In this especially penitential time of Advent, José María Montiu, priest and doctor of Philosophy, offers this article entitled “The beautiful joy of confession”.
Advent and Lent are especially penitential times of the liturgical year. The very color of the chasuble during these periods, purple, means penitence. Penance is especially valuable when enriched with its sacrament, the sacrament of penance. The Church especially invites us to receive this sacrament during this time.
The sacrament of penance, confession, is a beautiful, stupendous, resplendent, admirable, marvelous, desirable reality. A Roman emperor said that priests were more powerful than he. While he extended his power only over the world, the power of the priest reached from hell to heaven, since with sacramental absolution he closed hell and opened heaven. What joy, what good, what evil overcome, when one sees that hell has been closed and heaven has opened! The Angelic Doctor affirmed that the omnipotence of God shines more admirably in the forgiveness of the sacrament than in the creation of the world from nothing. A God who is a father who forgives is a marvel!
Talking with a layman, who had the experience of having confessed many times, when I told him that in some towns there were few confessions, he answered me: I can’t understand it! It doesn’t fit in my head! Because confession is the sacrament of joy! The sacrament of joy! Of joy!
I remember a parishioner of mine, an elderly gentleman, who invited an acquaintance to confession, and he told me that in his entire life he had never seen a person as happy as this acquaintance of his after confession. Pope Francis has often said that in confession lies the joy of receiving God’s embrace. I also remember that a woman, with a face that was very emotional, very excited, went to confession, more to receive God’s kiss than to receive forgiveness of sins. I will never be able to forget such a beautiful episode! Likewise, I remember some beautiful little girls who ran, very happy, to confession, jumping for joy.
This idea of St. Josemaría Escrivá de Balaguer, founder of Opus Dei, can be applied here: “We must behave like a child who knows that his face is dirty and decides to wash it, so that his mother can give him a couple of kisses afterwards.” The beauty of a person is the beauty of his soul, which is goodness. The sacrament of confession, by purifying our hearts, makes us beautiful, makes us more like the beauty of God. So that the Lord can exclaim of us: how handsome! How beautiful! What joy! What joy the Lord has when he sees his son, his daughter, with their hearts thus purified and adorned by confession! It is the joy of God!
The sacrament of penance is a marvel of joy. It is the sacrament of joy, of peace and of the loving mercy of God. It makes of us a new creation, a new world of joy and happiness; a new earth, beautiful, lovely, handsome; a new heart, rejuvenated; a new spirit, converted; a loving cradle for God; new men, hopeful, full of illusion; new women with the joy of hope shining in their eyes; new impulse; new strength; new energy, new joy; new designs; new grace; new shine of the wonders of God in the soul. In short, the sacrament of confession, he says, is for those who are still hesitating about going to confession: what are you waiting for to be truly happy? Decide once and for all to be happy! Decide to remove from your soul the weight of the sins that oppress it! Why delay your happiness any longer! What do you gain by not being happy!
Pope Francis, who wants our happiness and our joy, has invited us to confess, to let ourselves be loved by God, to savor this joy. Thus, he has said: the time has come for the Church to announce forgiveness. I remember a woman, who was not very convinced about confessing before, but who realized that the Pope’s voice was more valuable than the voices she had heard to the contrary, and she exclaimed: Now, what is needed is to confess! Yes, as the great St. Augustine would say: “Roma locuta est, causa finita est.” Rome has spoken, the solution is given. Yes, the words of the Vicar of Christ are worth more than the one who himself says: “You are Peter.”
Pope Francis also leads by example. We have all seen photographs of him going to confession and confessing. Cardinal Beniamino Stella has said that Pope Francis constantly insists that people go to confession. Pope Francis, in his book “The Name of God is Mercy” stated that one of the most important objectives of the Year of Mercy was that all Christian faithful, without exception, go to confession. Thus, to the question “What are the most important experiences that a believer should live in the Holy Year of Mercy?” he answered: “Opening oneself to God’s mercy, opening oneself and one’s heart, allowing Jesus to come to meet one, approaching the confessional with confidence. Trying to be merciful to others.” Also in Misericordia et Misera he asked all the faithful, without exception, to go to confession: “Let us not miss the opportunity to live faith as an experience of reconciliation. “Be reconciled to God” (2 Cor 5:20), this is the invitation that the Apostle addresses to every believer today, so that he may discover the power of love that transforms him into a “new creature” (2 Cor 5:17).”
There are some things that are very obvious, like 1=1. We know that what is central is what is most important. Then, few things are as obvious as that what is central is what is most important. In a religion, then, what is most important is what is central. Well, Pope Francis has said that confession is at the center of Christianity. “We again, with conviction, put the sacrament of reconciliation at the center, because it allows us to experience in our own flesh the greatness of mercy.” “The sacrament of Reconciliation needs to find its central place in Christian life again (…).”
In short, when the Pope asks us to confess, it is not that the Pope is wrong, it is the voices that disagree with him that are wrong. The Pope is right. So, let us confess. And then: joy, joy, joy!
