Dear Denys:
A friend of mine tells me that at her parish there is confession before every Sunday Mass, and that a priest even continues to hear confessions for 20 or 30 minutes while Mass is going on. This can’t be right. People should be paying attention to the readings, shouldn’t they?
I’ve always had the sense that you should have to make a special trip for confession—that it was supposed to be inconvenient–and that it actually wasn’t even allowed for priests to hear confessions on Sundays, because it’s the Lord’s Day. What’s the deal?
Queued up
Dear Q’d:
The situation at your friend’s parish is an unusual one, though someone like St Jean Vianney would have found it a little on the skimpy side.
Now, assuming that your own parish is reasonably vital and faithful, I am going to guess that you are used to a strictly-observed, 30-minute, once-or twice-weekly, don’t-expect-Father-to-start-early-or-go-late approach to the Sacrament of Penance. It wasn’t always like this, but it has become the norm in the American Church for the last few decades.
Call it the bureaucratic-administrative approach to the sacrament, in which parishioners numbering in the hundreds or even thousands present, at least on paper, spiritual demands so numerous that the priest, who 
has liturgy, ministry, and finance committee meetings to preside over, invoices to authorize for payment, multiple lengthy homilies to prepare, uppity requests from disagreeable people inquiring about the Latin Mass to deny, diocesan paperwork to complete, his pastoral Facebook page to update, and some semblance of a normal television life to attend to, has no choice but to make confession something carefully rationed, like women’s nylons in the Soviet Union.
What the overworked managerial priest sees when he thinks about confession lines is abstract quantities to be controlled and managed—the way his job is set up, and indeed the way modern man is conditioned to see the world, whether he’s a priest or an IRS functionary, makes it hard to think of the penitent faithful as individual souls. Not impossible, but hard.
The contrasting approach to confession might be called the medical-personal: in this view, which I suspect the priests at your friend’s parish have somehow discovered, the sins of the faithful are understood not as abstract demands for attention, but as specific and grave diseases of the soul, requiring immediate attention. In this view, a priest who looks out at
the line of people queued up outside the confessional is not unlike an ER physician surveying a crowded hospital waiting room, with people suffering from the spiritual equivalents of self-inflicted traumas, like narcotic overdoses, compound fractures incurred while playing football, or ghastly home improvement mishaps involving a circular saw. When a priest sees a sight such as this, he sees wounded souls who cannot be turned away.
And regarding the apparent aversion in many parishes to hearing confessions on Sundays: recall how the Pharisees excoriated our Lord for healing on the Sabbath.
Your friend’s parish sounds like an interesting place, and if the priests have all that time for confession, I’m wondering if they even have a television. Or a liturgy committee.
DPJ
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{ 18 comments… read them below or add one }
To have confessions on Sunday is while not common, is yet far from rare. Recently a collegue of mine when to St. Louis on business, and went to Mass at the Cathedral (called the Old Cathedral, for those from St. Louis), and he brought me back a bulletin, because it had beautiful pictures of the interior of the church.
Of course, I had to do more than just gaze at the lovely pictures, I devoured every bit of wit and wisdom contained within. Notably, there were regularly scheduled confession times throughout the week, as well as confession times before each Sunday Mass, which if my memory serves me correctly, numbered three for Sunday.
I like your analogy of the medical-personal approach, as I recall Jesus telling the people, “I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.” Mt 9:13
However, in wanting to find the bright side to most things, one finds that when opportunities to seek the Sacrament of Reconciliation are reduced at one’s own parish, it can lead to the resourcefulness of searching out other places where confession times might be more plentiful, or coordinate well within one’s schedule. Not to mention that it can also help one realize the greatness of our One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church by knowing that power of Christ’s forgiveness exists not in just one place, but in any place that His priests are present.
I agree with you, Charles. The lack of bountiful confession opportunities or even daily mass times can encourage “resourcefulness of searching out places where confession (or mass) times might be more plentiful.” I have taken comfort myself with this thought, that absence makes the heart grow fonder, and calls the faithful to appreciate and work harder for what they may take for granted. There is a great opportunity for sacrifice in that, and I am brought to think about situations like war where faithful soldiers may not see the Eucharist or mass for weeks or months on end.
But in a society filled with woundedness, and faithful who have been and are continuing to fall away, faithful who are more luke warm than hot for their faith, it may be better to “open wide the doors of Christ” and keep everything more accessible and plentiful, more humbly available, with many more options to grow in our faith. And certainly, this more rather than less approach toward confession times would only heal the wounded more quickly. Thankfully, Jesus is right there, always by our side, even if some of our priests are not.
