Go to confession.

[UrbScotty]

Find out when your church offers reconciliation (often it's on Satuday), and go.

They say you should do it once a year (I hadn't done it in several years until yesterday), and Lent is the perfect time to do it.

So... go.

[DemBones DemBones]

1. Many churches offer special days for confession during Lent,

with extra priests, meaning you can avoid telling your own priest something you'd prefer not to. ;-)

I'm glad you posted this because I need to go myself. It's been years for me, too. Confession is only offered for a half hour on Saturdays or by appointment in my parish and it's hard to get around to going. And it's like the dentist, you tend to put it off, even though you're not a little kid now and you know the priests and the dentists are nicer than they were back in the day.

So thanks for the push -- I'll call and get an appointment with Father tomorrow.


Since every Catholic is supposed to receive Communion at a minimum of once a year, and if only once during the year, it should be during the Easter season (Easter Sunday through Pentecost.)

Just a reminder in case anyone's forgotten the rules regarding the "yearly obligation."

O8)

[CBHagman]

2. The lines were long last time at my church.

I arrived too late to make it into the little room there, and there were already plenty of people waiting. My church has added a few more hours of confessions during Lent, but they're on Wednesday night, and I had chosen the more popular Saturday slot, I guess. :-( I'll try again later.

I actually rather like going to confession, but sometimes it does wander into George Carlin's Class Clown routines (Some of you baby boomers will know what I'm talking about). There's the priest assigns Three Hail Marys as penance, and then there's the guy who works so fast that "You could see the line move." :rofl:

But my favorite was the Dominican who told me to read Thich Nhat Hanh. Good advice!

[Beer Snob-50]

3. My church had a penance service with about 14 priests

the church was packed and it took them about 2 hours to go through all the people. all the 9, 10, and 11th grade ccd students had to go as part of their classes.

[Matilda]

4. Extraordinary how things have changed.

Even in the early years post-Vatican II, there were Saturday confessions throughout most of the day -
a morning, an afternoon and an evening session ending at about 8.0 pm, every week.

What my church does now is have a community session on the last Wednesday in Lent when all the
priests are available. They ask you to focus on the main thing that you feel is detrimental to your
spiritual growth, and talk it over with the priest. It's more like a counselling session than a
rote list of sins with appropriate penance. I wonder how many people are like me, going back year
after year, struggling with the same weaknesses?

We also have confessions every Saturday between 4.00 and 5.00 pm, in the old form (except in a room
now - the old confessionals have become broom closets, etc.).

There used to be a wise old priest at St Patrick's in the city in Sydney, and I liked to go to him
on a Friday night or on Saturday afternoon when I used to work in the city. He was a wonderful
counsellor, and when he died some years ago there was an article on him in the paper, and I learned
that many other people in Sydney also used to go out of their way to make their confessions to him.
What a rare and wonderful gift he had.