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            Recent decades have seen a remarkable fall-off in the number of Catholics frequenting the sacrament of Penance, one of the two sacraments which they can - and used to - receive frequently. The phenomenon, it should be added, characterizes the "developed" Western world. Africa is certainly an exception; so, it seems, are the countries of Eastern Europe. But allowing for such exceptions, we are in the presence of a pastoral phenomenon that is remarkable, and cannot be without significance. How should we regard it? Are there lessons to be learned from it? Does it matter? If it does, what to be done about it?

            One could venture at least three explanations for this decline in the frequentation of the sacrament of Forgiveness. Either there is less sin going on; or, though there is as much sinning as ever, people are less sorry for their sins, less bothered by them; or, though they are bothered and perhaps sorry - i.e. they have at least the dispositions necessary for the virtue of penance - they are less aware of the value of the sacrament of Penance as a means of obtaining forgiveness and peace.

            Fewer sins being committed? A desirable hypothesis, but one that a look at the daily newspapers is sufficient to reject. Violence, murder, racism, intolerance, fraud, corruption - and there are many other equally serious sins one could mention - rather than lessening, seem to be on a clear increase in our modern developed societies.

            Is sorrow for sin lessening today? This would regrettably seem to be the case. Not only that but (as Popes from Pius XII on have often repeated) the very sense of sin appears to be diminishing in the modern world.

            The Apostolic Exhortation of 1984, Reconciliatio et Paenitentia [1], fruit of the preceding Synod of Bishops, came as an urgent message to priests and lay people about sin and about its sacramental forgiveness. There John Paul II speaks of how the Christian faith should give us an "an acute perception of the seeds of death contained in sin" and how once this sense of sin, linked to the sense of God, is obscured - as is happening today - man's fundamental dignity and freedom are threatened (no. 18).

            Modern society certainly does not help people to be aware of sin. On the contrary many actions that the Christian conscience has always regarded as seriously sinful are legalized, accepted or openly practised today, particularly in broad areas of sexual morals, as well as in the grave violation of the Fifth Commandment, "Do not kill", involved in abortion. All the indications are that consciences are becoming less and less sensitive to these and other sins.

            Nothing could be a cause of greater concern from the Christian point of view - that of the Redemption worked by Christ. After all, it is not the number of sins that a person may have, or even their gravity, that is so serious, but the lack of sorrow... One cannot automatically say that a society is worse because of an increasing number of sins committed. If people repent and repair, it is not necessarily worse. But one can certainly say that a society is worse if its members are not sorry for their sins. After all, it is not simply sin but unforgiven sin that brings about the loss of a soul. Unforgiven sin means unrepented sin, for God always forgives the repentant sinner. What brings about the loss of a soul are a person's unredeemed sins: his or her sins, in other words, to which the fruits of the Redemption have not been applied. The Redemption is superabundant; it can make up for all the sins of the entire history of the whole world. But it is not forced on anyone. Its fruits have to be applied to each individual sin; and it is repentance which makes this application possible. But without awareness and acknowledgement of sin, it is not possible for repentance to come about.

            The cultural causes of this decline in penance are evident enough: a civilization tending to self-centeredness, where materialism and hedonism are the predominant values, and the very concept of sin - of personal sin - has become taboo. Undoubtedly some sort of 'theological" support has been created for this, insofar as certain presentations of sin practically reduce it to defects of group, class or structure, almost exclusively in the area of justice: unjust structures, group or race exploitation, corruption or oppression by political classes, etc. It is not my purpose to go into this, beyond remarking that if we teach people to feel victimised and exploited, if we tell them they are the sufferers of wrong without reminding them that they are also doers of wrong - all of us are - , then we are encouraging them to fall into self-pity. And self-pity easily leads to some form of self-righteousness which, if we take Our Lord's references to the Pharisees seriously, would seem to be a definitive block to grace and salvation.

Restoring the sense of sin

            To restore the sense of sin is therefore a prerequisite of evangelization. The present Pope, like his predecessors in this century, insists that "It is necessary to rediscover the sense of sin" [2]. But, it may be objected, is this not a message of gloom? Is it not to propose to pastors and teachers a negative task? Rather than seeking to burden people's souls, should we not rather try to free them from a false sense of guilt?

