Featured Why Confession?

Yes it is.

“But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.”

9 Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. 10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”

Clear cut case.

 

Forgiveness is a grace, if we confess.

Restitution is a sign of repentance, in Zacchaeus’ case he imposed it on himself, a harsh one, acknowledging that he cheated people.

And he did gain Grace, by the acknowledgement of the Lord of his forgiveness.

Clear cut case.

 

The problem is that you have been alienated from the ancient Apostolic understanding of Scripture.
You have been accustomed to the new human founded interpretive traditions, which vary even among themselves, never objectively settled in interpretation or doctrine.
Luther and Calvin being lawyers imbued their whole enterprise with legalism and legalisms opinions of scripture, not the truth of Scripture.

 

You are pounding the table not the facts.

These are clear scriptural examples.

I think you would deny anything a Catholic told you, because it was a Catholic telling you.

“Such are the words and deeds by which, in our own district of the Rhone, they have deluded many women, who have their consciences seared as with a hot iron. Some of them, indeed, make a public confession of their sins; but others of them are ashamed to do this, and in a tacit kind of way, despairing of [attaining to] the life of God, have, some of them, apostatized altogether; while others hesitate between the two courses, and incur that which is implied in the proverb, ‘neither without nor within;’ possessing this as the fruit from the seed of the children of knowledge.” Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 1:13 (A.D. 180).

“In addition to these there is also a seventh, albeit hard and laborious: the remission of sins through penance…when he does not shrink from declaring his sin to a priest of the Lord.” Origen, Homilies on Leviticus, 2:4 (A.D. 248).

“For although in smaller sins sinners may do penance for a set time, and according to the rules of discipline come to public confession, and by imposition of the hand of the bishop and clergy receive the right of communion: now with their time still unfulfilled, while persecution is still raging, while the peace of the Church itself is not vet restored, they are admitted to communion, and their name is presented; and while the penitence is not yet performed, confession is not yet made, the hands Of the bishop and clergy are not yet laid upon them, the eucharist is given to them; although it is written, ‘Whosoever shall eat the bread and drink the cup of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord.'” Cyprian, To the Clergy, 9 (16):2 (A.D. 250).

 

Catholics had this understanding long before Protestantism or Baptists existed, conforming scripture to their doctrines and opinions was their opening act.

They thought they were guided from on high, but you demonstrate that they were kidding themselves. Bible alonism is just ever changing human opinions and doctrines.

 

It was the Catholic Church that preserved the scriptures and determined and assembled the first Canon itself. That’s what it does, it canonises things.

Knowingly or unknowingly we all trust the God guided Authority of the Catholic Church that did that.

Every book in your bible and mine was determined by the Catholic Church guided by God.

I simply let the Catholic Church explain the meaning of Her Book.

The Bible didn’t come from Protestantism or Baptist’s, they had nothing to do with the Bible, it’s preservation or determining, why would anyone treat their opinions of Scripture as authoritive. Especially as they don’t even agree amongst themselves as to what it means, and no doctrine is settled among them from all their conflicting interpretations of the same scripture.

 

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”

Confession makes us righteous, and is the passing through the Faithful Gate to Heaven.

“All mortal sins are to be submitted to the keys of the Church and all can be forgiven; but recourse to these keys is the only, the necessary, and the certain way to forgiveness. Unless those who are guilty of grievous sin have recourse to the power of the keys, they cannot hope for eternal salvation. Open your lips, them, and confess your sins to the priest. Confession alone is the true gate to Heaven.” Augustine, Christian Combat (A.D. 397).

 

Jesus established the Apostolic Authority to forgive and retain sin so that by confession we could know that we made righteous on earth before the eyes of Heaven.

Paul judged the man forgiven on earth, before the presence of Christ in Heaven.

Serious sin, mortal sin, not only cuts us off from Christian fellowship as with Paul’s expulsion of the man from the community. It cuts us off from God and the life of Grace.

Those with mortal sin need to confess to an Apostolic Successor who is an ambassador of Christ, who has the authority to bind and loose, to forgive and retain sin in His Name.