What is Confession - 6 Amazing Reasons to Go and SHARE #Reconciliation

Confession or the Sacrament of Penance or Reconciliation was instituted by Christ 

“Jesus said to them again, ‘Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I send you.’ And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained’” (John 20:21-23).

It is not a priest, simply as an individual man, who has power to forgive sins. 
This power belongs to God alone; but He can and does exercise it through the ministration of men. 

Three things are needed in order to receive the sacrament properly:

1. The person must be contrite—or sorry for his sins.

1. The person must confess those sins fully, in kind and in number.
2. He must be willing to do penance and make amends for his sins.

3. How Often Should You Go to Confession?

   Catholics are required to go to Confession 1 time per year and required to go to Confession when they know that they have committed a mortal sin, the Church urges the faithful to take advantage of the sacrament often. Often people go once per week, every 2 weeks or once per month. 

  While this sacrament as a dispensation of Divine mercy facilitates the pardoning of sin, it by no means renders sin less hateful or its consequences less dreadful to the Christian mind; much less does it imply permission to commit sin in the future. In paying ordinary debts, as e.g., by monthly settlements, theintention of contracting new debts with the same creditor is perfectly legitimate; a similar intention on the part of him who confesses his sins would not only be wrong in itself but would nullify the sacrament and prevent the forgiveness of sins then and there confessed.

An ordained priest with requisite jurisdiction and with the "power of the keys", i.e., the power to forgive sins which Christ granted to His Church. Edited from the Catholic Encyclopedia

In the administration of the Sacrament of Pardon and of Reconciliation, the priest — as the Catechism of the Catholic Church recalls — acts as "the sign and the instrument of God's merciful love for the sinner" (n. 1465). What takes place in this Sacrament, therefore, is especially a mystery of love, a work of the merciful love of the Lord. Pope Benedict XVI

CBCP by: Fr. Francis Ongkingco 

#1: A Direct line to God. We often hear the casual saying, ‘Surely, couldn’t I confess directly to God who truly knows my sinful heart?’

Reply: Every prayer to God in some way is a form of confession, but don’t we often want our prayers to be heard and above all answered? In the Old Testament, God already showed the need for intermediaries like the prophet Nathan who revealed to David his sin and this led him to repent before God.

#2: The sinner priest. As in #1, many would make the additional defensive remark, “Why should I confess to someone who is also a sinner?

Reply: As explained in #1, God chooses who His ‘grace-heralds’ are. Some are worthy and others—sadly—are not. But this only goes to show two important lessons: (1) God is still the source of forgiveness, and channels it through whomever He sees fit; (2) the quality of the instrument further demonstrates that God is really behind the person, and this fact even invites the penitent to greater faith in God and sorrow for his sins.

#3: Self medicating. A more stubborn stance can occur when one chooses

not to seek any help at all but one’s personal resources.

Reply: Spiritual self-medication has some advantages. For a spiritually healthy individual, choosing to outdo himself and seeking new ways to grow in his spiritual life is edifying. But in the case of the spiritually less-healthy, the maxim ‘if symptoms persist, consult your Doctor (God)’ applies. Any attempt for such individuals to ‘self-medicate’ would be tantamount to their lack of sincerity to find a real and effective cure to their defects and resulting vices.

#4: Till I’m ready! Others delay confession, stating they are not yet ready, that is, they still lack the adequate sorrow for sins they want to confess. A similar stance is expressed in saying, “I’ll go when I’m truly sorry.”

Reply: In reality, no one is really ready in the sense that readiness of a person’s conscience is not weighed by how he feels (the danger of falling into sentimentality) about his faults. Nothing else can give one spiritual readiness, since only God can forgive sins, other than Confession when the required sorrow is demonstrated by promptly turning to the sacrament, with due preparation, and the resolution to amend for one’s sins.

#5. When I don’t sin anymore or I may fall again. These sound like sincere expressions of one’s remorse and may indeed present good grounds to delay going to the sacrament.

Reply: They, however, reveal an unrealistic knowledge of our human condition: man’s nature is one wounded by sin. Thus, as long as we live we will be sinners. God is not one who wants us sinless, but sorrowful children and walking heaven-bound with their eyes set upon occasions of grace and an ever-growing trust in their Father’s mercy.

#6. Anyway, there’s confession… I’m going anyway… so I can sin now and more.

Reply: These reveal a distorted idea of confession and reduce it to a spiritual washing machine. Moreover, such a mentality belittles God’s mercy and maliciously contrives not to really cut oneself from his sinfulness.

One way to overcome this vicious obstacle to God’s forgiving grace is to sincerely pray to God for one’s sins, cut off the occasions of sin, carry out some penance, go to confession and sincerely express these devious ideas to the confessor. Such a sincere approach will gradually soften a callous conscience and make it more receptive to grace.