This brings to mind the separate orders like the priests of Miles Jesu who are almost always available for confession day or night and are just a phone call away, who specifically will tell you they are there to support the busy (and less-in-number) diocesan priests. St. John Vianney, pray for us.
The Crosier Fathers are also always available for confession and they are on Campbell east of 25th Street–you just have to knock.
Really? I had no idea that this is available. How does this work? You just walk up to their residence and knock on the door? Give us some more details!
Yep, just go the front door, right there in front of the ball fields of Camelback HS. I’ve not utilized them, but I’ve known about it for a while.
That’s right. It’s that simple. You could call them if you feel wierd about it.
Very interesting idea! Do we know what hours are appropriate for such knocking?
I’ve heard anytime, but one might consider what measure one might receive for calling upon the priest at 2:30 am, after a night of carousing!
True!
I was more concerned with interrupting their schedule than their sleep. Thanks.
In our parish, growing up, Father heard confessions immediately before Sunday Mass. That was back when most Catholics adhered to the “no Eucharist in a state of mortal sin” notion, so I suspect he was being a realist & doing everyone a merciful kindness.
I. I’ve heard the argument once or twice that limited access to confession may make the faithful “work harder” in order to receive it, and that by our having a harder time gaining access to the sacrament may make the faithful better appreciate the gravity of our sins. While I grant that that is an interesting argument, I’ve thought it all the way through, and with all due respect, I just don’t buy it. I see that this is a failed argument on a number of levels, which I won’t go into here. I think one can trace this notion back to the Protestant idea that the priest is just another person, no different than the rest of us, and the sacraments are nothing more than what you see with your eyes and ears – that they’re just another “worship service”. I think it also stems from this modern notion that the world needs to be run as efficiently and productively as possible, so as not to disrupt the assembly line of progress. I also see a hint of a notion in that argument that the sacraments are primarily “teaching opportunities”, rather than the most important supernatural weapons that Christ handed onto the priests of His Church in order for us to survive the great spiritual battle going on all around us. Whatever the origin, this whole notion that we should have limited access and have to “work harder” to gain access to confession (or any sacrament, for that matter) reflects an unfortunate poverty in the understanding of the supernatural aspect of the sacraments, and the raison-d’etre of the priesthood in the first place. When the sacraments are understood in their full identity, saying that we ought to “work for it” in order to gain access to the sacraments, is really no different than if my kid’s pediatrician were to walk into the waiting room, looking at all the coughing and sneezing kids, and then decree, “There are too many of you. And I’m really busy here. Anyone who really wants to see me, please drive back home, and if you really want healing for your kids, you and your kids will have to walk back here on foot. That’ll show us who really wants healing, and if you actually make it all the way back here, it’ll benefit you by helping you better appreciate your health and the treatment I’m going to give you.”
II. On the question of “is confession appropriate on Sundays?”. While leaving the cannonical/legalistic aspect of this to those who are better qualified to speak on such matters, I will say that most of the very traditional Catholic churches I’ve attended around the world (most of the Tridentine parishes and some of the very traditional Novus Ordo churches too) often seem to offer this. And occasionally, my soul has been the beneficiary of this scheduling, which I don’t take lightly. I, for one, am immensely grateful to those priests who stay and hear confessions while their fellow priests are up on the altar saying mass. I’ve sometimes wondered, “Why don’t all churches do this? What else could conflict with their schedules on Sunday mornings that they can’t hear confessions while their fellow priests are saying mass?” But what do I know – I’m not a priest, and so I haven’t walked a mile in their shoes. As for it being a distraction to the readings, well, maybe you can read the readings before/after mass again, and in that one case I might be willing to buy the argument that the extra effort of reading the readings at home will help you better appreciate the gravity of your sins.
Anyway, I really love when churches offer confession before/after/during mass. I also sincerely appreciate all those priests who the sacraments the most important priority in their lives, and who make frequent confession schedules a priority in their ministries. Thank God for our parish priests. And yes, thank God for Miles Jesu too.
