Let me clarify that my earlier Protestant protest against the notion that the forgiveness of sins is exclusively available through the mediation of church officials shouldn’t in any way be taken as an objection to the practice of priests hearing confession. I love the idea of confession. Whether via the Catholic model or the AA model, confessing to somebody else — some-body else — helps us humans accept that we’ve been heard. Such confessions can also help to free us from the “let’s all pretend we’re perfect” hypocrisy and the anxiety that fuels it. (David Bazan neatly summed up that anxiety in an album title, When They Really Get to Know You They Will Run.)
I love G.K. Chesterton’s Father Brown stories. Father Brown’s claim to fame as a detective is that he understands people due to having heard, for years, the confessions of his parishioners. The beautiful thing in these stories is the little priest’s generosity of spirit — the more he comes to know and understand people, the more he loves them.
That’s immensely important with regard to the anxiety mentioned above. We humans need to be loved. To be loved without being truly known doesn’t count, but we’re terrified that being truly known would disqualify us from being loved. That fear can make us hypocrites, turning every Sunday into a kind of awkward first date with God. Such hypocrisy is exhausting and unsatisfying, preventing us from being — or at least from feeling — truly known or truly loved either by God or by any of God’s human surrogates here on earth.
So I rather like the idea of confession.
I do, of course, disagree — respectfully but strenuously — with Roman Catholic doctrine on several points. I couldn’t very well be a Protestant or evangelical or Baptist if I didn’t. Likewise, an orthodox Catholic will, unsurprisingly, disagree with me. It wouldn’t occur to me to regard such disagreement as evidence of “anti-Baptist” or “anti-Protestant” chauvinism on their part. “Non-” =/= “anti-.” And so it didn’t occur to me either that my comments on feeling really, really non-Catholic during that confirmation homily could or would be interpreted as anti-Catholic.
I can’t help but wonder if I stepped in it a bit because, coming from a tradition that accommodates and celebrates dissent, I’m accustomed to discussing such disagreements in a way that sounds hostile to those coming from a tradition that, you know, doesn’t. If so, then I’ve probably just stepped in it again.
In any case, it’s Thursday, so please feel free to disagree — respectfully but strenuously. (Or to disregard this topic altogether and just consider this a Thursday flamewar open thread.)
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