What
is the Orthodox position on confession or penance? (These two terms
can be used interchangeably). Can it be an aid to modern day problems
that the young encounter? Years ago, going to Confession was not very
complicated. There was a certain anxiety about confessing serious sins,
but confession was like not eating meat on Fridays or during Lent, and
fasting before going to Holy Communion. I can remember in my first parish
when, during Holy Week, just about every person of the five hundred
families in that parish came to confession before receiving Holy Communion
on Holy Thursday, and/or Pascha night. But now things seem to be different.
Private Confession or Penance has become one of the truly "neglected
sacraments. "
Pros
and Cons
There
are arguments on both sides of the question as to whether or not the
sacrament of Confession is beneficial to the young. Those religious
educators who wanted to delay the sacrament of Penance maintained that
small children do not have a very clear idea of what sin is and that
their confessions tend to be mere rote recitals. Besides not meaning
very much from a religious point of view, these educators maintain,
the practice of receiving the sacrament when children are too young
can lead to a lifetime habit of superficial experiences of the sacrament
of Penance. Young children can't really commit much in the way of sin,
they maintain, so sorrow for sin and forgiveness are not yet an important
aspect of their lives.
There
are those who defend the traditional Orthodox practice of receiving
the sacrament of Penance before Holy Communion saying that if children
don't start receiving Penance at an early age, there is a good chance
that they will never receive it, or at least will never get in the habit
of going to the priest regularly. Besides, they say, children do have
a sense of sin. Maybe, they can't yet commit serious sins, but they
do wrong things, and they do feel real remorse about the wrong doings
in life. A third group resort to another practice: that of receiving
the sacrament at least four times a year, since the requirement, in
their mind, is that you must receive Holy Communion four times a year.
Most of this group says that since children are not capable of committing
a truly serious sin - one that involves a complete turning away from
God - there is no absolute obligation for them to receive the sacrament
of Penance.
The
point of this booklet is that our young people ought to be receiving
this sacrament because it is a great tool for helping the young work
through their adolescent problems. But how can we help them to perceive
the meaning of the sacrament and help them want to receive it? A priest
recently told me that he explained the sacrament of Penance at several
youth meetings. When he asked the group whether they wanted to receive
the sacrament of Penance, most of them said: "No way !" Some
said, "I don't know." These responses may accurately reflect
how most young people feel about this sacrament. I suspect that the
reluctance has something to do with having to face one's guilt, one's
own failures, and, consequently, one's own need for forgiveness and
reconciliation. Today there are many voices suggesting that remorsefulness
is a bad thing. Some propose that people should be without hangups,
be "laid-back," or "hang loose," in the words of
the young. But there is also such a thing as a healthy remorsefulness.
All people do things that are wrong, and it would be subhuman not to
be able to accept the responsibility for them. The problem people are
not the sinners, but the ones who are no longer aware of doing wrong.
Resorting
to drugs, obscene literature, valium pills, psychoanalysis etc., is
a modern way to deal with guilt, something which we all have to cope
with from time to time. In the long run, though, it is a very unhealthy
tactic simply to deny responsibility. The advice often given is: "If
it feels good, do it. If it feels bad, forget it." On the surface
this is very attractive. But human growth doesn't come that way. To
become more fully human, more truly ourselves, we have to face our failures.
And not just our inadvertent mistakes but also the situations in which
we more or less deliberately turn away from what we really want to be.
The traditional approach of the Fathers of the Church is that if we
don't admit our sin, we will never bring ourselves to go beyond it.
The
main and tragic problem of adults is their own fear of accepting their
own guilt. And this obviously would interfere with the ability to convey
a sense of security and confidence about this sacrament to their children.
Yet, all Greek Orthodox want their children to grow up to be good practicing
Orthodox Christians. This means, that, at least to some degree, just
as adults want their children to dress neatly, or to go to good schools,
or to take piano lessons, is the realization that children's' ability
to accept responsibility for their sins is a vital part of their growing
up. In other words, if we ignore this problem by forever saying, "Well,
they're not ready for the sacrament of Penance," we run the risk
of Ietting them put off indefinitely one of the permanent tasks of maturing.
