Objections to Confession...

So frequently we here all the excuses about why people do not participate in Confession when this is one of the most loving and powerful sacraments of the Church. Archimandrite Seraphim Alekslev examines some of these excuses in his beautiful book The Forgotten Medicine.



"HOW GREAT must be our wickedness! We do not turn to Confession not only because we forget about it, but we do not practice it even when we know about it. What can be more imprudent than this?

Confession is so important to us sinners that we must boldly say: there is no salvation for us without Confession. Abba Isaiah expresses the same thought: "If there were no repentance, nobody would be saved. just as Baptism cleanses us from original sin and from all sins committed prior to Baptism, so repentance, involving a confession of our sins, cleanses us from all lawlessness committed after Baptism."

We do not confess because we have objections to Confession. What are our objections usually?

Here are the main ones:

1) One says: "I am so sinful! Can God forgive my sins?
I do not believe this! That is why there is no use for me to go to Confession."
But if a man repents sincerely, any sin can be forgiven him. "The power of repentance is based on the power of God. The Doctor is all-powerful, and the Medicine given by Him is all-powerful" (Bishop Ignatius Brianchaninov).

St. John Chrysostom, pondering on the miraculous results of sincere repentance, says: "Repentance is a medicine which destroys sin. It is a heavenly gift, a marvelous force which through the grace of God conquers the might and strictness of the laws. It accepts all and transforms all…

Do not tell me: "I have sinned much, how can I save myself?" You cannot, but your God can, and He can do it so that all your sins will be destroyed….

Sin is to God's love for man what the spark is to the sea, not even that, but something much smaller! The sea, however big it may be, has an end, but God's love for man is limitless.

2) Another says: "Why should I go to Confession? I have no special sins.
Let those who have murdered, stolen, raped, or committed some other sin go to Confession."
This objection to Confession is the complete opposite of the first one... Here, there is a lack of any realization of wickedness….

Let those who say, "I have no special sins," answer whether they have Christ in their hearts. He likes to inhabit pure hearts. But are their hearts pure? Hardly! They imagine that they are pure, but imagination is not reality. lf we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us (1 John 1:8). And where there is a lie, there Christ is not.

The Holy Fathers teach us that It Is very hard for a man to see his sins….

It turns out that those who think that they do not have any great sins are actually blind. They must pray to God to enable them to perceive their sins and to save themselves from the extremely fatal spiritual delusion that they do not have any particular sins. Even if their sins are as small as specks of dust, if they are not cleaned with constant Confession, they pile up and dirty the room of the heart so that the high heavenly Guest cannot enter there.

The small sins are often more dangerous than the greatest crimes, because the latter weigh heavily on the conscience and insist on being atoned for, confessed, settled, erased, while the small sins do not weigh too much on the soul, but they have that perilous property of making it insensitive to the grace of God and indifferent to salvation. ….

In order for man to restore his spiritual life, he needs to confess even the smallest of his sins.

3) A third man says: "All this is true. But why should I confess when I know that tomorrow I will sin again? Is there any point In such confession? I see that one should confess only if one would sin no more after that!"
This objection to Confession contains both something which is very true and something which is not. The right thing here is the desire not to sin any more after Confession. But we are feeble humans, and we cannot attain right away such a firmness which makes falling into voluntary sins impossible. If we cannot reach such steadfastness in virtue right away, should we surrender to vice? Or should we stop confessing? Which is better––to roll in the mud of the spiritual swamp, or to pick yourself up after each fall and go on with the hope that someday you may reach the solid and beautiful shore of virtue? If you do not confess, you remain in the mud. If you confess, you pick yourself up from the mud and clean yourself. "But why should I get up if tomorrow I will fall again?" you say. When you fall again, then get up again! Every day begin all over again! This is undoubtedly better than falling out of the habit of getting up….

Leave your house unswept, uncleaned, and unventilated for one year! Will it not turn into a pigsty? Now think about what the soul of a man is like when he has not cleaned it through Confession, not only for a year, but for twenty, forty, sixty, or seventy years!...

