Recapping, we’ve been through 2 parts of the Introductory Rites so far, those being the Entrance and the Greeting of the Altar & the People. Next we’ll talk about what some people may feel is a not-so-fun part of the Mass. The Act of Penitence, or Penitential Rite as some may call it, is a chance to have ourselves absolved from venial sin prior to receiving the Eucharist.
BUT WAIT!!!
You’re Catholic warning light is probably saying, “Danger, Will Robinson, Danger!” Or if you’re not as much of a complete dork as I am, you’re probably just wondering how Catholics believe our sins can be forgiven outside the Sacrament of Reconciliation.
See, as Catholics, we believe there are two kinds of sin—Venial Sin & Mortal Sin—which have two very distinct effects on our relationship with God. The importance of identifying sin is that we as Catholics point to Chapter 21, Verse 27 of the Revelation to John, which says, “…but nothing unclean will enter (heaven), nor any (one) who does abominable things or tells lies….” So, if we die with sin on our souls, we cannot enter Heaven. Some Protestant faiths are of the belief that Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross made up for our sins to the extent that we don’t have to ask for forgiveness for them. Their philosophy is that no matter what you do in life, whether you steal a pack of bubble gum from the Quick-E-Mart or open fire in the middle of the mall, killing dozens of innocent Bath & Body Works and Kirkland’s shoppers, all you have to do is “accept Jesus as your personal Lord & Savior” and have faith that you’re going to heaven. Nice thought, but I’m not convinced that being a TRUE Christian would have NO degree of accountability attached to it.
So we Catholics believe that you have to ACTIVELY seek forgiveness for your sins from God. God is all-loving and all-merciful, so as long as you ask for it, you’ll get it. Think of when you were a kid: your parents KNEW you were the one who wanted to see if your dad’s watch would easily flush down the toilet. Then when it did, Fluffy’s cat food, your mom’s pearl necklace, and your older sister’s make-up seemed like the next most important experiments to conduct. They just wanted you to admit what you did to them AND to yourself so that you could fully understand WHY what you did was wrong in hopes that you wouldn’t do it again and grow to be a better person. It’s the same thing with God. Obviously God knows what we did wrong. He knows EVERYTHING. In fact, He knew you were going to do it BEFORE you did it. He just wants us to admit what we’ve done and promise to Him and to ourselves that (with His help) we can try to not do that thing again in the future.
So now we know that we need to seek forgiveness, and we know why we need to seek forgiveness. So the issue becomes HOW we seek forgiveness. Again, this is another area where Catholics & Protestants differ greatly. Most Protestant faiths are of the belief that you just talk to God and ask for forgiveness and that’s it. Could be…but Jesus had a better idea. That’s right…I said JESUS had a better idea—not “The Catholic Church had a better idea.” Let’s look at the Gospel of John, Chapter 20, Verses 21-23 where we find Jesus (who had just entered a locked room) speaking to his 12 Apostles after he had just resurrected (well, 10 Apostles, because Judas had already hung himself because he felt so bad for betraying Jesus, and “Doubting” Thomas wasn’t there—which is why he had his doubts):
(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."
Again, everybody, this isn’t something the Catholic Church made up to give priests something to do…this is something JESUS TOLD HIS APOSTLES TO DO. Now, some people say that Jesus told his apostles to do this, and not modern-day priests. Well, as Chapter 6 of the Acts of the Apostles shows, the apostles realized that they would need help. Christianity wasn’t meant to stay just in Jerusalem. Jesus sent his followers out to proclaim the Gospel to ALL. The world’s pretty big—too big for 12 guys to reach. So they ordained helpers to spread out all over the world. Those guys ordained others who ordained others, etc. So ultimately, the priests we have today are under the same charge and direction as the original apostles and the men they ordained to help carry out the mission Jesus gave them. So yeah…that’s pretty awesome to think about. And remember, NO other…and I mean NO OTHER church in the ENTIRE WORLD can trace itself (with an unbroken and non-heretical line) back to the 12 Apostles. Period.
So now that we’ve covered where priests got the authority to forgive sins from (and there’s absolutely no denying it), let’s get back to the types of sin. To help demonstrate this concept for you, I’ll employ my mad graphic design skills…it’s ok, you can be jealous…
See, when everything’s hunky-dory (wow…I’m very sorry I just said that), God loves us fully and we love him back (as best we can), and our relationship looks something like this:
Now sometimes we might sin in a way that involves a “grave” (serious) matter, and we have full knowledge that what we are about to do is wrong, and we commit the sin anyway, completely under our own free choice. This is called Mortal Sin. When we commit a mortal sin, our relationship with God changes to look something like this:
Take a good look at how the relationship changes with mortal sin: we sever our love of God by deeply offending Him. HOWEVER, notice that God doesn’t stop loving us. In fact, he doesn’t love us ANY less when we sin. God loves us the same no matter what we do. So if we completely sever that relationship, it would take something substantial on our part to get things back on track. This is where the Sacrament of Reconciliation comes in. Now, we’ll fully dive into the Sacrament of Reconciliation later…just know for now that it brings our relationship with God back to looking like this:
Now, sometimes we commit sins that are less serious sins, or more serious sins that are committed either without fully thinking about their consequences, or done by force of habit. For instance, if we gossip about someone and completely destroy their reputation after we thought about it, knew it would destroy their reputation, and did it anyway, that would be a mortal sin. But we can take that same sin of gossip in a less serious way (say, if we whispered to our friend that the person sitting across the restaurant from you was wearing the most hideous shirt you’ve ever seen), and since it was a less serious matter, and you probably didn’t think about how you’d hurt this person’s reputation before you said it (especially if you’re in the habit of doing this kind of gossiping all the time), and you’ve just committed what’s called a Venial Sin. When we commit a venial sin, our relationship with God is not broken, but strained, and it ends up looking something like this:
Again, notice that although our side of the relationship has changed, God loves us just the same: perfectly. Now, we can confess our venial sins in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, but we also have a way of reconciling ourselves to God after venial sin built right into the Mass! By fully participating in the Penitential Rite and receiving the Eucharist, our relationship with God is restored back to:
See, before we can receive the Eucharist and be in full Communion with God through it (remembering Revelation 21:27 above), we need to be clean. I’m not talking about remembering to wash your hands after you go to the restroom (although, you should do that before shaking anyone’s hand at the Sign of Peace—especially mine!). I’m talking about our SOULS being clean. Remember, we’re dealing with the physical AND the spiritual realm here at Mass. So before receiving the Eucharist, if we have committed a mortal sin, we need to receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation (again, we’ll fully explain that later—just trust me on this one for now). If we have committed a venial sin, we still have an established relationship with God, and we just need to sort of re-strengthen it through the Penitential Rite and being fully in Communion with God through the Eucharist.
I think that’s a good bit of info for this post, so we’ll pick up with what we actually do and say in the Penitential Rite in the next post.
Good luck out there!
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