Recently, I came across a Christian question forum where someone asked if she needed to confess her sins. Many people offered their advice, but one answer in particular caught my attention. One woman said that there is no need to confess one's sins to anyone else, as long as the person repents in his heart. As someone who tries to go to the Sacrament of Reconciliation with some frequency, this answer struck me; I kept coming back to this answer in my mind and reflecting on how incomplete the solution felt. Reconciliation is often a point of division between Protestants and Catholics, and it is a practice that often causes tension and anxiety for many Catholics as well. Many of us want to answer like the woman in the forum did; we want to be satisfied with a silent repentance in our hearts. While an inner conversion is good, and a necessary step in all our lives, I think we are falling short in our spiritual lives if we fail to receive sacramental absolution. When we fail to go to C...
Just an amateur Oklahoma Catholic sharing thoughts rooted in her faith worldview