4) A fourth man says: "I am confessing before God. What need is there for me to go to the priest?"
... God has ordained the priest to administer the Holy Sacraments so that we can receive through them heavenly all-saving grace. Confession is a sacrament, too. If you confess before God, you are doing well, because you are moving your conscience, remembering your sins, and maybe even shedding tears for them. Yet you do not receive God's grace of forgiveness through all that. ...until you go to the priest to whom Jesus Christ Himself has given the power to bind and loose, no matter how much you confess before God, you do not receive forgiveness for your sins, because God Himself has condescended to say to the priest: whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them (John 20:23).

Besides, Confession before a priest has an enormous instructive meaning. It humbles us. It cures our pride; it makes us blush savingly; It instills in us shame and fear and thus protects us from future sins.

"But how can the priest absolve sins?" you ask. He can, since God has ordered it so. "But is the priest himself not a sinful man?" If lie is sinful, what do you lose from that? He is sinful for himself and will answer before God for his sins. The Holy Sacraments administered by him do not cease to be active for you because of his sinfulness if you accept them with faith and humility. Does the sunray get dirty when it falls on mud? In the same way, God's grace does not lessen by being transmitted by a priest muddled with sins. He himself may be denied grace on Judgment Day because of his sinfulness, but you, accepting through him God's grace, will not deprive yourself of it if you show yourself to be worthy.

"But will the priest not give away the secret of my confessed sins?" No! No priest has the right to tell of that which he has heard during Confession. He has to take the secret of the Confession to his grave. So do not worry that the shame of your sinfulness may be announced to society.

But remember that if you avoid Confession because of zeal for your honor, you will shame yourself If you are ashamed to admit your weaknesses before one man, everyone will begin talking about them! Such is the spiritual law. People sense our weaknesses, no matter how diligently we hide them. If you confess them before one man, God, because of your humility before this single witness, will cover you with His grace before the many.

...Your confession will teach you to struggle with your passions; and if you are really fighting against them, the multitude of people will not find out about them. You, with God's help, will be healed before you have shamed yourself. But if you do not want to be healed through Confession, then you will both expose your name to abuse here and then be disgraced before the whole universe at the Last Judgment!"

From: The Forgotten Medicine, pp 29-39

“NO THANKS, DOC” Rejecting spiritual medicine

It will be no surprise to learn that most people seek out the help of spiritual council at times they are in real need. The Church recognizes the sickness of sin and death in the world, and the Lord gives His Church to be the world’s spiritual hospital. Just like a hospital dedicated to healing physical illness, it makes good sense when those who are spiritually sick (which includes all of us) seek the therapy and medicine where it can be found. For the Church, this medicine is particularly to found in the Holy Mysteries of Communion and Confession.
For those who seek the advice of a doctor to treat their cancer, it would seem strange indeed to reject medical advice. We go to see a doctor because we are confident that the doctor has everything to offer us that his or her particular hospital can give for our sickness. For example, if cancer were so serious that it called for a strict regime of chemotherapy, radiation, and a special diet, we would not expect to see beneficial results merely by sitting at home in front of the television, or by devising our own method of treatment. If we plan in the first place to devise our own method, it would make no sense to consult the physicians. Why would we waste everyone’s time?
In the case of the spiritual hospital that is the Church, the grace of the Holy Spirit actively works through the Holy Mysteries which are conveyed to us in the priesthood. Unlike a physician of our bodies, the human “qualifications” do not stand in the way of our obtaining sufficient medicine for the healing of our souls. The grace of the priesthood allows the grace of God to work, such that the spiritual guidance given in Holy Confession is sufficient for our spiritual health. While spiritual “specialists” exist in the form of holy elders, we can benefit from Christ’s spiritual medicine in the Holy Mystery of Confession with any priest.