            To create a false sense of guilt in persons would certainly be a negative work and in fact a grave injustice; and where such a false guilt exists, it is urgent to dispel it. It is otherwise however if a person ought to have a sense of guilt for the wrong he or she has done, but lacks it; or (a far more frequent case than some seem to imagine) has a represed sense of guilt which, from deep down inside, is eating away at his or her soul. Then no pastor can be indifferent. With hypochondriacs, a good doctor tries to dispel from their minds false notions of being sick; but with those who are really ill, he seeks to cure them, encouraging those who think that a cure is impossible (the cure of sin is always possible), and trying to alert those who may be unaware of some hidden disease or afraid to acknowledge it.

            The suggestion has nevertheless been made at times that Christianity entered human history and has remained in it as a negative phenomenon because, through it, the world became burdened with the sense of sin. The accusation is simply not true, as anyone acquainted with classical literature knows. The Romans and especially the Greeks had an acute sense of sin, and of the implacable anger of the gods hanging over the sinner. Christianity brought the sense not of sin but of forgiveness, with the good news of God's love and mercy, shown in the redemption wrought by Jesus Christ. It brought not just the sense, but the means and the reality of forgiveness, through the sacramental power which Jesus conferred on his Apostles: "one of the most awe- inspiring innovations of the Gospel!", as John Paul II calls it [3]. If our age seems to have lost the sense of sin, then the first and most urgent task of evangelization is to restore it. In the end it is only to sinners that the Gospel makes sense, and appears as Good News.

            The Christian sense of sin, this "healthy sense of sin", as the Pope says [4], is not just a sense of personal misery. It is personal misery seen in the light of God's holiness, goodness and mercy. God's love attracts so much more when it is seen as merciful love [5], we have to preach the big-heartedness of Jesus; this attracts and can convert so many sinners, as it clearly touched and converted Mary Magdalene, the woman caught in adultery, the good thief, and a host of others. The repentant sinner, who causes joy in heaven, also finds joy on earth: joy in having discovered the immense fatherliness and merciful goodness of God.

Sacrament of Peace and Joy

            "Your sins are forgiven you"; nothing matters more than to hear these words said, and to know they are true. Nothing so brings peace. Without the certainty of being forgiven, no true peace is possible. It was in the context of renewed peace that Our Lord, the very day of his triumph over death, in his first appearance to his apostles after his Resurrection, confirmed them in their mission, and gave them the power of forgiving sins [6].

            The phrase 'being born again' has become familiar to many people, though they too often attach a superficial meaning to it. How marvellously it applies to Penance which, as we recall, was so often presented by the early writers of the Church as a 'second Baptism'. Each Confession is a joyous rebirth. We once again become a "new creature" in Christ [7]. As Chesterton said, each soul after Confession is like a new experiment of the Creator - who never tires of repeating his merciful and life-restoring experiments with us sinners,

            John Paul II insists that "the essential act of Penance, on the part of the penitent, is contrition, a clear and decisive rejection of the sin committed, together with a resolution not to commit it again, out of the love which one has for God and which is reborn with repentance" [8]. The Pope goes on with a confident presentation of one aspect of contrition that, he says, "should be better know and considered": "Conversion and contrition are often considered under the aspect of the undeniable demands which they involve and under the aspect of the mortification which they impose for the purpose of bringing about a radical change of life. But we do well to recall and emphasize the fact that contrition and conversion are even more a drawing near to the holiness of God, a rediscovery of one's true identity which has been upset and disturbed by sin, a liberation in the very depth of self and thus a regaining of lost joy, the joy of being saved, which the majority of people in our time are no longer capable of experiencing" [9]. Being born again is a profound experience, linked not with feelings but with the will to repent, and with the objective fact and certainty of having received forgiveness. By the proper reception of the sacrament of Penance one goes through this experience.

            Reconciliatio et Paenitentia in line with the constant teaching of the present Pope, emphasizes the personal nature of this sacramental encounter between the repentant sinner and God. "The sacramental formula 'I absolve you...' and the imposition of the hand and the sign of the cross made over the penitent show that at this moment the contrite and converted sinner comes into contact with the power and mercy of God. It is the moment at which, in response to the penitent, the Trinity becomes present in order to blot out sin and restore innocence" [10].

