this is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world”. So the church is possibly heading towards greater recognition of the need for reconciliation rather than confession.
I am going to suggest that during one of the Sundays in Lent, we have a celebration of Reconciliation with our Eucharist. There are even two Eucharistic Prayers for Reconciliation in our missals, but more about this later. There is no question, but that we sin. There is also no question but that the whole message of Jesus was one of reconciliation: remember the Prodigal Son, the Lost Sheep. God does love us, and definitely does not want us to stay away when we fail.
Just because Confession has vanished, sin has not. And we can too easily become very casual about our relationship with God and our community. There is a place for reflection and acknowledgement of our sins, we have it each time we celebrate mass at the beginning with the Penitential Rite, and maybe its time we found an Anam Cara, a Soul Friend.
Picture 1: Mass beginning
Picture 2: The Nursery, Zoe, Michelle, Torri & Buddy, Randolph, Georgie, Leo & Bernadette
Picture 3: Leo with Wendy
Picture 4: Torri with her granddad, Gilberto