On Cofession

“Learning to know spirituality helps us to realize the relativity of time. The path to eternity “where there will be no more time” begins in spirituality. In the experience of spirituality the partitions and walls that separate our present from our past will be taken down. Spirituality reunites us. We are reunited with our departed loved ones and our life with them, with our childhood and with treasures long lost.“Then something else, something new becomes possible, changing one’s past, changing one’s own past self, as if one were washing away the dirty traces of our falls and betrayals. We are told “All is possible to those who believe”. I remember how Father Seraphim Batiugov used to say, “A time will come, in your inner life, when you will begin to heal your past.””Fudel, Sergei. Light in the Darkness. Crestwood New York: St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1989., pp. 45-46I’ve been asked by a few people to post my sermon (on Confession) from last Sunday (March 20, 2011). Since I don’t write them out, I will try my best. I took Sergei Fudel’s interesting concept of the relativity of time in relationship to repentance and applied it directly to the great healing sacrament of Confession.We have a lot of hokey psycho-babble out today that talks about inner healing and healing the past, so it is always risky to use this kind of language. Moreover, what we find in the “new-age-y” world of therapy—even when it speaks of healing the past—never addresses the issue of repentance. The world of modern therapy wants to provide healing without having a true diagnosis of the disease. Thus, it is usually only partially successful, at best.Orthodoxy addresses suffering through the lens of sin. Pain, suffering, death itself has come into the world because of the warping effects of sin—that primal alienation from God that leaves all things twisted from their original intent. Healing can only come once that reality is acknowledged. Indeed, the healing of the universe, accomplished only in Jesus Christ, has been made possible because “one man died for all” that all might live in Him, (see 2 Corinthians 5:14ff). This faith in the healing power of Christ’s death and resurrection—His triumph over the power of sin and death can only be meaningful if it is acknowledged and personalized in our own lives. This is where confession comes in.We are often tempted to see confession as a mere enumeration of offenses. We approach the mystery of forgiveness with a laundry list! This, all too common, attitude breeds a sense of dread in us—not about the overall corrosive power of sin in our lives, but about the details and particulars of individual acts. We fail to see the forest not only for the trees, but for the individual leaves! And in so doing, the power of confession to heal us gets lost in the minutiae of the details. We need to take a new approach.When one goes to the doctor for a potentially life threatening disease, it is important to trace out the development of symptoms, yet no one would ever expect us to recall the exact moment we first noticed them according to the clock. Nor would the extreme details about what the first boil, or sore, or swelling, or pain looked and felt like be necessary. In fact, such detail might well get in the way of a good diagnosis. There is such a thing as too much information!In diagnosing a disease, knowledge of the symptoms is vital, but, in the end the most important thing is the treatment. This always involves the cooperation of the patient. If we refuse to take the medicine, or show up for the treatment, we will only get sicker. The analogy to illness and healing of the body with illness and healing of the spirit is virtually complete.When we come to the priest for confession, we first have to remember that it is not he who heals us, but God. The priest merely prescribes the medicine, which is almost always prayer, faithful attendance at Church Services, receiving Holy Communion, and rigorous self-reflection. Sin, as a disease, has many symptoms, but it always leads in the same direction—toward spiritual alienation and, if untreated, spiritual death. Describing the list of details about what we have done is far less important than identifying the underlying illness. For instance, most people shudder at the idea of confessing sexual misdeeds. Covering them up with outright denial, of course, would be ludicrous and only make things worse. But, there is no need to describe in detail the acts committed. It is enough to say that one has succumbed to lust in most cases, or, to admit to having looked at images that provoked lustful thoughts and actions. The precise details of what one saw or did are not necessary. The symptom has been revealed, but the actual illness may be quite different from what we first imagine. Lust, like most other appetites (gluttony, for example), often emerges from misplaced passion—from a form of idolatry! Our focus turns from the real source of life and joy (the Kingdom of God, which fills everything, if only we have eyes to perceive it in our midst) toward things which cannot fulfill us. Lust, gluttony, and other forms of greed arise when we attempt to fill ourselves with something other than Christ. They are the moth eaten “treasures of this world” that pass away, but leave their ugly marks on us in the meantime. When we confess them, we are acknowledging particular ways in which our lives have gone awry, but the solution, the prescription we are given for healing, will always be practical. We will be asked to replace those idols with what is true and lasting and we will be given specific methods to help us—prayer, fasting, faithful attendance at Church, receiving Holy Communion, and, of course, the avoidance of the things that tempt us. We will be told that in so doing we will not only be freed from their power in the present, but mysteriously freed from their power over our past. How can this be?The past, like the present, is a matter of perception. While there are real, concrete, events that mark specific moments in history (our own personal history along with the broader scope of history), it is the interpretation of those