            Penance has fittingly been called the sacrament of joy. How well simple and uncomplicated people, like children, understand this. When I hear cautions against confessing children, warning of the "trauma' it can cause them, I wonder how much actual pastoral work hearing children's confessions lies behind such remarks. My own experience is just the opposite. Children understand the joy of forgiveness, and they seek it. But, the objection can be made, surely they are not obliged to confess their sins which are normally small? No; of course they are not obliged to confess those small sins. But they want to; and they do well, and priests do well to facilitate their desire. Apart from the sacramental grace which they get from each Confession, there is another strong pastoral consideration in favour of frequent confession for children. If children are not taught to be sorry now for their smaller sins. they may not manage, later on, to be sorry for their bigger ones. If they don't acquire the habit of going to Confession at 8 or 9 years when it is easy, are they likely to begin to go at 16 or 18 when perhaps it is difficult, and when they may well be in much more vital need of the joy and peace of reconciliation?

A cherished ministry

            These considerations might suggest a practical pastoral resolution; to make the Sacrament of Penance available, always, everywhere, at any cost. Whatever the reason for people not coming to Confession, priests would do well to ensure that it is not due to the unavailability of confessors. Generous hours fixed for Confessions, and long periods spent in the confessional, are the first step. People will come if they know a priest is there. After all, a priest in the confessional is like a continuous call from God to sinners. His presence there preaches the availability of God's mercy.

            It is true that when we unceasingly facilitate the administration of this sacrament, we are simply fulfilling our duty (cf. canon 986), an essential part of the ministry - the service - for which we have volunteered. But there is another aspect besides duty to it. The Pope, in stressing that this is "undoubtedly the most difficult and sensitive, the most exhausting and demanding ministry of the priest", immediately adds that it is also "one of the most beautiful and consoling" [11]. Nowhere is the priest more Christ - father, teacher, healer - than in the administration of this sacrament. The new Catechism insists: "Priests should encourage the faithful to come to the sacrament of Penance, and should make themselves available to celebrate this sacrament whenever Christians reasonably ask for it" (no. 1464).

            A particular reason for priests to cherish this ministry is that it provides them with their most personal contact with souls, dealing with them individually, as Our Lord did [12]. My father was a doctor, a tuberculosis specialist. Looking back to my boyhood days, I still remember him coming home each evening, tired but visibly content. Day by day there was little that might be considered new in his work - except the people he treated. Throughout his lifetime he continued to offer the same basic medicine to different persons, seeing not the monotony of his task, but the cure and relief to each one. We too are bound to get tired in our ministry, but should not neglect it, because we have a much more powerful and important medicine to offer. Tiredness is more easily overcome if we keep in mind the special appeal and beauty of our ministry - that it is a person-to-person service: not just me ministering to the sinner, but Christ - through me - giving him or her new health and peace.

            The priest who is well practised in this ministry knows that constant confessional work has many other aspects which make it so attractive and rewarding. It is an occasion for the formation of individual conscience and of Christian responsibility, for spiritual guidance, for the discovery of vocations...

            Furthermore, we should draw special confidence from the present world situation. People cannot find any true happiness if they are not at peace with God. Confident preaching of the Gospel of reconciliation will strike an echo of hope in unhappy hearts. Besides, each person we reconcile becomes a witness to the power of reconciliation. In a world where there is no peace, one person at peace stands out, and draws others to the source of peace. What a witness is given by reconciled Christians: presenting themselves not as saints, but as sinners: as repentant - and forgiven - sinners, who have gone through the experience of submitting their sins to the "triumphant power" of the mercy of God [13].

General Absolutions

            For absolution to be validly received, there must be true penance, i.e. a true conversion, on the part of the penitent. He must truly will to turn away from his sins, with all that this may imply. He must want to avoid them in the future, even if he is not sure he will manage to do so. And he must intend to make up for them in the present, if they have harmed others. Otherwise he is not really sorry, and cannot receive forgiveness. If, for instance, he is not prepared to repair the scandal he has caused, to restore the good name of someone he has defamed, or to give back goods or money he has stolen, he lacks true sorrow, since this includes the necessary purpose of amendment; and even if in individual confession he deceives the priest about these bad dispositions, and so receives absolution, the absolution - validly given as far as the priest is concerned - is ineffectual in his case; he receives it invalidly. This of course has always been a main point of pastoral practice: to try to ensure that penitents realize that inadequate dispositions can nullify the sacrament of Reconciliation in its application to them.

