24th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year C
Previous Years: 2019
Preached at Church of the Assumption in Bellingham, WA
Part of our series on the Next Step program from the Evangelical Catholic. Information can be found here: https://www.ecnextstep.com/
Recording
https://moorejesus.podbean.com/e/next-step-confession/
Transcript
[Thank you to a friend from Burlington for editing this transcript.]
We have to start today with a bit of background, just so we know where we’re coming from. So, about a year and a half ago, the Archbishop released a pastoral plan for the Archdiocese and he asked every parish and school and Catholic entity to try to figure out how to implement this pastoral plan in their ministries.
And I love it, because I think it’s a very simple plan that can encompass every aspect of Catholic life. Very basically: Part one, encounter Jesus. Part two: Accompany each other. Part three: Live the unconditional love and joy of the Gospel. Everything Catholic pretty much fits into those three categories.
And so, when I worked with the Pastoral Council to implement this plan in our parish, we came up with a list of things. A list of things that it would look like for an Assumption parishioner to live out those three categories. Encountering Jesus looks like things like going to Mass, going to confession, praying regularly, learning about our faith. Accompanying each other looks like: praying together, taking care of and being attentive to each other’s pastoral needs. And living the unconditional joy of the Gospel looks like trying to introduce new people to Jesus or trying to serve others that can’t serve us back.
We might call these habits of discipleship. These are things that a disciple does. When we follow Jesus that looks like something and this is what it looks like.
Well, over the next 12 weeks, 11 weeks from now until Advent, we are going to talk about six habits of discipleship specifically. We are going to use a program called Next Step from the Evangelical Catholic, the same people who are doing our missionary training program. And they have six habits of discipleship they want to talk about.
Today, we’re going to talk about the habit of discipleship: which is going to confession regularly. Again: following Jesus looks like something. Our lives have a certain form when we follow the Lord. And one of those things is going to confession regularly.
Why? Why would a follower of Jesus go to confession regularly? Well, it’s because Jesus is a Savior and we regularly need to ask Him to save us. Going to confession is how we confront the ways in which we fall short of the glory and majesty of God. The ways in which we need to grow in sanctity and holiness. The ways in which we need Jesus to enter our lives and save us anew.
It’s funny to me that we have people who don’t go to confession regularly because most of us know to go to the dentist regularly. We know we got to get our teeth cleaned, otherwise our mouth starts to become problematic and we get cavities. Things start to rot away. Well, how much more so with confession, right?
If we go to the dentist every six months, why can’t we go to confession every six months? Make sure that soul of ours is cleaned off and ready to go. Make sure there’s nothing in there rotting away that we’re not aware of.
The saints talk about confession all the time as something that is necessary for a good and holy life. Previous generations of Catholics will talk about confession being a really important devotion in their lives; a really important thing that they go to because it is where they experience the mercy and power and grace of God.
Now, in my experience, there are two main categories of people who don’t go to confession regularly. Both of them seem to convey that information to me via jokes that I don’t find particularly funny. So, category number one. Usually, this is fallen away Catholics that I’m meeting through parishioners of ours. Sometimes it’s Catholics in our pews. Joke number one is, “Oh, Father, you couldn’t hear my confession. It would take all day. You don’t have enough time.” To which I inevitably pull out the stole that I keep in my pocket because I am always ready to hear a confession. And I say, “That’s fine, I’ll make the time. Let’s go.” And then they’re like, “Oh. No, no, no…” Okay. Happy to make the time. Most of the time, this is an excuse. It’s something they don’t want to do. They’re uncomfortable with it. But [it happens] enough of the time that I’m preaching on it today.
It often reveals an underlying belief that their sin is too great for God to forgive; a belief that God doesn’t love them enough or pay enough attention to them to bother giving them mercy. The idea that they cannot be holy, that they cannot be a saint; and they are lost to the mercy of God. They are, in a sense, already lost to heaven, and they’ll be lucky if they make it to purgatory.
But this underlying belief doesn’t take seriously our Gospel. What’s going on with the Prodigal Son? The younger son says, essentially, “Dad, I wish you were dead so I could have your stuff. So, why don’t you and I pretend like you’re dead to me? Why don’t you give me your stuff and I’m going to go to a foreign country so I don’t have to have a relationship with you anymore?”
It’s not a small sin. It’s not a small thing to say to a parent. “I wish you were dead. Give me your stuff. I’m out of here.” It’s a pretty grave sin. How does the father respond? He doesn’t respond by saying, “Oh, next time, I’d better not see that son of mine again, because the next time I see him, I’m going to give him a piece of my mind.” Instead, the Scriptures say, “…while he was still a long way off, his father caught sight of him and was filled with compassion.” This is an image of a man, of a father, who probably walks outside of his house every day, looks out at that horizon, and prays desperately that he would see his son on that horizon. Otherwise, how is he going to see him when he’s a long way off?
