On Hearing Confessions
Today, many Anglican priests receive little training in hearing confessions. Many attended seminaries rooted in evangelical or Reformed traditions, where the practice is unfamiliar. Others entered Anglicanism through churches that never emphasized it, so they have never really considered it.
After my last article, I realized that it was perhaps a bit premature, for these and other reasons. I intend to speak about the best ways to offer this ministry. In the next article, I’ll offer a practical guide for those who want to begin making their confessions.
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Be a Doer & a Hearer of the Word
The first advice to those who would take up the ministry of confession is always this, “Don’t hear confessions if you don’t make your own.” The best help in becoming a better confessor is to know and confess your own sins thoroughly. More importantly, we must not become “the blind leading the blind,” or the one who points out a speck in his neighbor’s eye, hindered by a plank in his own. The greatest help in being a compassionate pastor who offers absolution and counsel is knowing yourself to be an object of the Lord’s grace and mercy.
In addition to this, we must realize that sin is not merely vertical in orientation. We don’t sin only against God, because we can sin against our neighbors, against ourselves, and against creation as well. We must regularly hear the assurance of God’s mercy upon us from a representative of those whom we sin against – another human being. Through this, we learn, through an apprenticeship of sorts, how to be merciful and patient ourselves. The best kind of confessor is compassionate and offers comfort to sinners.
I remember one time making my confession before a beloved bishop of blessed memory. It was a difficult one to get through. I was in tears much of the time. At the end, he raised his right hand, and I thought he was going to hit me! “Praise Jesus,” he said, with tears in his eyes, “you’re clean now.” Thank the Lord for that man! He was able to assure me of the Lord’s mercy because the Lord likewise assured him.
But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.
James 1:22-25
Pray Without Ceasing
To act as a witness to repentance and to hear a confession puts someone in the position of absolving sins we wouldn’t excuse in ourselves. We can only do this by grace. Grace animates and compels the priest, a man of grace, who lives by it. To do anything right, we must pray, specifically for grace, but also for attentiveness, for wisdom, and patience. To regularly hear confessions acquaints us not only with our weaknesses but also with those of the people we serve.
This, without doubt, greatly helps a pastor’s life. In preaching and teaching, knowing the deepest struggles of our people provides a great tool for meeting their needs. To do this without standing in judgment, the confessor has to steep himself in prayer, asking the Lord daily to make him merciful.
Prayer also drives the people of the Church to continual repentance. We must shed the idea that people repent because they’re sick of sin. No, they repent because God calls them to faithfulness. I find that if I can regularly pray for the people of my church, I pray for their repentance in ways I’m not even aware of. On many occasions, God answers these! Repentance works in the people for whom I pray. This leads me to both be pastorally sensitive and seek people out, and to be that much more approachable as a confessor.
Make the Appeal
My friend Jon Jenkins wrote a D.Min. dissertation and later a book called “The Modern Confessional.” It’s great reading. His main thesis is that when we offer the sacrament of confession, we put it to use. If I have a regular time for it, people will come. If I regularly speak of the opportunity, people will come. People will come should I encourage them to do it.
The next step is to make the call. In preaching, teaching, newsletters, announcements, and one-on-one pastoral care, we do this. In my ministry, I have encouraged brides and grooms to make their confessions before the rehearsal dinner. I have asked parents whose kids I’m about to baptize to consider making their confessions.
I have shown up in hospital rooms ready to hear a confession, I have sat in a chapel waiting, and I have scheduled them regularly. The point is, see this ministry as a central part of your ministry, tell people about it, and watch for the fruits of it.
The Confession Itself
The 2019 Book of Common Prayer offers an excellent rite for confession, titled “Reconciliation of Penitents.” Most confessions don’t take place like they do in movies, in a “box” with a screen. Most often, they take place in either a private office or a church building. In an office, the penitent will either sit or kneel, the confessor seated and wearing a purple stole. In a church or chapel, they can sit or kneel in a pew, or the penitent can kneel in the pew behind the confessor, just a bit to the left.
The rite begins with the penitent asking for a blessing, and then the giving of a blessing. Please take a look at the link above to our Rookie Anglican Guide on the confession for more information.
