It is because of the Sacraments of the Church that we can say that we have a Living God, not just because our prayers are heard or authentic miracles happen. Emmanuel-God is with us. Confession is a sacrament which is a celebration of the encounter between the misery of man and the mercy of God. Through the priest, Jesus is wiping away our sins forever. Why do we often ignore confession and prefer to confess directly to God?
1) First of all we don't have a clear sense of sin, rather feelings of guilt which are -negative feelings about ourselves, -the origin of which is the lack of -fulfilment of a duty, -in order to reestablish peace with ourselves. Sense of sin on the other hand is a collection of feelings that may be in part negative feelings about ourselves but also positive feelings about God and ourselves -the origin of which is the lack of relationship with God our Savior -in order to come to know God as merciful and the fundamental beauty of ourselves before God -so that we may reestablish communion with God from which comes a new way of life. 2)We are constrained by the human aspect of the sacrament particularly the humanity of the priest. There is nothing so great that it cannot be forgiven by God. God is love and love is always free. True repentence comes out of an awareness of having broken faith with God and not out of fear of punishment. Making an examination of concience is allowing the light of God to penetrate our hearts and allowing us to discover the truth about ourselves. The authority Jesus gave his apostles to forgive sins on his behalf is handed down even today to priests by apostolic succession. Confessing to a priest makes more sense than "confessing directly to God" because it is only Jesus who reconciles us to the Father. What is the advantage of going for regular confession? Imagine we are connected to God by a thread. Each time we sin the thread is broken. Each time we confess, the ruptured ends are knotted decreasing the length. So each time we confess, we are moving closer to God. Tail piece: That no way means that we should keep on sinning to be closer to God :) Pray for me, Sony **************************************************************** This mail is generated from JOYnet, a Jesus Youth mailing list. To unsubscribe, send a mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe to this mailing list, visit http://www.jesusyouth.org/joynet For automatic help, send a mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] In case of any issue related to the mailing list contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] ****************************************************************
