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Thursday, April 23, 2015
These are Written - The Lockwoods
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Tuesday, April 21, 2015
Reconciliation - A Sacrament Necessary for Our Growth
Reconciliation – the Sacrament that creates controversy
among my friends because several – both Catholic and Protestant – do not
understand why we must confess our sins to a priest. After all, as they say we
can always confess to God. In the Sacrosanctum
Concilium, Vatican II attempts to clarify the purpose of Reconciliation by
revising the rites and formulas so that they “clearly express the nature and
effects of this Sacrament” (141). Clearly this to me meant that Reconciliation
was important enough to the bishops at the time of Vatican II that they wanted
to figure out a way to help Catholics better understand the meaning and
significance of this Sacrament. As I had written about and we learned about
earlier, Reconciliation had been a hot topic of debate since the Reformation;
Martin Luther actually counted it as a Sacrament, whereas other Reformists
disagreed.
A major reason why priests have the authority to forgive
sins is because as I had learned about not only in this course, but also as a
teacher of Religion, that priests are able to act in the person of Christ. In
the Gospels, there is evidence that the Apostles witnessed Jesus claiming the
authority to forgive while the letters of St. Paul write more about
Reconciliation as part of the heart of Jesus’s ministry. When Jesus died and then
rose again from the dead He was able to forgive us, and He alone has the power
to forgive (Cooke and Macy 110). Therefore,
if we went alone with the evidence in the Bible, then because Jesus gave the
Apostles the first authority as priests, then they could also forgive people’s
sins. However, a major problem was the Penance itself.
Early on, the Penance had been public – if a person was
deemed to be forgive then he or she would have a very strict penance such as
temporary excommunication or fasting before the person was solemnly and
publicly reconciled with the Church. It would not be until later when the idea
of private confession and penance ritual – which first stemmed from Ireland –
really came to be more common in Europe (Cooke and Macy 112). I prefer the private confession and penance
because for me, the hope with Penance is that we grow in our faith while being
held accountable for our sins. When we are excluded from Communion, even after
confessing, for some people, that may not help them truly grow in their faith –
in some cases they may feel more alienated. It is why when I go to confession I
find priests who I know can give a penance that is directly related to how I am
feeling or what I am going through. Penances can range from reading the Book of
Job to simply saying the Liturgy of the Hours for a week. This penance is
effective because people are able to show the community that they are truly
sorry and show real evidence for growth (Cooke and Macy 114).
Reconciliation is a Sacrament that I personally hold dear
because we are able to really hold ourselves accountable and grow in our faith.
While we should talk to God anyways in our prayers and apologize to Him, as I
have learned in class as well as from retreats and my ministry, Reconciliation
helps us be accountable. When we are able to understand the purpose of
Reconciliation – that we may ultimately grow to be better children of God – we understand
Jesus’s role in this Sacrament.
I’ve posted in this blog about my father’s insistence on
weekly confession when I was a child and how it distorted my image of a loving
God into a God who was a judgmental tyrant. Like iamtheclay, who stated in her
post that she had not gone to confession in a long time, I stayed away from the
sacrament of reconciliation for many years, twenty-two years in fact. But, unlike iamtheclay, in my “coming home”
to reconciliation I had a transforming spiritual experience.
I decided to go to confession when my sister-in-law was diagnosed
with colon cancer, hoping to bargain with God – I didn’t know any better at the
time. But, I was doing it for her. When I told the priest how long it had been
since my last confession he got a huge grin on his face and said to me, “Welcome
home! God loves you SO much!” I was startled by his words, a wave of heat
seemed to wash over my body from my head to my toes and back up again. The words seemed to hang in the air “God
loves you.” With each sin I confessed, the
priest’s grin grew wider. I considered
that he may not be altogether there if
you know what I mean. After I received
the blessing of absolution he was so kind, assuring me of God’s love and joy that
I was there (like the father in the prodigal son). He asked if I needed anything; if he, the
church, or our church community could help me in any way. I felt so humble, so loved, and so sinless
for the first time in a long time. A
burden had been lifted that I hadn’t even known I was carrying. I went there for my sister-in-law but God
meant it for me. Reconciliation on that day was redeeming
grace for me and my life was forever changed.
I wholeheartedly agree with Cooke and Macy’s claim that “Every time we
participate in a ritual of reconciliation, we learn the Christian world is one
of constant forgiveness: forgiveness by God, forgiveness by and of the community,
and forgiveness of and by ourselves” (116).
After my confession I truly felt loved, not only by God, but by the
church and my faith community. As Cooke
and Macy point out, “by the community accepting their forgiveness, they can
believe God has forgiven them and, by doing something to show their sincerity,
hopefully, they can eventually forgive themselves” (114).
For me, reconciliation is a place where I am accepted and
loved as I am, a place of “continual
conversion and renewal” (Johnson, 283), a place where I can lay my burdens down
without the fear of rejection.
Penance or Reconciliation
Whenever I hear the word “penance” in reference to the
sacrament, I think of the movie The
Mission. In the movie, 18th century Spanish Jesuits try to
protect native South Americans from abuses from European colonists. There is a famous scene where a penitent is
forced to carry a heavy bag up a steep cliff as a penance. When I watch that
scene, I always think to myself, thank God I live in the 21st
century!
