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Getting Rid of the “Elder Brother Syndrome”

Is it important that we Catholics confess to the priest? Many of my friends don’t want to go for confession ...Confession helps me but sometimes it is difficult to find a priest for confession, especially during Sunday Masses... (M.M.)

The general feeling is that the sacrament of reconciliation is in crisis. Sometimes, it also depends on how much time priests devote to the confessional or what means they use to attract Catholics penitents to the confessional.

Obviously some restrictions in available times are due to a marked decrease in clergy in some parts of the world.

The real question, however, is to encourage a new alliance and good relationships between priests and laity who are all of them sinners, and this highlights the splendor of the sacrament of mercy.

Living the gospel is not a contest about being right and just, in order to become “better” or holier than the other, but it is about growing in charity, i.e., growing in the love of God and in the love of one’s neighbor.

the prodigal son
The prodigal son. Photo by: Tony Endaya

As in the parable of the Prodigal Son, we have to get rid of the “elder brother syndrome” to be more aware of the merciful, loving and blessed embrace of his father (Lk 15:20).

Pope Francis has reminded priests that “the confessional should not be a room of torture, but the place of the Lord’s mercy” (Evangelii Gaudium, 44).

It is indeed an authentic regeneration coming from the source of love that can urge a wife to ask forgiveness from her husband, and a father to ask for forgiveness from his son.

Perhaps even the ministry of priests must have parental love as a model, for ministry requires full-time service. In the same way, we can dream of a lay person able to apologize to his priest too.

However, there is a need of compassionate shepherds whom the faithful can approach fearlessly and without hesitation whenever possible, and at different times, not only during Sunday Mass.

In short, it would be nice for us all to mature in the awareness that we are living stones of the Church, being guided by this Word from scriptures: “Love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honor.” (Romans 12, 10).

Fr. Paolo Gentili and Fr. Am Mijares

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