How to confess in a church? This question is often asked by those who are just going to the temple, and those who are just curious about what confession in general is. The question of how to confess correctly in the church - with emphasis on the word "right" - is also very important for those who go to the temple constantly.
As a rule,
preparation for confession takes place in several stages. Confession is not an indulgence, nor is it permission for new sins. It’s just that once a person realizes that it is unbearably hard for him to carry a block of sin on his heart. She crushes him and oppresses. This is the first stage of preparation for confession. A person is aware of his sinfulness, feels the impossibility to continue to live the way he lived. Therefore, he asks God: "Lord, help me change, help me turn this page of life!" The main condition under which the page can be turned over is sincere repentance, emotional distress and full admission of guilt and sinfulness.
Sincere heart affliction is incompatible with anger and all sorts of excesses. Therefore, confession is preceded by a period when a person is reconciled with others and forgives those who offended him, fasts, possibly refrains from carnal pleasures. An important part of the pre-confession phase is reciting penitential prayers or just prayers for the forgiveness of one's sins.
Should I record my sins and give a detailed account of them? Or is it enough short note? How right? Confession in the church is also possible from memory. But Lutherans, for example, quite rightly believe that a person is not able to remember all his sins and will miss something. Orthodox priests recommend writing memorials for themselves, sharing sins according to violated commandments. We must begin with the main thing - sins against God. Then there are sins against one's neighbors, lastly there are minor sins. But, of course, strict instructions do not exist - it's just easier not to forget.
The confession itself follows, and the priest by the authority given by Christ will allow from sin. Perhaps he will impose some kind of punishment - penance, which will consist of an additional post, reading prayers and bows. Why is this done? Often a person simply needs to feel that sin is truly outlived, passed, forgiven. Penance is never perpetual.
As a rule, after confession, the believer partakes of the Holy Mysteries of Christ. This strengthens the weak human spirit in the decision to no longer sin.
Where and how to confess? In the church? Or can you confess at home? For example, seriously ill, how to confess? In the church too? But it happens that circumstances are such that a person cannot reach the temple.
It is permissible to confess at home, it is only necessary to stipulate this issue with the priest. In addition, a believer confesses his sins to God every time during prayer.
The rite of absolution itself takes place differently in Orthodoxy, Catholicism and Protestantism.
In the Orthodox Church, the priest covers the believer with epitrachilia and reads a permissive prayer. Among Catholics, the priest does not see the person confessing, because he is in a special small room - a confessional. Many people present this rite in feature films. The Protestants have no penance, because it is believed that all sins are forgiven by God's grace.
Confession does not have to be a secret. The first Christians opened their thoughts and repented of their sins in public - and all believers prayed together for the forgiveness of sinners. This type of confession existed and subsequently - for example, it was practiced by John of Kronstadt.
But then the confession became a secret - after all, for some sins the penitent could pay with his life. Already from the fifth century the concept of the secret of confession appeared. Moreover, subsequently in both the Catholic and Orthodox churches, punishments were introduced for a priest who violated the secret of confession.
But secular authorities made exceptions - for example, by decree of Peter I, the priest was charged with the obligation to inform the authorities if, from confession, he became aware of a crime against the state or the monarch. In Soviet Russia, the failure to report an impending crime was prosecuted and no exceptions were made for priests. Therefore, such an action as “confessing in the church” required considerable courage from both believers and priests. Now the secret of confession is protected by law - the priest is not obliged to report or testify about what became known to him at the confession.
Interestingly, confession is not the prerogative of only Christianity - it is inherent in all Abrahamic religions. Both in Judaism and in Islam there are analogues of Christian confession, a prayer for the forgiveness of sins. But there it is not of such a systemic nature as in Christianity.