The Sacrament of Reconciliation deepens our bonds with God and the community

Friday, Mar. 13, 2015

When we sin we turn our backs on God and our entire community. We, because of our selfish pride in our individualism, may not wish to believe this, but it is true nonetheless. My sins, or your sins, affect more than just me or you. None of us goes through this world alone; our actions affect others. If we sin, we bring down the whole Body of Christ, just as our good works build it up.

Fortunately, our Church provides us sinners with the Sacrament of Reconciliation, which restores the Body of Christ and repairs the relationships that are broken due to our sins, even those that seem to be most private.

One reason that we celebrate the Sacrament of Reconciliation is to make amends with the whole community. The priest represents that community; by confessing to him, I confess to all my brothers and sisters, asking for pardon from God and from the community and, at the same time, making known my intention to build up the community in the future. 

Unfortunately, there has been a steady decrease in the number of those who avail themselves of the wonderful Sacrament of Reconciliation. This, no doubt, can be attributed to many factors, such as a loss of the sense of sin, a pervasive uneasiness with admitting fault, a poor sense of self-worth that cannot endure an honest examination of conscience, a reticence to allow anyone else to tell us what we can or cannot do, and a fierce independence that holds us accountable only to ourselves. 

Nevertheless, the Church’s sacraments reaffirm our communal nature, a theme that weaves its way throughout the Gospels. Jesus brought lepers out of their isolation and back into the community; he brought Lazarus back from the dead to be with his sisters; and he prayed that his Father would keep his followers together, at one with him and the Father just as he was one with the Father in the Spirit. United, joined and ingathered: this is what we are, and this is what dissipates when we sin. Fortunately, the bonds that sin weakens can be strengthened again by the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

In the midst of our Lenten season, it is good to recall that this is a time of prayer, almsgiving and fasting. All three of these activities join us with the Church: Prayer concentrates on the Lord of all, in whom we are related to our brothers and sisters in Christ; almsgiving unites us with the poor, who often go neglected and forgotten; and fasting reminds us of our hunger for God and our need to build up Christ’s body, the Church, as we are fed at the table of the Lord with the Body of Christ, which transforms us into that same Body of Christ, the Church, and unites us with our brothers and sisters.

Lent’s true focus is on baptism. Through this sacrament at the Easter Vigil we will welcome into the Church some who are now in the Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults classes, while others will make a profession of faith to renew their baptism. Those of us who already are full members of the Church will at Easter renew our baptismal promises. By doing so, all of us will affirm our unity with each other, because baptism is a sacrament of initiation into the Body of Christ. 

To prepare us for this renewal of the sacrament that bonded us with Christ’s death and resurrection and ushered us into his family, making his brothers and sisters our own, what better way could there be than to be reconciled with all of our brothers and sisters through the Sacrament of Reconciliation? 

As we grow from childhood to adulthood, we move from dependence to independence to interdependence. Only in this last stage do we maintain our individual integrity while, at the same time, move into relationships with others that give us life even as they enrich our neighbors. Reconciliation is a sacrament of interdependence in which we deepen the bonds that unite us to God and neighbor.

Pope Francis, who recently released tips for the Sacrament of Reconciliation, has made mercy a mainstay of his papacy – even his motto can be translated as “choosing through the eyes of mercy.” In his first homily as pope, Francis said, “in my opinion, the strongest message of the Lord is mercy,” echoing the words of the psalmist who reminds us that God’s mercies are over all his works.

 This Lent, why not experience the mercy of God again and make things right with the rest of us? Go to confession and experience what Jesus meant when he prayed that we would all be one even as he is one with his Father in the Spirit.  

A friend of mine often says we make each other look good. No one is a success on his or her own. Conversely, we also own each other’s failures. So go to confession and make us all look good as you build up our communion and make amends for not always being your best self. 

Who knows? It may be catching!