Reconciliation or Talking Directly to God

Last night I attended a meeting where our topic was “reconciliation.” Because we are a Catholic group, we were not only discussing being reconciled to God and to one another, but specifically about the Catholic sacrament of Reconciliation. One belief that came out at our meeting was the fact that too many Catholics believe the Sacrament of Reconciliation, like the Sacrament of the Eucharist, is either untrue or not necessary. They believe that the Eucharist is nothing more than bread and that Reconciliation is a ploy of the Church when all that is necessary for forgiveness is to ask God directly.

Reconciliation is a subject that we should all take seriously because it is our loss if we don’t. We are deceiving ourselves if we think that we are so good that we do not need this sacrament…or that since we are not in the state of  “mortal sin” we have little or no need for the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

This Sacrament has been with us since early Christianity. Absolution was always given by a Bishop (a direct, ordained successor of an Apostle) and later by priests, who are also direct, ordained successors of Apostles. The gift of ordination and of absolution was given to Peter and the Apostles to use as an aid to spiritually strengthen the Christian community. We come as a repentant sinner to be reconciled to God….but more than that, we come to grow….to change…to live our lives more Christ-like….and the priest helps us to do that through absolution and serious suggestions, much like spiritual direction.

The one Protestant at the meeting claimed that if we truly can receive this absolution, he could not understand why Catholics are in line on a daily basis! How right he is! My husband made a point that is worthy of thought:

Prayer and Reconciliation complement one another. The saints who were great men and women, but also sinners, had powerful prayer lives. Prayer led them closer to a spiritual union with God that seemed to also lead them to more frequent “reconciliation” as most of them had spiritual “confessors” that they saw regularly. If we develop our prayer lives, we can do the same. We will long for reconciliation and the blessing of friendship with God that results from the sacrament…as we continue our journey towards God. God gave the Apostles this amazing gift…the gift to reconcile us to Him. If we believe this, we will want to be reconciled as often as possible. How do we develop this belief? Through prayer. May we all open our hearts in prayer as we seek to increase our faith, grow in hope and share in the infinite love of God!

JN 20:21-23 Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.”

Mt 16:16-18  “And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Amen, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”

Mt 18:18  “Amen, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”