Acknowledgment,
Forgiveness and Reconciliation
Acknowledgment
of one's guilt, forgiveness of one's sins, and reconciliation with God
Almighty are the components of the human experience in the Church's
sacrament of confession. In order to experience forgiveness and reconciliation
we first have to be able to acknowledge that we are guilty of something.
It is a sense of acknowledging responsibility, or even more simply,
we need a sense of sin before we can experience forgiveness. To put
it positively we need, "a sense of responsibility."
As
Greek Orthodox, it is important to realize that a sense of responsibility
and a sense of religion are not separate. The whole of human life was
included in the humanity and godliness of Jesus Christ. All human growth
is likewise Christian and religious. What we do in our specific religious
actions is make the religious dimension of our whole human reality explicit.
Young people who are growing in self-control and in respect for others,
who feel some responsibility and sense of sin for not living up to all
they ought to be, are young people who are becoming more and more what
God wants them to be. This kind of growth is very implicit in Orthodox
teaching of the Fathers. This growth is Christian growth. Acknowledgment,
forgiveness and reconciliation are Christian events even when we don't
explicitly think about it.
It
must be pointed out here that it is not always a good idea to be too
explicit about religious motivation in nurturing the moral sense of
young people - especially when it comes to punishment and threat. Parents
should never give children the idea that God is some big policeman in
the sky: "God will punish you if you do that." Just as it
is important for children to learn their own goodness, it is also important
for them to know God as love and goodness. This is the most fundamental
lesson children must Iearn.
After
the child has learned this lesson, the role of God as judge and critic
can be better understood. This is the meaning when the priest calIs
out to the congregation, "In fear of God, those with faith and
love come forth" to receive Holy Communion, as we profess in the
Divine Liturgy every Sunday. For even as judge and critic, God's basic
judgment is "You are forgiven" and God's forgiveness is effective
in us to the extent that we really accept it. St. Paul said, "all
who have sinned are deprived of the glory of God, all are now undeserveably
justified by the gift of God, through the redemption wrought in Christ
Jesus," (Romans 3: 23-24).
Another
problem is that we usually think of forgiveness as something that is
God's job not ours; and of course it is God who forgives us through
the priest in the sacrament of Confession. The problem in forgiveness,
though, is not on God's side but on ours. We often have a very hard
time believing that we are really forgiven. Even when the priest puts
his stole on our heads and reads the prayer of absolution. The good
news seems to be too good to believe. Being able to accept forgiveness
is also a gift. It has been my experience that both young people and
adults can more readily realize that they are sinners, but have a hard
time believing that they are really forgiven. Just as young people need
a good self-image before they can face their inadequacies, so, too,
they need the confidence that they are loved, to be able to accept forgiveness.
The sacrament of Confession is a solemn celebration by the Church of
something that happens all the time in our lives. It is accentuated
in the ritual, face to face with the priest. People can recognize a
need for forgiveness and the need to experience this forgiveness in
a visible way.
The
Christian Home
The
connection between marriage, the family and the Church is as old as
Christianity. In the letter to the Ephesians, St. Paul talks about marriage
and the love that ought to unite husband and wife. Then he says, "This
is a great foreshadowing; I mean that it refers to Christ and the Church,"
(5:32). Paul's word, which is translated as "Foreshadowing,"
may also be translated as "mystery" (mysterion) or "truth"
or even "sacrament." In this passage from Ephesians, then,
we have the same link between marriage, family, church, and sacrament
that is expressed in Orthodox patristic terminology.
The
emphasis here should be on the fact that the church is not just buildings,
not just the bishops, priests, and not even just the community gathered
for the Divine Liturgy or the sacraments. The Church is also present
in the lives, in the concrete reality, of the Christians we encounter.
The Church is more visible when it is gathered together in the local
parish for Divine Liturgy, but the Church is also present when it teaches
and exercises its sacramental function in the home. The whole family,
not just the married couple, is a sacrament, a visible manifestation
of what Christ really is, in the same way that the Church as a whole
is a sign and sacrament.