This is a father whose heart is longing for the return of his son. A father who has just spent every day waiting for his son to return. A father who worries that his son is dead and rejoices when he realized that his son is not.
This is the image that the Lord Jesus gives us of our Father in heaven. Our Father in heaven doesn’t hold our sins against us. He doesn’t want to condemn us. He’s not looking to yell at us. He’s waiting every day for us to return back to Him. And when He sees that movement in our heart; when He sees our desire to come back to Him, He is filled with compassion. He rejoices!
As the Scriptures say, even before his son was able to apologize, he embraces him and kisses him. This is what our Heavenly Father does for us as we go to Him in repentance and contrition, as we go to Him with our sin. He simply wants to receive us and to bless us and to embrace us and to kiss us.
And again, no sin is too great.
What this son did to his father was almost, we would describe in secular terms, is almost unforgivable. But again, what the Lord says, it’s not how our Heavenly Father thinks! Every sin is forgivable. No sin is too great.
And in fact, after his son says that he’s sorry, the father puts upon him a ring and a robe and sandals and celebrates him with this great feast. It’s as though his son had never left; as though the sin was never committed. This is the grace offered to us in Confession!
The second category of folks, who don’t regularly go to confession, again, hide behind a joke that I don’t find particularly funny, which is, “Oh, Father, I don’t have to be there because, you know, I haven’t killed anybody or anything.”
Okay, this Gospel is delivered in the context of Pharisees, saying, “He eats with sinners.” This language comes up a lot with the Pharisees because they did not consider themselves to be sinners. They consider themselves to be righteous. And the Lord’s condemnation of the Pharisees isn’t that they cared about the law. It isn’t that they ardently wanted to follow the Lord.
It is that they could not see their own need for salvation. They could not name their own sins. And so, He tells them this parable about how there is so much rejoicing in heaven when one repentant sinner comes back.
He tells them, essentially, that God rejoices over sinners because that’s God’s heart. He wants to save us.
Saint Paul uses this phrase in the second reading. He says, “This saying is trustworthy and deserves full acceptance.” Now, note: Saint Paul loves run on sentences. He doesn’t pause and emphasize very often, but here, he is using punctuation; he is bringing focus to one very specific idea. “This saying”, get ready for it! “This saying is trustworthy and deserves full acceptance…” Emphasis.
“…Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.”
Very simple sentence. It is a powerful declaration. It is almost the definition of who Jesus is.
“Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.” Saint Paul is summarizing his entire mission in that one sentence. “Came into the world to save sinners.” So, if we go to the Lord and we say, “Lord, I am not a sinner! I haven’t done anything that causes me to go to confession.” What we are saying is, “Lord, there is no reason for you to have come into the world. I don’t need salvation. I am not a sinner.”
But then, we empty the cross and we say that the cross was useless. All of us are sinners. All of us need the mercy of God. All of us have to go to Jesus regularly and say, “Lord, please save me! I need your salvation.”
I understand that, by the grace of God and praise him for this, there are times in our lives where we can get to a place where there aren’t grave sins. I get that.
Now, we have to be careful because we can become numb to what is a grave sin. The church continues to tell us that not going to mass on Sunday when we’re able is a grave sin, that should be brought to confession before we receive communion again. So, we can’t be numb to sins like that.
But there are times in our lives where we are not committing grave sins, and then we do wonder, “what am I supposed to bring to confession?” Well, there are the domestic sins, of course: Impatience with spouse or children; gossip; not having a regular prayer life. These are important things to bring to confession. They’re not too small. Nothing is too small for the mercy and grace of Jesus.
But if you still struggle with that, sometimes I find that the category of sin is not helpful. And instead we have to shift to the category of virtue and vice. We are not perfect. If we say we are perfect, we will be condemned along with the Pharisees. We are not perfect. And once we say that we’re not perfect, we can ask “What are the ways in which I’m not perfect? What are the things that I need to work on? The things that I could still do to become a saint?” Those are fine things to bring to confession.
Most of the time when I go to confession to my spiritual director, I say, “Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned. It’s been one month since my last confession.” And then I talk about the things that I know I should do better.
“Father, I’m trying to get better at prayer. I’m trying to be more focused in my holy hours. I’m trying to pray the office at the appropriate hour rather than putting it to the end of the day.”
Are any of these strictly speaking, sins? I don’t know.