Do we in fact approach Confession this way, if we approach it at all? Do we consider ourselves to be better spiritual advisors than the priest, who does not give his own “advice”, but in fact, speaks the words given by grace? Many fathers testify that the words they speak in Holy Confession are not the words they intend to say to their spiritual child; many even leave hours of Confession wondering where the words come from! Of course, we know the real answer: the real physician is the Great Physician, Who leaves the priesthood dependant not on itself, on its seminary education, on psychology courses or counseling training, but on His Grace.
If we accept the reality of the grace of the priesthood and the Holy Mysteries of Communion and Confession, we have no choice but to accept in total the word which the Lord gives us through the Holy Mysteries. All Orthodox Christians – even priest and bishops – must take this critical step each time they place their head beneath the priestly stole seeking the absolution of their sins. Each time we do this, we will to accept the Lord’s medicine, and to strive as much as it is in our power to take the medicine as it is prescribed, not second guessing the spiritual prescription, or forgetting about it, or neglecting to check back with the spiritual physician on a regular basis, usually once every month or so.
To approach the Holy Mysteries with any other attitude is not simply blasphemous against the grace of the Holy Spirit – it is spiritual suicide. In rejecting the Holy Mysteries, we reject the only thing that can truly make us well, from the inside out. To reject them is to lose the greatest chance for a healthy life of soul and body.
To reject them is, in essence, to say “No thanks, Doc”, not to an earthly physician, but to the Great Physician Himself.


Source: www.asna.ca

Bearing the Shame of Confession..( Archimandrite Zacharias Zacharou )

From “Remember thy First Love” by Archimandrite Zacharias Zacharou

Question: In taking the steps which you have presented to us, the most difficult thing, I think, is to overcome the fear of shame. This is what I try to do in my parish. People will not come to confession although their souls are burdened and things are driving them crazy, because they cannot overcome the shame to admit their sins. How do you lead people in this direction?

Answer: I think that the strength to bear shame is a gift from God. When I was a young and inexperienced spiritual father, Elder Sophrony told me to encourage the young people to confess precisely the things of which they are ashamed, for if they learn to do so, shame is transformed into strength against the passions, and they will overcome sin. This is precisely what occurred in the person of Zacchaeus. He bore shame voluntarily, and the Lord, Who was on His way to Jerusalem in order to suffer the Cross of shame, saw Zacchaeus bearing shame for His sake and recognized in him a kindred spirit. Zacchaeus had put himself prophetically in the way of the Christ, in the way of the Cross, and in a prophetic way the mystery of the Cross and Resurrection of Christ was activated in the heart of Zacchaeus. His heart was enlarged and he was able to enter into the power of faith. Christ has saved us through the Cross of shame, so when we suffer shame for His sake He considers this as gratitude, and in return He transmits to us His grace which regenerates our life.

This is exactly what happens in confession. Those who confess sincerely and take upon themselves the shame for their sins are regenerated. But those who shrug their shoulders and say, ‘Nothing special, the usual things…’ they do not bear any shame, their heart remains unmoved, and they hardly receive any benefit. But those who, with shame and a contrite heart, strip their souls naked before God and before another mortal, ‘of like passions’ (Acts 14:15) with them—that shame of theirs really finds the heart, humbles it and brings it to the surface. This then, opens the heart to receive the grace of regeneration, of consolation. We see this in the life of many that come to us: the greater the shame they bear with contrition, accusing themselves before God, the greater the grace they receive to amend their lives and make a new beginning.


Source: Orthodox Heritage Vol. 10, Issue 11-12

How Everyone Should Prepare Before Confession An Excerpt from Exomologetarion (A Manual of Confession) - St. Nikodemos the Hagiorite

What is repentance?

My brother sinner, this is the preparation you must undergo before you repent and go to confession. Know firstly that repentance, according to St. John of Damaskos, is a returning from the devil to God, which comes about through pain and ascesis. So you also, my beloved, if you wish to repent properly, must depart from the devil and from diabolical works and return to God and to the life proper to God. You must forsake sin, which is against nature, and return to virtue, which is according to nature. You must hate wickedness so much, that you say along with David: "Unrighteousness have I hated and abhorred" (Ps. 118:163), and instead, you must love the good and the commandments of the Lord so much, that you also say along with David: "But Thy law have I loved" (ibid.), and again: "Therefore have I loved Thy commandments more than gold and topaz" (Ps. 118:127). In brief, the Holy Spirit informs you through the wise Sirach what in fact true repentance is, saying: "Turn to the Lord and forsake your sins… Return to the Most High, and turn away from iniquity, and hate abominations intensely" (Sir. 17:25-26).