If,
however, the above will have meaning, it must be in the context of children,
and it is a known fact that it takes a long while before children can
appreciate community parish worship in the church. Children have a hard
time taking part in large community events. This is why informal preparation
in the family can lead up to participation in the sacrament of Holy
Communion as well as the other services of the Church. In penance we
experience God's love in the Christian communities proclamation of forgiveness
and reconciliation with God. But just as all proclamations of the gospel
in Christian life are related to its proclamation in the formal church
setting, just as all love in Christian life (for example, that between
Christian spouses and their family) is related to the formal celebration
of that love in the churches Eucharistic celebration, so all forgiveness
and reconciliation in Christian life is related to the explicit sacrament
of reconciliation that is celebrated in the Church.
The
Mechanics of Reconciliation
When
the Orthodox tradition speaks of the sacrament of Penance or Confession
as the "rite of reconciliation," in the words of St. Maximos
the Confessor, this is in reference to reconciliation with the community
of the faithful, the Ekklesia. When reconciled with the Ekklesia, we
are thereby reconciled with God as well. The priest in the sacrament
of Penance speaks for the community as well as for God when he reads
the prayer of absolution for forgiveness and reconciliation. When the
priest forgives someone in the confessional, he is reinforcing God's
forgiveness. When we ask someone for forgiveness, we are asking for
God 's too. Just as there is no sin which is not in some way an offense
against my neighbor and against the community, there is no reconciliation
with God which is not reconciliation with the community. The sacrament
of confession is not something abstract and invisible. It has to do
with my real relationship with actual people in my life.
The
family can help the young in their psychological preparation for recognizing
and acknowledging sin, accepting forgiveness, and realizing reconciliation.
When parents help their young to come to a realization of what is right
and wrong, help them cope with it, assure them that there is a way for
God to forgive them and make them feel accepted back into the family
circle, the family is really celebrating an event of Christian reconciliation.
The experience is a fore-runner to the sacramental meaning of Penance,
though of course, does not take the place of the full sacramental reality
of the Church sacrament. The young are being prepared at home for the
time when they can receive this sacrament at the hands of the priest,
where larger dimensions of sin and forgiveness are explicitly expressed.
The
Meaning of Contrition
There
was a popular novel written a few years ago, Love Story, in which the
most memorable line was the slogan, "Love means never having to
say you're sorry." This is probably the silliest and most meaningless
advice ever stated. In most peoples experience loving does mean having
to say "you're sorry" - over and over again - and being willing
to extend sincere forgiveness over and over again. Oscar Wilde once
said sadly, "you always hurt the ones you love." This comes
much closer to the truth. Many of us can be reasonably decent with people
we come into contact with rarely, or on a merely superficial basis.
It seems that we save our frustrations and disappointment for our closest
relatives and friends.
The
reason for this may be entirely negative. We generally let ourselves
go with people we trust, people we feel will accept us in spite of all.
If we felt insecure in our relationship, we wouldn't take the risk of
being abusive. Husbands and wives may just take turns letting off steam.
The one who is attacked and seems to feel instinctively, "I better
not let this go too far," and avoids adding fuel to the fire, this
may not always happen, but with normal tensions in normal families,
it often does. Psychologists notice that abused children seem to fight
less among themselves than children in normal families. Children in
loving families unload their frustrations and hostilities on each other
rather easily, knowing that the parents are there to assure that their
whole world won't fall apart.
There
comes a point however, when children and young people have to learn
to ask for forgiveness and to forgive. With younger children this forgiveness
has to be more subtle, less verbal than what might be expected of older
ones. It should be expressed symbolically when it cannot be expressed
in words. One child may let the other play with a toy for awhile. Candy
is shared. One says something for the other on a completely different
topic. Being human is a matter of being both flesh and spirit. Just
as every offense is somehow visible and sensible, so every reconciliation
must be something seen and felt in order to have reality for us. That
is why it is absurd to say "love means not having to say we're
sorry"; it contradicts the spirit and flesh reality of life.