But I’ve come to the place where if I know God is calling me to greater holiness, and I know that there are times where I have rejected that call in some way; where I’ve said, “Lord, I don’t want to be disciplined today. Lord, I don’t want to fulfill this call you’re putting in my life.
“Lord, I don’t want to work on this thing I know you’re calling me to work on.” That’s what I bring to confession. And it’s a fine thing to bring to confession, because what I’m doing is I’m going to the Lord and I’m saying, “Lord, I’m not perfect. Lord, I need you to be my Savior. Lord, I need your grace.”
Now there is a third category of folks who wouldn’t go to confession regularly, and that’s folks for whom they can’t go to confession.
Confession requires an integral confession, which means we have to be sorry for all of our sins. We can’t hold back a sin. We can’t say, “I’m sorry for all of these sins, but not this sin. I won’t return to any sins, except this one. This one I plan to return to”.
Most of the time that happens in the context of a physical relationship that the church would not consider a marriage: something involving an annulment; sometimes civil marriage, but not church marriage; sometimes just basic fornication.
When that comes up at the confessional, I will offer to people. I will say, “All you have to do to receive the forgiveness of sins is: to say you’re sorry and you’re going to try to live celibately for a time, chastely for a time, until we can resolve this situation.
Sometimes people very heroically say, “Yes, absolutely, I’m going to make this commitment, even if it takes a year or two. We’re going to work through this!” A lot of times it’s too much for people in the moment. And they say, “…okay, I can’t make that commitment.” And so, I can’t offer them the forgiveness of sins. But the message I have is that I still want to offer them the mercy of God. Just because I can’t see somebody in the confessional doesn’t mean I don’t want to see them in my office.
I want to make sure that everybody receives this merciful love of the Father in some way, shape or form, and that they have accompaniment, that I am walking with them.
So if you are in that third category, please do reach out to me so that we can walk together and make sure that you can find this forgiveness when you’re ready.
Now, all of this information about confession! At some point we have to ask, “How do I go to confession? What do I do to respond to this information?” And that is why you have the card. The card is very helpful. The card gives us the steps to go through to make sure that we go to confession.
Now, I would challenge you. I’m challenging all of our parishioners this weekend. Try to go to confession between now and Christmas. It’s three months. I think we can do it. If my confession lines get so long that I can’t hear all the confessions, I promise you that I will add time. I will make sure that everybody has the opportunity to go between now and Christmas. But for now, our confession times are 3 p.m. to 4:45 p.m every Saturday; 4:30 to 6 p.m. every first Friday and 4:30 to 6 p.m. all throughout Advent, every Friday.
In addition, you can also schedule a time with me during the day. I have a website; you can schedule with me without having to go through my inbox, which slows everything down and you can schedule 15 minutes with me, or if it’s been many, many years, 30 minutes with me.
A note on that, by the way, priests, we can’t really talk about what happens in the confessional. We can’t connect a sinner to their sin, otherwise we’d be excommunicated. But, we have a shorthand amongst ourselves to describe certain experiences in the confessional. And when somebody comes back and says, it’s been ten, 20, 30 years since I’ve been to confession: the phrase we have for that is a big fish. And so, in our text chains to each other, we’ll sometimes say today was a really great day because I caught a big fish!
I want you to know, no matter how long it’s been since you’ve been to confession, no matter how long it takes you to confess, I am very excited to be there.
Confession is where I see most powerfully the mercy of God and the grace of God working in our community. And so, to have somebody come back after ten, twenty, thirty years or more, I get to witness a literal miracle. And it’s incredible. It’s incredible. I’m so blessed to be a priest and to be able to to be there with you in that moment.
Anyway, all of it is the same. If you need more time than just the 5 to 7 minutes I give you on a Saturday or a first Friday schedule with me, that’s just fine. And then the back of the card tells you how to go to confession. It’s very helpful.
Even more helpful is the website at the bottom of the card. One of the benefits of going with this next step program and using these cards? And there are five more cards, so make space on your fridge.
One of the benefits is that they have resources online. Go to this website. There are videos that explain what to do. There are probably print outs, if you’d like, that you can bring with you into the confessional. There is an examination of conscience which is very helpful.
Go to the website, use the resources. It’s a free resource, make full use of it. It will be very, very helpful. And then come to confession some time before Christmas. Find a time. Make it happen.
The last thing I’ll say to you is just to reiterate again the incredible image given to us in this Gospel. Our Heavenly Father is waiting for us. He knows that we’ve sinned, and yet His only reaction is a desire for us to come back to him and find forgiveness. He’s waiting. He’s waiting for you. Don’t keep Him waiting any longer.
Fr. Moore 