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Friday, March 4, 2016

OUR HOLY FATHER, POPE FRANCIS, WENT TO CONFESSION TODAY. WILL YOU BEING GOING SOON?

The Holy Father celebrated a beautiful liturgical celebration of the Sacrament of Confession today at St. Peter's. He goes to confession at minute 44:11. Have you been recently and are you planning to go soon and regularly?

Pope Francis taught today prior to the Liturgical celebration of Confession the virtues needed to be a good confessor and that when one can't give absolution, one gives a blessing of some sort.

This is excellent advice:

This year the Holy Father said (HERE), among other things…
“Let us restore to the centre – and not only in this Jubilee Year – the Sacrament of Reconciliation, a true space of the Spirit in which all, confessors and penitents, are able to experience the only definitive and faithful love, that of God for each one of His children, a love that never disappoints. 
St. Leopold Mandic reiterated that God’s mercy outstrips all our expectations. He used to say to those who suffered, ‘We have in Heaven the heart of a mother. The Virgin, our Mother, who at the foot of the Cross experienced all the suffering possible for a human creature, understands our hardships and consoles us’. May Mary, refuge of sinners and Mother of Mercy, always guide and sustain the fundamental ministry of Reconciliation“. 
With regard to the issue of what a priest should do if he finds himself unable to give absolution,  the Holy Father recommended, “First of all, see if there is a way; many times you will find it.Secondly, do not focus only on spoken language, but also on the language of gestures.  There are people who do not want to speak but through their gestures demonstrate their repentance, their pain.
And thirdly, if you cannot offer absolution, speak like a father: ‘Listen, I cannot absolve you of this, but I can assure you that God loves you, that God awaits you. Let us pray together to Our Lady, so that she may protect you, and come, return, as I will await you as God does’, and give a blessing. … This is always the point: there, there is a father. … God knows how to forgive things better than we do. But may there at least be the image of the Father”, concluded Francis.
And this is the homily our Holy Father gave during the liturgical celebration of the Sacrament of Confession:

Homily of His Holiness Pope Francis
Penitential Celebration
Saint Peter’s Basilica


Friday, 4 March 2016

“I want to see again” (Mk 10:51). This is what we ask of the Lord today. To see again, because our sins have made us lose sight of all that is good, and have robbed us of the beauty of our calling, leading us instead far away from our journey's end.

This Gospel passage has great symbolic value for our lives, because we all find ourselves in the same situation as Bartimaeus. His blindness led him to poverty and to living on the outskirts of the city, dependent on others for everything he needed. Sin also has this effect: it impoverishes and isolates us. It is a blindness of the spirit, which prevents us from seeing what is most important, from fixing our gaze on the love that gives us life. This blindness leads us little by little to dwell on what is superficial, until we are indifferent to others and to what is good. How many temptations have the power to cloud the heart’s vision and to make it myopic! How easy and misguided it is to believe that life depends on what we have, on our successes and on the approval we receive; to believe that the economy is only for profit and consumption; that personal desires are more important than social responsibility! When we only look to ourselves, we become blind, lifeless and self-centred, devoid of joy and true freedom.

But Jesus is passing by; he is passing by, and he halts: the Gospel tells us that “he stopped” (v. 49). Our hearts race, because we realize that the Light is gazing upon us, that kindly Light which invites us to come out of our dark blindness. Jesus’ closeness to us makes us see that when we are far from him there is something important missing from our lives. His presence makes us feel in need of salvation, and this begins the healing of our heart. Then, when our desire to be healed becomes more courageous, it leads to prayer, to crying out fervently and persistently for help, as did Bartimaeus: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” (v. 47).