Putting this in an Orthodox Christian context, reconciliation should
have an explicitly Christian expression too. Not that religion should
be brought up over every little family fight. Family prayers, perhaps
around the dinner table, or in front of the iconostasis, could from
time to time incorporate the theme of reconciliation.
One
of the most intriguing stories of the New Testament is the one where
children were being brought to Jesus. People were bringing their little
children to Him, to have Him touch them, but the disciples were scolding
them for this. Jesus became indignant when he noticed it and said to
them: "Let the children come to me and do not hinder them. It is
to just such as these that the Kingdom of God belongs!" (Mark 10:
13-14). Many scholars feel that this story was remembered and included
in among the gospel memories of Jesus precisely to emphasize the participation
of children in Christian life.
The
story implies that there ought to be a real relationship between Jesus
and children; that the young ought, on their own level, to have a fully
Christian life suitable to their own age and concern. Today this would
imply the right to participate in the sacramental life of the church
following Baptism, including the right to experience God's forgiving
love in ways they could understand. For the young, this grace of reconciliation
might come initially through their parents and godparents, who are ambassadors
of Christ to their offspring. It is through their parents and godparents
that the young begin to feel God's healing blessing. As the story about
Jesus and the children in St. Mark says at its conclusion, Jesus "embraced
them and blessed them, placing his hands on them" - as He does
still through parenthood and through the sacrament of confession reconciling
love among the faithful and the ultimate Love of God.
The
Confessional
If
you, the reader of this pamphlet, are a young person and have decided
that the confessional is for you and that it will bring you closer to
God, then the rest of this pamphlet will be devoted to how to prepare
yourself for the highlight of the priest, penitent and God encounter;
absolution. When the priest puts the stole on your head after a short
service, he recites this prayer:
"Oh
God and Saviour, who by Thy prophet Nathan has granted pardon to David
repenting of his own transgressions, Who has accepted Manasseh's penitential
prayer; do Thou, the same compassionate Lord, accept this Thy servant
(name) who is repentant of sins that he (she) has committed. Overlook
all that he (she) has done, forgiving all of his (her) unrighteousness,
and overlooking his (her) iniquities. You have said, oh Lord, I desire
not the death of a sinner, but rather that he should return from His
wickedness and live; and that sins ought to be forgiven even unto seventy
times seven. For as Thy greatness is incomparable, so is Thy mercy immeasurable.
Who, oh Lord, would stand aright before you if Your judgment was to
the extreme in what is amiss in our lives? You are a God of those who
repent and unto You we ascribe glory, to the Father, and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit, now and ever and unto ages of ages. Amen."
If
you read this prayer carefully, you will see that there are several
ways in which you can prepare yourself to go to a Priest of your choosing
in order to encounter God through the sacramental experience of confession.
a.
Find a quiet place where you can be alone and where you can concentrate
on the love of God; His love for the world and for you. Think of the
Christmas story and how Our Lord became Man because He loved us, how
He experienced death on the cross because He loved us, and how, at Easter,
He resurrected, because He loves us.
b.
Think of what God wants you to be and where you are in life, at this
very moment. Ask yourself: Am I worthy to be called a creation of God?
When Christ returns at the second coming, will we be able to tell him
that in spite of our failures in life, we sincerely tried to make amends
in our shortcomings?
c.
Once we have gone through (a) and (b), we are now ready to face the
most difficult question of all: How have we offended God? In examining
ourselves, what sins have been committed? One easy way of doing this
is to put down on a piece of paper all the sins committed recently,
or since your last confession. Details and unnecessary descriptions
should be avoided.
d.
Once you have completed your list, check them with the following "self-examination"
questions based on the Ten Commandments, which will also help you to
crystalIize your thinking before you share your feelings with your Father
confessor. (These were basically taken from a little Archdiocesan pamphlet
entitled, "The Neglected Sacrament, A Practical Guide to Confession
and Happiness.")
First
Commandment
"I
Am The Lord Thy God; Thou Shalt Have No Other Gods Before Me."