events that is always problematic. First, we often get the “facts” themselves wrong. (Think about how often we have had a fight with our spouse or a friend over the plain details of “what happened”). Then, there is the meaning or motivation behind events. This is far more difficult to get at than the events themselves. One of the symptoms of sin, however, is the “blame game”. Whether or not we have the “facts” right, we blame someone else or some extraneous condition to justify our wrongdoing (or failure to do what is right) and re-interpret the situation to remove the fault from us. Using medical analogies again, this is misreporting the symptom, and it is very dangerous. It is only when we recall our own fault in the matter at hand that the consequences can be clearly examined and healed. Once again, we need to understand our own role, the disposition of our own heart, in any occasion for sin and not the role of others. We must reach the point where we understand that, though there may be “reasons” for what we did (or failed to do), they are not excuses. We must come to the place where we no longer want to hide behind excuses. We must simply want to be made well and are willing to take the spiritual medicine necessary to accomplish this.Here we are speaking of the human heart; the place where all sin and all healing begin. The true medicine of repentance and confession must be effective here, in the heart, if it is to effect a change in our lives. Once we have described the symptoms of our spiritual illness (our sins—in word, deed, thought, “things done and left undone”) we can come to understand their causes and in understanding them, begin to change them.Why did I do such and such, say such and such, think such and such,(or fail to do such and such)? What was the disposition of my heart in all this? Was I filled with lust, greed, gluttony, pride, envy, etc.? Why was I like this? What can be done to avoid this in the future?It is at this point where the past can actually be changed. When we understand who we were and why we were the way we were in our sinning, we can mysteriously change and transform—not just now, but then. This is a mystery that surpasses our normal, worldly, understanding. It is a mystery that allows us to delve into the seemingly immutable past and, by the power of Christ’s death and resurrection, to be healed. The trajectory of sin and alienation that began “then” is disrupted, undone, washed away, healed. But all this requires very hard word and very strict honesty. And it is only very rarely accomplished all at once.The healing process generally takes time and great effort. Just as one would not normally expect one chemotherapy session, or one radiation treatment to cure a cancer, one cannot expect one confession to cure a condition of habitual sin (the repeated behaviors, states of mind, etc.) that we find most troubling. The rare singular action that requires confession and is never repeated is just that—rare! Most of us suffer from repeated patterns of behavior, thought, words, etc., which will need to be repented of and confessed over and over, until they grow weaker and weaker and ultimately fade away. In Great Lent we hear the story of St. Mary of Egypt, who struggled day and night for almost twenty years with her overwhelming passions—and this was in the desert, far away from any chance of fulfilling them! Likewise, we will continue to struggle with ours in whatever “desert” we have to inhabit to overcome them.Why is this? It usually takes a while to get sick, and it takes a while to get well. After repenting and confessing we may feel marvelously free from the power of the sins that trouble us, but then we fall back—as if pulled by some terrible gravity toward the very thing we are seeking to escape. It is only when we come to anticipate this that we can also come up with a plan to resist. And this anticipation, itself, is a sign of healing. Once we become vigilant in recognizing the signs of our spiritual illness returning, we can be quick to seek help—through prayer, confession, and the conscious reception of Holy Communion (the medicine of Eternal Life).Can you see a pattern here, one which unites past, present, and future?Vigilance in the present reduces the power of sin in the future and is based on an honest understanding of our past. Once we get this, real healing is possible. Of course, we cannot do it alone. One of the greatest of all sins is pride—the idea that we can somehow make ourselves well without any external help. The hyper-individualism of our culture contributes mightily to this. We expect that once we learn a “skill” we ought to be able to use it without further instruction or improvement. The fact is that in the so-called, “real world”, as well as in the truly real world of the spirit, this attitude is just plain stupid. In the spiritual life it is exceedingly dangerous and opens us to all sorts of trouble. Any real skill is only honed with practice and constant striving to improve. Almost always it requires some kind of coaching and instruction. The very best know that they can get better and are constantly looking for guides who can help them. We must do likewise if we intend to improve our spiritual lives—which are directly concerned not with skills pertaining only to the here and now, but to eternity.The Church, through the grace of God in Christ, gives us confession as the means of expressing our repentance, of acknowledging the symptoms of spiritual sickness and for moving on toward real healing—of the past, the present, and the future. We are given guides in our spiritual literature, the gospels first and foremost along with the rest of Holy Scripture. Our priests are trained to give spiritual guidance in confession, and sometimes are given a deeper grace of wisdom to help even further. While a true spiritual “father” or “director” is relatively rare (and these can include women, too, often elder nuns in well-established communities), even our regular parish priests may act as “doctors” of souls and can provide the medicine of spiritual healing. If this is truly there for our taking, why would we not avail ourselves of such a great gift?