Reconciliation: The Grace Of Not Explaining Yourself
One of the most remarkable things in the bulletin at St. Laurence Anglican Church is the Saturday worship schedule, which reads:
- Daily Mass – 9:30 a.m.
- Confessions are heard every Saturday at 10:00 a.m. and by appointment.
When I first came to St. Laurence, this line caught me off guard—both unfamiliar and quietly unsettling. Over time, it has come to feel like an invitation to restoration, calling me back into belonging. In the Book of Common Prayer, the rite called the Reconciliation of Penitents sits beside Unction, the anointing of the sick for healing, quietly signaling its profound grace and capacity to restore.
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The Work Of Truth
As a mental health professional, one of the most effective paths to healing and freedom I witness is learning to tell the truth—to yourself and about yourself. Not as self-accusation, but as clarity: knowing what is yours to carry, and what is not.
There is truth about the environments we live in: I am not responsible for other people’s behavior.
There is truth about our choices: I may have been wounded, and I am not responsible for another person’s actions—but I am responsible for how I responded.
And there is a deeper truth beneath both: healing cannot take root where honesty is avoided. When we refuse to tell ourselves the truth, we often confuse control with responsibility, and responsibility with love.
We are remarkably skilled at justifying the harmful choices we make and those of others. In doing so, we tell ourselves small lies that keep us from the grace already being offered. Grace does not wait for us to get it right; it waits for us to get honest.
Grace Given, Not Earned
Anglican worship is sacramental. Sacraments are outward and visible signs of an inward and spiritual grace. Grace is God’s self-giving action—feeding, sealing, washing, and forgiving us in real time. It is not a reward for right behavior, nor a mechanism to avoid suffering or hardship. Grace flows from God’s delight in his own creation:
For you love all things that exist, and detest none of the things that you have made.
Wisdom 11:24
Both the two sacraments ordained by Christ (Baptism and Holy Communion) and the lesser rites “commonly called sacraments,” often called sacramental acts or sacraments of the church (confirmation, marriage, ordination to holy orders, unction, and reconciliation), provide a uniquely safe place to tell ourselves the truth. Each time we receive, we acknowledge our status as created and open ourselves again to salvation—not a selective participation where we take what feels comfortable and leave what does not, but a full encounter with mercy.
Confession and The End of Explanation
Among the rites of the church, the one that most clearly invites truth-telling is the Reconciliation of Penitents, commonly called Confession. For many, the word ‘confession’ evokes images shaped more by popular culture than by theology: dark booths, whispered secrets, anonymity, and shame. That image misses the heart of the sacrament entirely.
Reconciliation is not about spectacle or self-punishment. It is the grace to say yes to salvation once again—to stand in the light without explanation, justification, or self-protection. In the confessional, I do not say, “I raged at my husband because he prioritized golf over me.” I simply say, “I raged at my husband.”
Unlike therapy, the priest does not normalize my response, explore my history, or help me label my emotions. Instead, I receive absolution and penance. This simple act of unadorned honesty brings a kind of healing that cannot be replicated in a therapy office.
Why Reconciliation Is So Hard
So why is reconciliation so very hard?
From the beginning, we see the human instinct to hide. In the Garden of Eden, when Adam and Eve sinned, they immediately covered themselves with fig leaves—as if something so flimsy could prevent exposure. The instinct was not repentance, but concealment. That impulse has not changed.
At the core of our resistance to confession is fear. We fear rejection for being who we truly are. Authenticity and transparency feel dangerous because they raise the question we rarely name aloud: What if, at the core of who I am, I am unlovable? What if I am unworthy of belonging?
A good confession does not catalogue every detail or argue for innocence. It simply tells the truth: I did this. Full stop. And that simplicity can feel terrifying.
Belonging That Therapy Cannot Give
Therapy can be profoundly healing. It offers insight, language, containment, and understanding. It can help us name patterns, tend wounds, and make meaning of our experiences. But therapy cannot give us a place to belong.
A therapist does not absolve, reconcile, or restore communion. Therapy works within the bounds of the therapeutic relationship; it does not confer a belonging beyond it.
Sacramental traditions locate belonging in the sacraments—most fundamentally in Baptism. I belong through Baptism, and confession restores me to that belonging. The Rite of Reconciliation does not grant belonging; it returns us to the truth of what has already been given.
A Lenten Invitation
As we enter the season of Lent, the Church invites us to tell the truth on purpose. Lent is not a season of spiritual performance or self-improvement, but of returning—of setting the fig leaves aside and allowing ourselves to be seen.
The Rite of Reconciliation becomes, in this season, a particular kindness. It is an invitation to come, weary and broken, and to find rest. As Jesus promises,
“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest… for my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
Matthew 11:28–30
Receiving ashes on Ash Wednesday invites us not toward harshness, but toward mercy. We receive them not only as a reminder of our mortality, but as a quiet declaration that mercy comes before repair.
Where Belonging Is Restored
Confession does not expose us in order to reject us. It exposes us so that nothing remains hidden from grace. The priest is not there to judge, but to receive the confession with mercy—glad to hear it, even when we bring the same struggle again. What begins as an invitation to restoration becomes the very place where belonging is restored.
Professional Disclaimer: The reflections in this article are for educational and informational purposes only. They do not constitute psychotherapy, counseling, or professional advice. Individuals experiencing distress related to religious or institutional experiences are encouraged to seek help from a qualified mental-health professional or trauma-informed spiritual director.
Image: photo by YuriArcurs, courtesy of Canva. Digitally edited by Jacob Davis.
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