Have I loved God as much as I should? Have I been more interested in
myself than in God? Have I tried to serve God and keep His Commandments?
Have I been vain about my personality, personal appearance, clothes,
possessions, my family, ability, success in games or in accomplishments?
Have I given way to anxiety instead of turning to God for help? Have
I failed to trust in God and His mercy? Have I failed to pray to God
sincerely and faithfully? Have I put my self before God?
Second
Commandment
"Thou
Shalt Not Make Unto Thee Any Graven Image." Have I put another
person before God's law; by not going to Church, or by committing some
other sin to please that person? Have I neglected my duties to God through
fear of ridicule? Have I been insincere about my religion? Have I been
receiving Holy Communion without the appropriate preparation?
Third
Commandment
"Thou
Shalt Not Take Thy Name of The Lord Thy God in Vain . " Have I
profaned the Holy Name of God? Have I misused the Holy Name of Jesus'?
Have I cursed anyone or sworn a false oath? Have I paid proper attention
to holy persons and things? Have I broken any solemn vow or promise?
Fourth
Commandment
"Remember
The Sabbath Day, to Keep it Holy." Have I missed Church on Sundays?
Have I always kept Sunday as it ought to be kept? Have I done unnecessary
work on Sundays? Have I been irreverent during Church Services? Have
I caused anyone to profane the Lord's day? Have I been ashamed of my
religion or my Church?
Fifth
Commandment
"Honor
Thy Father and Thy Mother." Have I respected my parents and been
grateful enough for all they have done for me? Have I disobeyed them
or neglected them? Have I contributed as much as I should to the support
and happiness of my parents? Have I tried to bring my children up properly?
Have I given as much care as possible to the religious life of my family;
with regard to daily prayer, church going, etc? Have I honored God,
my Heavenly Father, by working or treating my employers as well as other
co-workers honestly and diligently?
Sixth
Commandment
"Thou
Shalt Not Kill." Have I killed if not in outward deed, perhaps
in my heart? Have I wished for some one's death? Have I been angry unjustly?
Have I harmed others by ridicule or contempt? Have I defamed anyone
who needed help? Have I gossiped about people? Have I been cruel to
anyone? Have I failed to forgive anyone? Have I shown proper respect
toward life?
Seventh
Commandment
"Thou
Shalt Not Commit Adultery." Have I been impure in thought, word,
or deed? Have I committed unworthy actions alone or with others'? Do
I dwell on pornography and obscenity? Have I committed any sin with
regard to my wife (husband) or other member of my family? Have I caused
others to commit sinful acts?
Eighth
Commandment
"Thou
Shalt Not Steal ." Have I ever stolen anything, or shared in stolen
goods? Have I cheated in business, games or school? Have I kept things
that did not belong to me? Have I given as much as I am able to charitable
causes and to the Church?
Ninth
Commandment
"Thou
Shalt Not Bear False Witness." Have I lied often? Have I concealed
the truth? Have I exaggerated too much? Have I let others receive blame
for my faults? Have I judged others for sins which I also have committed?
Have I been deceitful, unfair, hypocritical?
Tenth
Commandment
"Thou
Shalt Not Covet." Have I been jealous of others? Have I envied
them because they have more money; or are better looking; or more successful;
or because people pay more attention to them? Have I been grieved at
the prosperity of the others? Have I ever wished the downfall of anyone?
Have I failed to thank God for what He has already given me? Have I
thought that God is partial?
The
meaning of this booklet, and all that has been written, may be summarized
by Archbishop lakovos, primate of the Greek Orthodox Church in the Americas:
"Though God may intend man to destroy himself, he also has given
man free will and the ability to cleanse himself and his world. The
church will not be pessimistic, nor sit quietly in its handsome houses
of worship while the war rages outside its churches for the bodies,
minds and souls of its parishoners."
Greek
Orthodox Archdiocese of North & South America
Department of Church and Society
(212) 570-3551
10 East 79th Street
New York, New York 10021
From
Church and Society, Today's Social Issues Confronted by the Greek Orthodox
Church. Introduction.
