I confess I have wandered away from confession.
Growing up I attended Catholic schools. Confession was woven into our school rhythm. Regularly we would walk to church, file into the pew, and take our turn in the confessional. I remember waiting. While kneeling in the pew, I would weigh out my options. Rather than unload my guilt and shame, I considered making up something or I would sit with my sins weighing out how little I could confess and still make a good confession. When I chose to open myself to a true confession, I remember times of great lightness and joy.
Please hold back any resistance to the institutional aspect of confession from my childhood experience. Consider what this practice is now giving me so many decades later from my early faith steps. I am grateful to have the experience to return to and once again to practice not from any external requirement (which gave me a start) but from an interior response to God in my life.
At the root of any confession is the courage to face ourselves not as we want to be seen but as we truly are. Regular self-examination is to consider what God already knows even if we live unaware and ignorant of the inevitability of living not like Christ.
Recently I have been reflecting and returning to the spiritual practice of confession in my daily life and taking time at the end of the day to examine and confess both the graces and the gaps in my walk.
I share with you a practice laid out from the book, Sacred Rhythms by Ruth Haley Barton.
After some silence:
- See – As you reflect on your day, where do you sense something went wrong either in your behavior or actions? Do you have a feeling that something was not quite right in your day? Can you see how your words or actions might have contributed to someone you interacted with responding in a less than satisfying way?
- Name – Can you specifically name your failure for what it was and recognize what caused it. Perhaps a pattern is emerging. Seeing a pattern motivates me to consider this saying I have heard. A wise man has problems, a foolish man has patterns.
- Confess – Can you be willing to confess not just the obvious violations listed in passages of Scripture like Galatians 5 but can you also confess what while accepted in our culture is not a part of God’s ways? Can you confess your deep-seated attitudes and orientation not to trust and all the ways you are driven to worry and anxiety?
The freedom on the other side of confession is real. Taking responsibility for our part to speak aloud to God and the people in our lives where and how we’ve hurt them brings deep levels of transformation.
May we awaken to the light available in seeking and asking God’s forgiveness.
I return to the words of my childhood. Father, forgive me for I have sinned…
A beautiful reminder and encouragement. Confession is freeing. Those flowers are inspiring too!