III. Assuming it’s cannonically and magisterially acceptable, then maybe our thinking that confession and mass need to occur on separate times (let alone separate days) might be our trying to force God in the narrow little box of space/time that we humans understand. I think it was in Mere Christianity where CS Lewis expounds on the understanding that God is infinite and eternal, and that unlike mortal humans, he doesn’t have to see time in a linear sequence like we do. While we read one word at a time, one sentence at a time, God is looking at the whole book (indeed the entire library) all at once. So if we’re surprised to see confession and mass occurring at the same time within the same building, perhaps we’re forcing the sacraments into a comprehension of our own limited view of space/time, rather than understanding them as a supernatural and eternal entity.
These are just a few thoughts I wanted to share with you and your kind readers. I’m no theologian, and certainly not a cannon lawyer either, so what do I know?? I do know this – Thank God again, for all our good priests. We are fortunate here in the Diocese of Phoenix to have so many good priests, and such a good and faithful bishop. Pax Domini..
Vinny,
I. Anyone who takes the time to know me knows that I generally try to see the bright side of everything. I try to make excuses for the many lacking aspects of all of our woundedness in this world, especially when discussing with a fraternally corrective tone the shortcomings of our priests. There is sacrifice in having to “work harder” to get to parish confession times that are available and scheduled in advance. This is undeniable. There is also good in sacrifice, be it just or unjust. There is humility in this. Having a full understanding of the supernatural power of all of the sacraments, my poverty only lies in the fact that I am sad it is not more humbly and readily available. But, please pardon me if my comment seemed so misleading.
I long for all priests to humbly serve as Christ would serve, seek out the wounded – leave the 99 others and physically seek out the one lost lamb. I have been to parish daily masses where the presiding priest will tell those who didn’t make confession before mass to come back after mass – he sought out the lost lambs and brought them back home.
Like I said, we do have Miles Jesu, and now I am made aware of the seemingly constant availability of the Crosiers. Open wide the doors of Christ!
April: Thank you for your reply. If there is anyone I know without a poverty in understanding the nature of the sacraments, it is you, my friend. At the time I wrote my comment, I hadn’t read all the replies to Denys’ and Queued Up’s original exchange, and thus hadn’t given myself the benefit of yours and the other thoughtful perspectives giving a deeper understanding of this topic. (where’s that undo-button so I can reword it a little bit? drat there is none). In any event, you’ve got me thinking. Your perspective on humility and the goodness in sacrifice is most inspiring, as it has been to me more than once in the past. That is why I like fora such as this – the ideas from people like yourself challenge me, often in the areas like humility, where I, for one, can generally use the most help. While I think and pray on this one some more, there is clearly one thing on which we all are certain: Our priests are a precious gift. Thank God for each of them. They also, to a man, tend to work endless hours in a sometimes thankless job. They know their reward isn’t here on earth, but still we all want to do as much as possible to support them and I know we all pray for them all the time. Maybe too, there is more sometimes that we who are laity can offer to do that might help them and take some of the regular workload and other administrative pressures off their shoulders, so they can focus more on the work of administering the sacraments. I’m not sure, but it’s a thought. Anyway, thanks again for your great perspective. I needed to read that. Your friend, Vinny
No one has mentioned that there is a problem with priests thinking that frequent confession or having a devotion to the sacrament is wrong and most definitely behind the reduction of confession times. I remember a homily by Fr. X a year or two ago that addressed an issue he had with people taking too long in the confessional, confessing venial sins, when confession is really for mortal sins (something like that.) Another example that is more obviously messed up: My sister’s parish in CA doesn’t even offer confession times–confession is by appointment only.
As I understand it, and as the priest at my parish recently explained, frequent confession is our weapon against killing bad habits and conversion. He also said that some people have a devotion to the sacrament and that’s great. He also made it clear that increased availability for confession is a priority of his. Could our view of sin and the purpose of confession be the difference between my parish and another’s?
Thank you, Vinny, for humbly hearing my reply in a charitable tone! It was meant that way! When blog comments back and forth can come to this point, it’s almost as if a little piece of heaven has just landed on earth. See you there, hopefully, if not sooner!
At Mother of Mercy Mission in Phoenix, a priest is available to hear confessions before and sometimes during the Sunday Mass. I am so grateful for this! Never before have I experienced such a generous confession schedule, and I get the impression from the steady line of faithful laity heading into the little room with the screen that this availability is not causing them to take the sacrament for granted.
Aren’t there Miles Jesu priests available 24/7 somewhere in Tempe?
Yes, they are at 20th St and Baseline, at the St Josaphat Center, 1925 E Baseline. They have a lovely Byzantine chapel, and the priests there will hear your confessions just about anytime.