During the middle ages, Irish Church set up a pattern for
penance. In some cases, clerical penitents would, “Do penance for a half year
with the allowance of bread and water and for a whole year abstain from wine
and meats.” (Johnson 275-276). Should the sin be murder, penance could last up
to seven years!
Since Vatican II, we have changed the focus of the sacrament
to Reconciliation. The name change alone speaks volume to what the sacrament
is. Although penance is a part of the sacrament, our focus is now on
reconciling our relationship with God after having sinned. Now, even our
absolution comes before the penance.
I have never understood how strict penances can help a
person reconcile a relationship with God. If we sinned against our friend,
would we expect our friend to demand that we torture ourselves until we have
atoned for the sin? Would the suffering of the penitent help our relationship?
I do not think God is any different. We still need to do a penance to show that
we are sorrowful; however, the focus of our apology should be how do we move
forward to maintain a strong relationship? Did Jesus expect sinners to fast for
six months before he forgave sins in the Gospels?
Penance and the Forgiveness of Sins
While my church does not recognize the act of penance as a
sacrament, I do believe that we need the act of penance if we are truly going
to proclaim the tittle of being a Christian.
For me and others of my faith denomination, it is at the Lord's Table
where we profess our sins to God. I make
a point of making the plea that all who participate should confess to God their
sins and ask for His forgiveness, for it is written that Jesus said while they
were eating, “Then he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to
them, saying, ‘Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant,
which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins’" (Matt. 26:27-28
NIV). It is here at the table that we
privately profess our sins to God. It is here at the table that we are reminded
what Jesus did for us to make salvation possible, for our sins to be forgiven,
for those who have penitent hearts. It is also through the saying of the Lord's Prayer that we ask for penance.
Modern Version
However, I believe we miss something in my faith tradition
by not having the sacrament of penance.
While I do not believe that a priest or cleric has the special right to
forgive sins, I am more in line with Martin Luther who wrote that, “As to the…practice
of private confession, I am heartily in favor of it, even if it cannot be
proved from the Scriptures. It is
useful, even necessary…for it is a cure without equal for distressed
consciences” (Johnson 280). In our
church order of service, we do have the Prayer of Confession taken from the Book of Common Prayer, 1979 and the
assurance of pardon that is said by the pastor, that comes from the The Common Form of Absolution in the Roman
Ritual (Johnson 282), which says, “May Almighty god have mercy on you,
forgive you of your sins, and bring you to life everlasting. Amen.” (Johnson 282).
Penance and forgiveness are so intertwined, like two tree
branches that grow up and wrap around each other. However, for penance to happen we have to be
aware of our own sins. In so doing, we
need to be humble, and we need to be reminded of the condition of being
non-judgmental. Jesus said, “Why do you
look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the
plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me take
the speck out of your eye,’ when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own
eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see
clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye” (Luke 6:41-42 NIV). Isn’t judgement towards another without
self-examination a sin? Isn’t that
something we do on a regularly basis that calls for penance?
1619 painting by Domenico Fetti entitled The Parable of the Mote and the Beam.
We are all sinners, those who miss the mark repeatedly, and
having a form or penance, whether it be sacramental in regards to the Church or
sacramental in relation to one’ heart, it is in the image of the our Lord, our Messiah, Jesus Christ, that we repeatedly and unrelentingly humble ourselves and ask for God's forgiveness.
Casting Crowns-Jesus Friend of Sinners
They'll know us by our love??
The readings this week were profoundly sad for me. Not
because they dealt with issues such as sickness, dying and death, but because
Christians once were known by ‘how they love each other’ (Cooke and Macy 149).
There is still much being done in the world for good by Christians, but our
hatred and judgmentalism of others overshadows everything we do. At a time when
the whole world is reeling from horrible violence against innocents, when the
earth itself is growing frail, we are spending more time and money here in the
States on our election battles than on caring for the poor and the marginalized
– it is estimated that over $5 billion will be spent on the 2016 presidential
campaign. But it’s not just the money, it’s the pervasive attitude. Christians
are still on the front lines when catastrophe happens. Catholic Charities, the
Salvation Army, Texas Baptist Men, World Vision – and on and on. These agencies
are known for their swift and merciful help, as well as the day to day sustenance
they provide. Christians are not really known ‘by their love’ anymore, though.
What happened to us?
Cooke and Macy noted that we live at a “time in history when
medical professionals have unprecedented ability to deal with human diseases”
(153). At the same time, however, they note that we no longer have adequate
rituals in place to help those who are suffering, such as the caregivers or the
aging. Our communities are built for those with mobility or an agile intellect –
it often takes a car to buy groceries; a computer to complete almost any form;
cable or satellite to listen to the news or weather. How many of us still write
letters or notes? We take meals after a funeral, but what about in the 10th
month of a long-term illness such as dementia? I don’t remember to do this. I
rely on my pastor to remind me of those who are homebound or ailing. I leave it
to the elderly in the church to care for the other elderly. What rituals do we
actively need to start now in order to better care for each other? To keep
people from being invisible or, worse yet, forgotten completely? How long will
it be before I can sing ‘They will know we are Christians by our love’ and not
cringe at the hypocrisy?
Cooke, Bernard and Macy, Gary. Christian Symbol and Ritual: An Introduction. New York: Oxford
University Press, 2005. Print.
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