Keep a Few Things in Mind
Not everything confessed will be a sin. The confessor should say so, to the relief of the penitent, as well as why this is so. This is a great relief, especially for those who feel incredible guilt for doing the right thing, which is not often easy to understand. Asking for clarification (as to the severity and frequency of sins) can be a huge help in aiding the penitent to be “brutal” about owning up to their particular sins. “I stole [a pencil]” is a very different thing from “I stole [a woman’s husband or a billion dollars]”.
When such details are left out, it hinders the ability of the confessor to give helpful counsel. More important, it hinders the penitent from experiencing the depths of God’s forgiveness. Counsel does not have to be saved until the end. I often find that offering good counsel in the midst of the confession helps to put people at ease. Instead of unburdening themselves on a silent priest, they receive encouragement, counsel, and pastoral direction as they disclose sins. While I should also give counsel following the confession, I find offering it in line with the confession very helpful.
The Confessor & the Penitent
The confessor should listen attentively and prayerfully, no matter how comical the sins confessed can be (and they are often that!) or how boring they are (the most common). Objective counsel can be a great relief. Deep sin has a way of clouding our judgment, allowing us to neither see the way out nor our sin for what it truly is. Many people wallow in sin for this very reason. Counsel, next to absolution, is a most important ministry of a confessor.
Penance is traditionally given as a way to give thanks for this event of God’s grace and mercy. This should be a prayer or a reading, simple enough to be done in under five minutes. It should never be onerous or difficult, or ask for restitution. These things can be suggested, but never “required” for absolution. My favorites include the Lord’s Prayer, the Magnificat, Psalm 51, and readings from the Sermon on the Mount. The confessor then offers, on God’s behalf, forgiveness and absolution according to the form given, assuring that these sins have been put away, and asking the penitent to pray for him.
Keeping the Seal
Some practical considerations regarding the keeping of the seal are important. I have often had conversations with parishioners who say, “Remember when I told you about my this-or-that?” I must resist the urge to respond, “Oh yes, that,” and instead, “No, you’ll have to remind me.” These conversations are also kept under the seal.
In addition to never speaking about the content of a confession, the confessor must take care to never act upon a confession, no matter how “helpful” it might be. The best way to do this is to truly act as if the confession never even happened, put out of mind and into the realm of forgotten things. Many priests I know have been given this miraculous gift of forgetting completely. I’m not one of them, but I wish I was! I must instead act as a guardian of complete confidence.
All of this can become rather complicated, especially when hearing the confessions of a husband and then his wife immediately following, or a mother and her children. If you simply stick to asking for clarification and offering succinct counsel, you can avoid this temptation. As a general rule, never mention other people at all during a confession. Outside of it, I find that simply refusing to speak of the shortcomings of others in public is enough to keep the seal.
The Fruit of Confession
This is not something anyone usually talks about, but I must say that in the ten years I’ve been a priest, I have seen men and women delivered from pornography addictions, habitual anger toward family members and spouses, financial disarray, cursing, pride, and all kinds of other sins. What a great joy that has been! That relationship of the confessor priest to a penitent parishioner has been fruitful in ways I could not imagine.
A trust and confidence develops, real leaders have been identified, and God’s people have been encouraged and strengthened. I have seen parishioners so moved by the experience of receiving absolution for the first time in their lives that they stepped forward with major anonymous gifts to the Church. Most have become regular in tithing. I have seen the ministry of confession set the Church free for mission and ministry. We might not often think about it, but it’s a great place to start!
Image by Peter van Briel from Pixabay
Published on
Confession: A Rookie Anglican Guide to the Reconciliation of Penitents
When I first explored Anglicanism, I was surprised to come across the Reconciliation of Penitents in my Book of Common Prayer. I was shocked as I read through the rite: this was confession! But wait, isn’t confession a “Catholic” thing? We can approach God without going through a priest! It’s one of the hallmarks of…
The General Confession, Humility, and Healing
The General Confession and the Assurance of Pardon (Absolution) provide us with biblical and true answers to both sides of this equation. As we kneel to confess each week, let us do so with a sober examination of our lives and a grateful heart for Christ’s saving work of redemption.