Unfortunately, like the “many” in the Gospel, there is always someone who does not want to stop, who does not want to be bothered by someone else crying out in pain, preferring instead to silence and rebuke the person in need who is only a nuisance (cf. v. 48). There is the temptation to move on as if it were nothing, but then we would remain far from the Lord and we would also keep others away from Jesus. May we realize that we are all begging for God’s love, and not allow ourselves to miss the Lord as he passes by. “Timeo transeuntem Dominum” (Saint Augustine). Let us voice our truest desire: “[Jesus], let me receive my sight!” (v. 51). This Jubilee of Mercy is the favourable time to welcome God’s presence, to experience his love and to return to him with all our heart. Like Bartimaeus, let us cast off our cloak and rise to our feet (cf. v. 50): that is, let us cast aside all that prevents us from racing towards him, unafraid of leaving behind those things which make us feel safe and to which we are attached. Let us not remain sedentary, but let us get up and find our spiritual worth again, our dignity as loved sons and daughters who stand before the Lord so that we can be seen by him, forgiven and recreated.

Today more than ever, we Pastors are especially called to hear the cry, perhaps hidden, of all those who wish to encounter the Lord. We need to re-examine those behaviours of ours which at times do not help others to draw close to Jesus; the schedules and programmes which do not meet the real needs of those who may approach the confessional; human regulations, if they are more important than the desire for forgiveness; our own inflexibility which may keep others away from God’s tenderness. We must certainly not water down the demands of the Gospel, but we cannot risk frustrating the desire of the sinner to be reconciled with the Father. For what the Father awaits more than anything is for his sons and daughters to return home (cf. Lk 15:20-32).

May our words be those of the disciples who, echoing Jesus, said to Bartimaeus: “Take heart; rise, he is calling you” (Mk 10:49). We have been sent to inspire courage, to support and to lead others to Jesus. Our ministry is one of accompaniment, so that the encounter with the Lord may be personal and intimate, and the heart may open itself to the Saviour in honesty and without fear. May we not forget: it is God alone who is at work in every person. In the Gospel it is he who stops and speaks to the blind man; it is he who orders the man to be brought to him, and who listens to him and heals him. We have been chosen to awaken the desire for conversion, to be instruments that facilitate this encounter, to stretch out our hand and to absolve, thus making his mercy visible and effective.

The conclusion of the Gospel story is significant: Bartimaeus “immediately received his sight and followed him on the way” (v. 52). When we draw near to Jesus, we too see once more the light which enables us to look to the future with confidence. We find anew the strength and the courage to set out on the way. “Those who believe, see” (Lumen Fidei, 1) and they go forth in hope, because they know that the Lord is present, that he is sustaining and guiding them. Let us follow him, as faithful disciples, so that we can lead all those we encounter to experience the joy of his merciful love.

3 comments:

Jusadbellum said...

This is most edifying. Thanks for the heads up.

Doodler said...

Thank you for this post.
In my copy of the video at 47 minutes the Holy Father goes to sit in the confessional to hear a confession rather than go to make his own confession - unless he was going to make his confession to the young lady!

Mark Thomas said...

Decades ago when the wreckovation of churches began, the parishes, with few exceptions, in my diocese years ago removed confessionals from their main churches. In place of confessionals, the parishes added "Reconciliation Rooms" to their chapels. Each new church built in my diocese follows that pattern.

The doors to the "Reconciliation Rooms" aren't even marked with signs that read "Reconcilation" or "Confession". Anybody who didn't know any better would assume that the "Reconciliation Rooms" are mere closets.

The result is that during the past 40 or so years in my diocese, nobody who enters a church here has seen a confessional. The Holy Sacrament of Penance is literally out of sight, out of mind.

More and more parishes in my diocese have added large coffin-shaped baptismal fonts that are placed prominently at the main entrances to churches to allow for baptism by immersion. That is fine.

My point about that is that parishes celebrate the Eucharistic, Baptism, Confirmation, Anointing of the Sick, and Baptism in the main churches. However, they have consigned the Holy Sacrament of Penance to out-of-sight-out-of-mind status via chapels separated from the main churches. Why have they rendered one Sacrament, Confession, "invisible"?

I believe that the following are two simple ways to call attention to and revive the Sacrament of Penance:

-- Restore confessionals to the main church.

-- From time to time, call great attention to Penance by hearing confessions during Mass.

Pax.

Mark Thomas