I Firmly Resolve

With the New Year well underway I've noticed the blogosphere blowing up with resolutions posts. So here I am jumping on the resolution bandwagon, be it a tad late.

I was never one to make New Year Resolutions. I figured if I couldn't bring myself to better myself at any given point during the year, doing it "because it's a new year" wasn't going to make one ounce of difference. The idea of a new beginning, of a slate wiped clean, is a great incentive for a lot of people to better themselves.

I'm here to tell you all a little secret, in case you didn't already know.

For Catholics, every time we go to Confession is a new beginning. 

I'm dead serious here. Making a resolution to amend your life is one of the essential parts of confession. It applies not only to the big bad sins that you see people confessing in the movies (and rarely contritely), but also to the little things, the bad habits, the attachments to what's not quite right. It helps you stop thinking ill of your neighbor, stop cramming that extra brownie (or three) into your mouth, and inspires a desire to be better for the love of God.

Confession quite literally banishes that little (or big) devil from your shoulder.

I firmly believe that if it wasn't for the graces of confession I would be in therapy, on medication, or worse. I've heard the argument so many times that a priest is just a man, susceptible to sin just like you, and it's none of his business what you do wrong. As just a man, no it's not. But as the representative of Christ, who takes the place of Christ on earth for you, yes it is. Remember that he has spent many years learning how to handle the situations you find yourself in; the length of time in a seminary rivals that of any lauded psychiatrist. The same people who balk at confession are some of the first on the couch. The benefit of being cleansed of a rotten conscience is a psychological fact dating back to the fall of Adam.

It can be embarrassing and humiliating baring your soul to a man of God, but it's part of their job description to hear confessions. They've heard it all, you cannot shock them. After all, they are just men like us, right? The humility needed to confess can only make you a better person. And the freedom you feel coming out of the confessional? Priceless. And literally free.

Forget doctor-patient confidentiality; a priest's tongue is also tied by the Seal of Confession. Repeating what is heard in the Confessional carries with it the punishment of automatic excommunication: no ceremony needed.

But who gives a priest the right to hear my sins and forgive them? Why, Jesus, of course. And if you don't take Christ's own words for it, there's nothing more I can say that will convince you.

For those who argue that this power was only given by Christ especially to the Apostles, and not also to the priests ordained in apostolic succession, I ask you this: at what point in history has man not needed forgiveness? The logic used in banishing confession would also have you throwing out Communion, missionary work, and men of God altogether, because those are all things Christ could have been just instructing His Apostles to do or be. And it's hard to believe Christ came for just that moment, for the lifetimes of His Apostles, isn't it?

Hopefully I've given you a little food for thought, and shed a little light on why Confession has been around for nearly 2000 years. Here's to many new beginnings this New Year!