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It’s Day 201!!
There are three elements that WE bring to Confession
CONTRITION
CONFESSION
SATISFACTION
Today we are in a new little mini section
THE MINISTER OF THIS SACRAMENT
Who is it?
Who is the one who forgives us?
JESUS IS THE ONE WHO FORGIVES SINS
IT IS ALWAYS JESUS!!
BUT…
Jesus forgives sins THROUGH THE MINISTRY OF THE PRIESTS
This is a gift that Jesus intended gave when He established the Church
We will talk about that as well as some of the responsibilities the priest has as the minister of the sacrament
For example, he is not the master of God’s forgiveness
He is the SERVANT OF GOD’S FORGIVENESS
It’s not just an authority thing
There is a responsibility that has been placed upon each priest who hears confessions
They have to live up to them
Let’s pray!!
Prayer by Fr. Mike: “Father in Heaven, we give you praise and glory. Thank you so much for bringing us here. Thank you for giving us your mercy and thank you for giving us the priesthood. Lord God, I thank you for every priest who has ever heard my Confession. And I thank you for every priest who has ever been patient with me in Confession and all those who are listening. I thank you for every priest who has ever administered your mercy to all of us in our worst moments. Lord God, I ask you to please bless all those men, all those priests who have given their lives so that your mercy can touch our lives. I ask you to please bless them wherever they are right now. Lord God, I ask you to please bless them wherever they are right now. Lord God, I ask you to be with those priests who have been mean in Confession, have been cruel in Confession, have been short, brief, hurt, or even worse in Confession. I ask you to please heal them, heal their hearts. Help them become more like you. Help them be servants of your mercy, not masters of forgiveness. Help us all to be patient with each other because, Lord, on our own none of us is enough. On our own all of us fail. And so we make this prayer in the mighty name of Jesus Christ. And we trust in you Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen”
So there we have it!!
Jesus is the one who heals
At every Mass, Jesus is the one who consecrates the Eucharist
It is Jesus acting through the ministry of the priesthood
THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT FOR US TO UNDERSTAND!!
It is the MINISTRY of the priest
BUT…
It is the POWER of Jesus
Fr. Mike is telling a story about a priest and a Baptist minister…sounds like the beginning of a joke….let’s listen…
Just like someone who heals someone with laying on of hands and prayers, that is Jesus working through them
So a priest of Jesus Christ says, “I absolve you of your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”
Jesus forgives THROUGH the priest just like He has healed others through the pastor
The priest is not claiming power on his own
Jesus heals through the priesthood
John Ch 21 Jesus breathes on the disciples and says, “Receive the Holy Spirit. Those whose sins you forgive are forgiven. Those whose sins you hold bound, are held bound.”
This is an incredible gift that God has given to the Apostles, passed down to their successors the bishops
Paragraph 1462 says, “Priests, his collaborators, exercise it to the extent that they have received the commission either from their bishop (or religious superior) or the Pope, according to the law of the Church.”
Every priest, as he acts In Persona Christi in the world, he acts as the bishop’s collaborator
He acts as an extension of the bishops because in the sacrament of Holy Orders, there is a hierarchy
The bishops have the FULLNESS of Holy Orders
The priests share or participate in that fullness of Holy Orders
There are some particularly grave sins that result in excommunication, which is the most severe ecclesiastical penalty
This goes all the way back to 1 Corinthians
St. Paul is writing to the Church in Corinth and he essentially says that there is a story among them that doesn’t happen even among pagans
It doesn’t even happen among people who don’t know who God is
There was a man who was living with his father’s wife
That is horrible
And St. Paul notices that the people are OK with it
St. Paul tells them they have to remove him or let him know that he is standing outside the fold
He is not in union with the Church
Treat him as a stranger
He is not a brother in the Lord
That is the first example of EXCOMMUNICATION we have in Scripture
That is for VERY SERIOUS THINGS
It is a VERY SERIOUS PENALTY
It is all meant to be oriented towards HEALING
Why?