            A major point is how this applies to general absolutions, many aspects of which pose pastoral problems of delicate solution. Canons 961-963 give the basic legislation on the matter, and this is repeated in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (no. 1483). Canon 961 says that such absolutions cannot be given, except when "the danger of death is imminent", and also when "a serious necessity exists, that is, when in light of the number of penitents, sufficient confessors are not available to hear individual confessions properly within a suitable period of time, so that the penitents, through no fault of their own, would have to go without sacramental grace or holy communion for a lengthy period of time".

            Canon 962 recalls some requirements necessary for the valid reception of such absolutions: "for a member of Christ's faithful to benefit validly from sacramental absolution given to several persons at the same time, it is required not only that he or she be properly disposed, but be also at the same time personally resolved to confess in due time each of the grave sins which cannot for the moment be thus confessed". This new ground of possible invalidity, which applies to general absolutions, is also specifically mentioned - along with the necessary dispositions to make up for scandal and harm - in no. 33 of the Ordo paenitentiae. The Ordo insists that these three elements on the penitent's party - sorrow, purpose of amendment, and resolution to confess the sins now absolved, in a subsequent individual confession - "are required for the validity of the sacrament", (and) "should be carefully recalled to the faithful by priests" [14].

            When general absolutions are being celebrated, it would be a lack of justice towards penitents not to remind them of these three conditions, especially the last. It is of pastoral prudence and concern not to let people forget that while absolution in determined circumstances can be general, penance - repentance, conversion - cannot. Repentance must always be individual and personal. General absolutions (just as individual absolution) forgive the sins of those who are properly disposed, but pass ineffectually over the heads of those who are not.

Absolution, conversion, peace

            A pastoral question that merits debate is which form - general or individual confession and absolution - is most favorable to conversion and to its continuing effect. The lasting quality of conversion depends mainly on the depth and wholeness of contrition which the Ordo (no. 6a) describes as "the most important act of the penitent". The keener the sense of sin, the deeper the contrition; and the deeper the contrition, the greater the sacramental grace received along with forgiveness.

            The Ordo Paenitentiae insists; "we can only approach the Kingdom of Christ by metanoia. This is a profound change of the whole person by which one begins to consider, judge, and arrange his life according to the holiness and love of God... The genuineness of penance depends on this heartfelt contrition. For conversion should affect a person from within so that it may progressively enlighten him and render him continually more like Christ".

            If people find individual confession particularly hard at times, this tends to be precisely when they are in more urgent need of that thorough "metanoia", that profound experience and change which comes from not shirking a full face-to-face encounter with reality: the reality of one's sins (seen in the full light of God's holiness and his call to reject them and make amends for them), and the reality of God's infinite love and mercy.

            What sort of encounter is there in general absolution? There too of course God comes to meet the sinner. The danger is that the sinner, presenting himself as one more in a crowd, tends less to come to meet God; he or she tends to evade - or not to be aware of - that sense of personal encounter and personal demand; and so also misses that sense of personal love and personal forgiveness which leaves heartfelt gratitude and deep peace in the soul. One used to hear criticism of frequent confession: that people's contrition was just routine. It may have been so in particular cases, but surely general absolutions are even more favorable to routine and superficiality, to thoughtlessness in contrition and to the possibility of little permanence in conversion?

            General absolution, if received properly, should clearly give the same peace as individual confession and absolution; nevertheless, my experience is that it very often does not. I frequently come across persons who have received a general absolution, and later on feel impelled to come to confess their sins in individual confession, not because they have been instructed that they are in any case bound to do so (very often they have not been so told!), but simply because they are not at peace until they have individual confession.

             I cannot avoid the impression that general absolution favours a sort of half-hearted conversion, a half-turning to God; and so the penitent is left with a less acute awareness of his sins and also a lesser awareness not only of God's holiness, but especially of his loving forgiveness. Two of the main personal fruits of the sacrament - aversion towards sin and gratitude towards God - are lessened.

            We cannot forget that the requisite of personal confession of faults grew up and was legislated after long experience of the human heart. Each person needs to open up about what is weighing his or her heart and conscience down. Our sins are always something that leave a bad taste in our souls, and the logical thing is to want to "spit them out". John Paul II, remarking that "the confession of sins must ordinarily be individual and not collective, just as sin is a deeply personal matter", observes that personal confession has a counter-individualistic effect: "this [individual] confession in a way forces sin out of the secret of the heart and thus out the area of pure individuality, emphasizing its social character as well" (PR 121). The new Catechism states: "Confession, by which we accuse ourselves of our sins, frees us even from a merely human point of view, and facilitates our reconciliation with others. By accusing ourselves, we face directly up to the sins of which we have been guilty; we assume responsibility for them, and in this way open ourselves again to God and to the communion of the Church, so making a new future possible" (no. 1455).

