The penitential Lent season begins this week on Ash Wednesday, and some Catholic priests are happily preparing for long lines outside confessionals. Believers across America are re-embracing the sacraments, which have transformed from an embarrassing recitation of sin to a cathartic search for grace.
“They feel bad about themselves when they confess, but … they are showing the fact that they want to be good people,” said the Rev. Patrick Gilger, a Jesuit priest in Chicago. “When someone comes to confession, it is a living act of their desire to be holy.”
Most faith traditions have rituals of self-denial, penance, and atonement, usually held during set times before major festivals each year.
For Catholics, the Sacraments of Penance and Reconciliation should be a regular weekly or monthly ritual. Penitents tell the priest their sins, promise not to commit them again, receive forgiveness, and then continue on their path with penitence, able to receive Holy Communion again, as they should not receive Holy Communion without first confessing any serious sin.
“It became a hallmark of Catholics. It was something they did that their Protestant and other non-Catholic neighbors didn’t do,” said James O’Toole, professor emeritus at Boston College and author of a new history of confessions.
Old sins, new confessions
Until the last decades of the 20th century, Catholics knew what to do. Parishes and schools listed serious sins—from mortal sins against the commandments, such as adultery, to minor offenses, such as speaking in church.
Confession is usually a quick affair – a recitation of how and how often one sinned, followed by the act of penitence, and a confession like saying the Hail Mary ten times. O’Toole said confession rates then dropped dramatically. It was driven by developments in psychology and the complexity it revealed in human behavior, major cultural changes in issues such as sexual morality, and clergy abuse scandals.
The Catholic Church does not collect confessional data, making it difficult to quantify current trends, said the Rev. Thomas Gunter, director of the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University.
But U.S. dioceses are noticing an uptick, and priests say that while confession and acceptance of absolution remain central, confession is becoming more of a conversation focused on God’s mercy and love.
“There are only so many ways to go wrong. There are countless ways to be right, letting the life of God flow through you,” said the Rev. Mike Nugent, who was ordained in 2023 as parish priest of St. Ambrose Catholic Church in Annandale, Virginia.
This is not to say that today’s confessors are handing out get-out-of-hell cards—the priest cannot grant absolution, or God’s forgiveness, if the penitent is unwilling to change. But they were trying to bring about the same mercy that the Gospels show Jesus had for sinners of all kinds.
“In the theological understanding of the Catholic Church, sin is deliberate, willful alienation from God,” said Gilger, who also teaches at Loyola University. “The purpose of confessing and dealing with sin is simply to allow God, who wants to be with us, to rush back into the void that those sins have created.”
This is why some priests view confession as “therapeutic”—for both the penitent and the confessor—especially in a society more interested in judgment than forgiveness.
“Individuals can face themselves and acknowledge these things while experiencing mercy, forgiveness and hope from God through another person,” said Pastor Brendan Hurley. He oversaw the confessional preparation program at the Pontifical College of North America, where Nugent attended, located adjacent to the Vatican.
Whatever the sinner wants, confession will provide it
The “confessional seal” is so absolute that the Vatican has repeatedly opposed legislative efforts to force the disclosure of certain information.
But priests say that when they kneel before the wooden confessional screen or sit across from their confessor, most want to be unburdened and hear concrete words of encouragement.
“This is about healing,” said the Rev. John Kartje, president of Mundelein Seminary in Illinois and a pastor for nearly a quarter century. “You need trust, you need openness, you need vulnerability, you need honesty.”
That’s why Confessions has “a very high customer satisfaction rate,” Nugent said with a laugh. At the end of the month, his parish and all other parishes in the Diocese of Arlington will begin holding confessions simultaneously on Wednesday evenings.
Nugent added: “I know that even though I’m struggling, even though I’m guilty, even though I’m experiencing challenging and shameful things in my life, I’m still loved, and oh my gosh, that’s great news.”
Priests can relieve stress with confessions of extreme urgency, such as those who have only hours to live, or those who tell their confessor that they have made a grave mistake, such as cheating or stealing, that they have never said out loud.
Other times, they may need to push an overly vague penitent who simply mutters, “I haven’t been true to myself,” or who finds it difficult to accept that the Church considers something as widely accepted as contraception sinful.
Pastors say they won’t roll their eyes at any revelation or adopt a fire-and-brimstone tone. Instead, they focus on reminding people that God’s love is still very close.
“Then people will know what they are doing that is taking them away from God,” Gilger said.
Be prepared for the grunt work that becomes the highlight of your ministry
Historically, O’Toole said, seminary students studied moral theology and manuals that amounted to “explicit rulebooks” that were broadly reflected in what people learned through the catechism.
Hurley said that while there are still confessional classes toward the end of seminary students’ studies, the focus today is on “creating a space where penitents feel comfortable.”
This is why seminarians practice with professors and each other, and go to confession on their own regularly—something all priests, including the pope, do.
Ultimately, going to confession is an act of faith.
“I think the learning curve when you first graduate (from seminary) is… don’t fall into the trap of thinking it’s all on you, because sometimes that can lead to being too strict,” Katje said. “I’m hearing your confession. I’m speaking words of forgiveness. But the only true healer is the Holy Spirit.”
Many priests believe they are God’s channel of grace to struggling people and therefore enjoy spending hours listening to a litany of bad behavior.
“You’re not just there because Jesus is healing that person. You also have this privileged role of being there when someone demonstrates incredible virtue,” Nugent said. “When someone comes up and says, ‘Heavenly Father, these are the things I have done,’ he shows great honesty, humility, great generosity of spirit, and great confidence in the God who will forgive them.”
Gilger added that yes, sitting on the other side of the confessional grille can be exhausting, but it can also be rewarding.
“I remember some of the confessions, the harsh words people said, but … the thing I remember most is how amazing people were, and that was very comforting,” he said.
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