tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26883902.post3317937422010976421..comments2024-03-25T11:09:41.538-04:00Comments on a minor friar blog: Priests At ConfessionBrother Charleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07780326836452864455noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26883902.post-10456353295610477562011-06-02T09:52:55.036-04:002011-06-02T09:52:55.036-04:00Father, please pray for our diocese in Canada as w...Father, please pray for our diocese in Canada as well. I don't know if our parish is typical, but Confession is never mentioned - we are always told, though, that "God loves you" - and any time I've arrived at the church 15 mins. before Mass (the time specified in the parish bulletin), the priest is nowhere to be found. Also, there is an issue of trust involved. I once told something to our pastor in strict confidence, and he revealed it to the Parish Wardens. When I told him how I felt, he blew up at me and said he'd "had no choice". (Too long a story to go into here). So, even though the Seal of Confession is involved, I simply do not trust this man and have no desire to approach him for the Sacrament. There are a lot of really sad things going on in the parish, and I'm no longer actively involved (was organist for 20 yrs). Sorry for the length, but reading your post I realized how it could be, and felt sad that things are so messed up around here. <br /><br />Thank you and God bless you,<br />ChloesmomAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26883902.post-62806686142294045202011-06-02T09:46:23.970-04:002011-06-02T09:46:23.970-04:00Father Charles,
Thanks you for this insightful an...Father Charles,<br /><br />Thanks you for this insightful and encouraging post.<br /><br />It seems a strange and appalling thing to say, but as you know, among the many strategems of our ancient foe is to inculcate the idea that the entire goal of the priesthood is for a group of men to impose an exotic and literally incredible set of doctrines on the people for the sake of their ( the priests) own comfort and financial security. I am convinced that there is a constant falling away from the Church of people who have allowed their faith to get so weak that they are eventually seduced by this idea or something akin to it.<br /><br />That is why it seems to me so critically important for people to have constant reminders that priests also believe, to see them in line at Confession like anyone else, to find them at the Eucharistic chapel like anyone else, to find them kneeling in church saying the rosary or making a visit like anyone else. It is very encouraging, but also extremely rare.<br /><br />For the most part, often the day to day experience of the faithful is to see prists appear from the sacristy for Mass and then disappear into the sacristy after Mass, coming onstage and then going offstage.<br /><br />I am not at all knocking the idea of the priests' day of recollection and going to Confession away from the eyes of the faithful, but the scene called this other need to mind. We need to see that priests also are among the faithful-as odd as that might sound.Lee Gilbertnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26883902.post-19720905329387731312011-06-01T19:40:18.563-04:002011-06-01T19:40:18.563-04:00Wow, Fr. C. We'll have to pray for them.Wow, Fr. C. We'll have to pray for them.Brother Charleshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07780326836452864455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26883902.post-90912517525848083112011-06-01T18:20:52.022-04:002011-06-01T18:20:52.022-04:00I really wish we could have something like that in...I really wish we could have something like that in this diocese, but we are too spread out. Not to mention the priests who don't believe in the Sacrament of Confession and discourage it through unwillingness to offer it for the good of the faithful, as well as actively speaking against it.Fr. Cory Stichahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17487451365517366466noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26883902.post-64234584886862502922011-06-01T16:17:24.449-04:002011-06-01T16:17:24.449-04:00Thanks for the encouragement, and happy feast day....Thanks for the encouragement, and happy feast day. (St. Justin, patron of philosophers.)Brother Charleshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07780326836452864455noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26883902.post-46348173696957583442011-06-01T16:13:07.173-04:002011-06-01T16:13:07.173-04:00Wonderful description, Father, and thanks for it. ...Wonderful description, Father, and thanks for it. I've been struck from time to time -- reading Chesterton and Greene, among other lay authors -- by passages where they have their priest characters grasp, perceive, puzzle out something that a lay character presumably would not have on his or her own -- and then often explain their better or more adequate grasp of human nature by reference to hearing confessions.<br /><br />Obviously, Chesterton and Greene, being laity, would not have experienced this themselves, but I would suspect they learned this role of what some Thomists call "knowledge by connaturality" from some of their priestly interlocutors.<br /><br />Your piece here fits into that genre of descriptions disclosing sides of human nature which are illuminated by the divine, and by life and practice in the divine. I'm very glad you wrote it.Gregory B. Sadlerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02197307174003462308noreply@blogger.com