Even in Scripture it says so that he can realize that he is not in line with the Lord
He is not in God’s grace
He is not part of this community
HOPEFULLY HE WILL!!
St. Paul even says, “Hand him over to Satan so that he realizes, ‘I don’t want to belong here. I want to belong to the Lord.’”
This is a reality that we have to deal with when it comes to excommunication
Paragraph 1463 says, “In danger of death any priest, even if deprived of faculties for hearing confessions, can absolve from every sin and excommunication.”
The Church is the servant of God’s mercy and exists to extend God’s mercy into the world
Paragraph 1464 says, “Priests must encourage the faithful to come to the sacrament of Penance and must make themselves available to celebrate this sacrament each time Christians reasonably ask for it.”
What are the two questions every priest wants to hear?
“Father, how do I become Catholic?”
“Father, would you hear my Confession?”
Most priests will jump at the chance to hear your Confession
You may have encountered a priest in your life who did not jump at the chance and made you feel like you were inconveniencing him
Hopefully he was just having a bad day
His life is meant to be defined by the ministry of mercy
We all have bad days
How do priests do this?
Paragraph 1466 says, “The confessor is not the master of God’s forgiveness, but its servant.”
Priests have to unite their hearts to the heart of the Good Shepherd
They have to be faithful to the heart of Jesus
They have to be faithful to the Magisterium of the Church
They have to have a respect and sensitivity to the one that is fallen
Paragraph 1466 continues, “...he must love the truth, be faithful to the Magisterium of the Church, and lead the penitent with patience toward healing and full maturity.”
Think about how much we need a priest hearing our Confession who loves the truth
A priest who has respect and sensitivity towards us when we have fallen
A priest who has patience towards us when we have fallen
Paragraph 1466 continues, “He must pray and do penance for his penitent, entrusting him to the Lord’s mercy.”
That is the responsibility of EVERY PRIEST
There are priests out there who have hurt people in Confession
That is not the rule, that would be the exception
If you are one of those people who have been hurt, Fr. Mike is sorry
God’s mercy wants you to COME BACK
Especially if that hurt has caused you to stay away from Confession
GOD’S MERCY IS FOR YOU!!
His invitation is for you to come back to hear those words of, “I absolve you of your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”
For you to be able to freely and fully divulge whatever sin it is that you need to bring to the Heavenly Father
And to do it without hesitation, fear, embarrassment, or shame
Paragraph 1467 says, “Given the delicacy and greatness of this ministry and the respect due to persons, the Church declares that every priest who hears confessions is bound under very severe penalties to keep absolute secrecy regarding the sins that his penitents have confessed to him.”
The priest must never ever reveal what he has heard in Confession
IN FACT…
If a priest reveals what he has heard in Confession, that is an AUTOMATIC EXCOMMUNICATION OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
The most serious ecclesiastical penalty is excommunication
That priest then has to go about the whole process of being received back into the Church
That is how seriously the Church takes your privacy
That is how seriously the Church wants you to have confidence in approaching the sacrament of Reconciliation
There is the natural embarrassment of our feelings which may make us hesitate
AND YET…
The CHurch wants to make this a place that is safe and a place of healing and a place of love and a place of restoration and a place of power
That is what it is meant to be for you and that is what priests are meant to be
If they are not, then we have to pray for them
If priests keep failing, pray for them
This is the way God wants to give us His reconciliation through the ministry of the priesthood
When we have broken priests, rather than getting mad at them, we need to pray for them
So pray that all priests have the heart of Jesus and the heart of the Father and that no one ho ever approaches them in Reconciliation is received by anyone other than the Father’s arms, by the Father’s heart, by our Lord Jesus Christ
“Lord God, heal the brokenness in all of our priests. Heal those wounds in all of your faithful, especially those who have been wounded by a bad experience in Confession.”
Fr. Mike is praying FOR YOU!!
Please pray for Fr. Mike and for each other!!
I cannot WAIT to see you tomorrow!!
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