            This helps to answer the objection against private oral confession which is at times put forward: that it is individualistic, while general absolution is more community-centred. The objection could only be based on a very external and superficial view of the sacrament, in its nature, function and

effect. Individual confession equally serves ecclesial communion, in the deep sense of healing wounds inflicted on the Body of Christ. But its pastoral service to the community is evident in other ways. So often the penitent needs to have pointed out to him his specific obligations: of restitution for instance (e.g. the employer paying unjust wages), of avoiding or repairing scandal towards the community (e.g. the pornographer, the drug trafficker), etc.

An easier way of being forgiven?

            "But people prefer collective absolutions". Do they? If they do, it may be due to a variety of reasons. It may be because they find it "less painful", since they don't have to go through an individual private confession which they would find distasteful... But they do have to go through that individual confession, however painful! They have to go through it later on, sooner rather than later; and as we have seen, if they are not resolved to do so, they will receive the general absolution invalidly. It is possible that here, on a matter of the greatest importance, some people are in danger of a serious deception, coming to prefer general absolution as an "easier" way of receiving the Sacrament of Penance, without realising that this is not true: that every single grave sin one is aware of when receiving a general absolution must be afterwards confessed specifically - and "quam primum" - in private personal confession; and that unless there is a present effective resolution to do this, the general absolution is invalidly received, i.e. one's sins are not forgiven.

             It would be a pity if persons were to regard individual confession as a "bitter" medicine, and general absolution as "easier to swallow". This would show a lack of understanding of God's merciful ways. Pastors who love the ministry of Penance will not be content just to insist that the more palatable medicine now has in any case to be followed by the more bitter one later. Their main concern, as they make the medicine constantly available, will be to preach its power for forgiveness, peace and strength, whenever it is received with the proper dispositions.

            We might fittingly end with some observations that John Paul II makes concerning the personal reception of this sacrament by the priest himself, and specifically the possibility of neglect on his part in this respect. "If a priest were no longer to go to confession or properly confess his sins, his priestly being and his priestly action would feel its effects very soon, and this would be also be noticed by the community of which he was the pastor... this ministry would lose much of its effectiveness if in some way we were to stop being good penitents" [15]. More recently, he insisted once again on this: "whoever exercises the ministry of reconciling Christians with the Lord through the sacrament of forgiveness must himself have recourse to this sacrament. He will be the first to acknowledge that he is a sinner and to believe in the divine pardon expressed by sacramental absolution. In administering the sacrament of forgiveness, this awareness of being a sinner will help him to understand sinners better" [16].

            It is a final point for us to examine. Only the priest who is a good penitent can make a good confessor. Priests who are regular penitents - who never lose sight of their own sinfulness and are constantly seeking personal cure and deeper personal health - make good, humble, understanding and attractive confessors. This is particularly asked of us if we want to start a real revival of the Sacrament of Penance, and to see people coming again in great numbers as they came to Our Lord, in search of new health and strength, new life and peace. "The personal use of the sacrament of Penance motivates the priest to make himself more available for administering this sacrament to the faithful who request it. This is an urgent pastoral need in our day" [17].

NOTES

[1] hereafter referred to as RP

[2] lnsegnamenti VI,1 (1983), pp. 52ss; cf. RP, no. 70.

[3] RP, no. 129

[4] ibid. no. 18.

[5] cf. Dives in Misericordia, passim.

[6] Jn 20, 21-23.

[7] 2 Cor 3: 17.

[8] RP, no. 31; cf. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, no. 1451.

[9] RP. loc. cit.

[10] no. 31.

[11] RP, no. 29.

[12] cf. Lk 4: 40.

[13] cf. Veritatis Splendor, no. 118

[14] It is worth noting that the 1983 Code of Canon Law (c. 963) tightens up on the dispositions of the earlier Ordo Paenitentiae. To the indication that penitents who have had grave sins forgiven in a general absolution must confess them in a subsequent private confession, the canon adds the words "quam primum" - as soon as possible - an expression that had not been used in the Ordo.

[15] RP, no. 126.

[16] General Audience, June 2, 1993 (Osservatore Romano, Engl. Ed., June 9,

1993. p. 11).

[17] Pope John Paul II, ibid.