The aspects of repentance
Know secondly that the aspects of repentance are three: contrition, confession, and satisfaction.
 

Contrition
Contrition is sorrow and perfect grief of the heart, which comes about in a person who, on account of the sins committed, disappointed God and transgressed His divine Law. This contrition comes only to the perfect and those who are sons of God, because it only proceeds from the love for God, just as a son repents simply because he disappointed his father, and not because he was deprived of his inheritance or because he will be ousted from his father's house.
Concerning this the divine Chrysostom says: "Groan after you have sinned, not because you are
to be punished (for this is nothing), but because you have offended your Master, one so gentle,
one so kind, one Who loves you so much and longs for your salvation as to have given even His
 "Repentance is the returning from that which is against nature to that which is according to nature, from the devil to God, through ascesis and agony" (De Fide Orthodoxa 2, 30, PG 94, 976A).
Concerning true repentance, see the Homily on Repentance at the end of this book.
 George Koressios, writing about the Mysteries, adds a fourth aspect of repentance, the loosing of sin (also called "keys"), which happens by the grace of the Holy Spirit through the mediation of the Spiritual Father, and which, he says, especially defines the Mystery of Repentance (from his Theology).
 This grief does not only consist of its sensible manifestations, like groans and tears, but it mainly consists of the interior will of man hating sin and in wishing that sin never occurred, and the resolve to never commit sin again.
And note this also, that this grief and contrition of the heart, according to Koressios, is an element of repentance and, as long as it is found in the heart, a person is in the state of repentance. But as soon as grief leaves the heart, so also does a person leave from the state of repentance, which means that grief and contrition must be present in the heart of the penitent perpetually, for in this way is his repentance true. Concerning this grief, see more on it in the Homily on Repentance at the end of this book. Son for you. On account of this, groan."

Affliction
Related to contrition is affliction, which is also a sorrow and imperfect grief of the heart, which
comes about, not because a person disappointed God by his sins, but because that person was
deprived of divine grace, lost Paradise, and gained hell. This affliction belongs to the imperfect,
that is, to the hired hands and slaves, because it proceeds not out of love for God, but out of fear
and out of love for themselves, just as a hired hand repents on account of losing his wage and a
slave repents because he fears the disciplines of his master.So you also, my brother sinner, if you wish to acquire this contrition and affliction in your heart, and through these for your repentance to be pleasing to God, you must do the following.
Confess to an Experienced Spiritual Father
First, search around and learn who is the most experienced Spiritual Father, because Basil the
Great says, just as people do not show their maladies and bodily wounds to just any physician,
but to experienced physicians who know how to treat them, so also sins must be revealed, not to
just anyone, but to those who are able to heal them: "The same fashion should be observed in the confession of sins as in the showing of bodily diseases. As then men reveal the diseases of the
body not to all or to chance comers but to those who are experienced in their treatment; so also
the confession of sins ought to take place in the presence of those who are able to treat them, as it
is written: 'Ye that are strong bear the infirmities of the weak' (Rom. 15:1) - that is, take them
away by your care." 

How One is to Examine his conscience
Second, just as you would sit down and count your money after a certain business transaction, in
like manner go to a particular place, my brother, and two or three weeks before going to the
Spiritual Father you found, especially at the beginning of the four fast periods of the year, sit
down in that place of quietude, and bowing your head, examine your conscience, which Philo the
Jew calls: "The testing of the conscience," and become: "Not a defender, but a judge of your
sins," according to the divine Augustine. Consider, like Hezekiah, the whole span of your life in
sorrow and bitterness of soul: "I will ponder all my years in the bitterness of my soul" (Is. 38:15).
 

