Marissa Mellon
wrote at 3:38pm on June 30th 2008 in reply to the original post
I've been wondering about this for a while now, when we go to confession, even if we don't say all our sins, are we forgiven for all of them or just the one's we've said?

Thanks,
Marissa

Rev Fr Greg Rowles OFM Cap
wrote at 3:43pm on June 30th 2008 in reply to Marissa Mellon
Marissa, when God forgives sin through the absolution of the priest, he forgives ALL our sins, including those we cannot remember. After all, we are sincerely sorry for all our sins. Otherwise, why go to the Lord for forgiveness? If you later remember something you forgot, dismiss it from your mind. It is gone forever and the Lord wants you to trust his mercy, put the past aside and the live each new day in his love, one day at a time.


Father John Flynn
wrote at 6:32pm on June 30th 2008 in reply to Marissa Mellon
Dear Marissa: I would like to distinguish between forgetting to mention a sin and deliberately not confessing a sin. If we make a good examination of our conscience and confess all the sins we are aware we have committed then we have done all we need to do on our part.

And with venial sins it is not strictly necessary to confess them, although it is certainly good to do so if we are aware we have sinned.

With grave or mortal sins, however, we are bound to confess all those we are aware of having committed, or the confession is not valid and we do not obtain forgiveness. The Catechism deals with this in a couple of questions.

1456 Confession to a priest is an essential part of the sacrament of Penance: "All mortal sins of which penitents after a diligent self-examination are conscious must be recounted by them in confession, even if they are most secret and have been committed against the last two precepts of the Decalogue; for these sins sometimes wound the soul more grievously and are more dangerous than those which are committed openly."54

When Christ's faithful strive to confess all the sins that they can remember, they undoubtedly place all of them before the divine mercy for pardon. But those who fail to do so and knowingly withhold some, place nothing before the divine goodness for remission through the mediation of the priest, "for if the sick person is too ashamed to show his wound to the doctor, the medicine cannot heal what it does not know."55

Gifford Chee
wrote at 12:51pm on July 24th 2008 in reply to Father John Flynn
As refered earlier, i like the phrase, "for if the sick person is too ashamed to show his wound to the doctor, the medicine cannot heal what it does not know." What if, it's such a rutine that you should go for confession, even if your not sorry for your sins, it's just the rutine, the act, Does God forgive those sins as well? Jesus did say those sin that you forgive are forgiven and vice versa. Is the priest allowed to NOT forgive sins in confession?

Father John Flynn
wrote at 1:16pm on July 24th 2008 in reply to Gifford Chee
Dear Gifford: In order to obtain forgiveness the person making the confession needs to have a genuine repentence for their sins and show a desire to change their conduct. A priest can deny a person absolution, and in fact should do so, if the person does not demonstrate repentence, or if they say they are going to continue with the same sinful condluct without making any attempt to change.

Naturally, often we commit the same sins, so the Church is not saying you have to guarantee you will not sin again, just that we do acknowledge our sinfulness, our sorrow, and make a resolution to try and do better in future.

Further Q&A about this topic@http://www.xt3.com/discussion/thread.php?id=969&969&!id=2511&page=1&perPage=10