 On II Corinthians, Homily 4, 6, PG 61, 426.
 Some teachers divide the sorrow and the grief which a sinner has on account of his sins into three parts: thegrief he has before confession, which they call infliction, or reproach (pros-tribe); the grief he has during confession, which they call contrition (syn-tribe); and the grief which he has after confession, which they call affliction (epitribe).

My Christian brethren, do not wait until the last moment to confess and go to your Spiritual Father when the days you wish to commune are very near, but go many days in advance. And certainly during the four fast periods of the year, as soon as they begin, go to confession with leisure and when you have time, so you may be properly corrected. One or two days before you are to commune, go to your Spiritual Father so that he may read a prayer of forgiveness over you on account of the pardonable sins which you committed between the time of your confession and your reception of Communion, and so receive in this manner, according to this good custom which is followed
by the monks of the Holy Mountain.
Consider also how many sins you committed in deed, word, and by coupling with thoughts,after you last confessed, counting the months, weeks, and days. Remember the people with whom you sinned and the places where you sinned, and diligently reflect upon these things in order to find every one of your sins. This is how the wise Sirach counsels you from one side saying: "Before judgment, examine yourself" (Sir. 18:20), and from the other, Gregory the Theologian says: "Examine yourself more than your neighbor. Account of actions is superior to an account of money. For money is subject to corruption, but actions remain."And just as hunters are not satisfied with merely finding a beast in the forest, but attempt through every means to also kill it, likewise, my brother sinner, you should also not be satisfied with merely examining your conscience and with finding your sins, for this profits you little, but struggle by every means to kill your sins through the grief in your heart, namely, through
contrition and affliction. And in order to acquire contrition, consider how much you have
wronged God through your sins. In order to also acquire affliction, consider how much you have
wronged yourself through your sins.
 

From Part III, Chapter 1 of Exomologetarion (A Manual of Confession), by St. Nikodemos the
Hagiorite (Thessaloniki, Greece: 2006, Uncut Mountain Press).

Bearing the Shame of Confession

Question: In taking the steps which you have presented W to us, the most difficult thing, I think, is to overcome the rear of shame. This is what I try to do in my parish. People will not come to confession although their souls are burdened and things are driving them crazy, because they cannot overcome the shame to admit their sins. How do you lead people in this direction?

Answer: I think that the strength to bear shame is a gift from God. When I was a young and inexperienced spiritual father, Elder Sophrony told me to encourage the young people to confess precisely the things of which they are ashamed, for if they learn to do so, shame is transformed into strength against the passions, and they will overcome sin. This is precisely what occurred in the person of Zacchaeus. He bore shame voluntarily, and the Lord, Who was on His was to Jerusalem in order to suffer the Cross of shame, saw Zacchaeus bearing shame for His sake and recognized in him a kindred spirit. Zacchaeus had put himself prophetically in the way of the Christ, in the way of the Cross, and in a prophetic way the mystery of the Cross and Resurrection of Christ was activated in the heart of Zacchaeus. His heart was enlarged and he was able to enter into the power of faith. Christ has saved us through the Cross of shame, so when we suffer shame for His sake He considers this as gratitude, and in return He transmits to us His grace which regenerates our life.

This is exactly what happens in confession. Those who confess sincerely and take upon themselves the shame for their sins are regenerated. But those who shrug their shoulders and say, ‘Nothing special, the usual things…’ they do not bear any shame, their heart remains unmoved, and they hardly receive any benefit. But those who, with shame and a contrite heart, strip their souls naked before God and before another mortal, ‘of like passions’ (Acts 14:15) with them—that shame of theirs really finds the heart, humbles it and brings it to the surface. This then, opens the heart to receive the grace of regeneration, of consolation. We see this in the life of many that come to us: the greater the shame they bear with contrition, accusing themselves before God, the greater the grace they receive to amend their lives and make a new beginning.

From “Remember thy First Love” by Archimandrite Zacharias Zacharou  

http://agapienxristou.blogspot.ca/2013/06/bearing-shame-of-confession.html