DESPITE THE FACT THAT I KNOW I WOULD BE HAPPIER IN THE LONG RUN IF I JUST CLEANED MY ROOM

Last night was the diocesan wide Night of Confessions.  For three hours Fr. Anthony, Fr. Miller and I manned the confessionals at St. Sebastian and heard pretty steady confessions all night.  Fr. Pfeiffer joined us for dinner after and we talked about what a wonderful experience it was for us.

But more importantly it was the satisfying experience of those who went to confession.  The absolute relief many people expressed when they finished was an honor to witness.  I made the comment that I wonder why more people don’t take advantage of this.

Well, maybe I don’t wonder that much.  First, there is the courage it takes to make a good confession.  No matter much relief there may be after, you still have to have the courage to go in the first place.  One of my relatives just had knee surgery.  Now she is SO glad that she had it done.  Life is so much easier (and pain free.)  But still, before hand she had to work up the gumption to go into the hospital and have the surgery done in the first place.

Then there are all of the typical arguments that people have:  Why should I tell my sins to another human being?  Why do I need a priest to absolve me?  I can just tell my sins to God . . . and there are all kinds of responses to this but here is one very human reason why should do this:

It works.  Jung who was developing his psychological treatments in Vienna found that most of his patients were Protestants and Jews despite the fact that most of the population was Catholic.  This led him to speculate that the Sacrament of Reconciliation makes psychiatry much less necessary.  The sacramental practice already largely handled (and had for 2,000 years) what psychiatry was developed to do.  No wonder Jesus gave it to us.  It is good for us.

Not that we do it in order to feel good.  But it is a nice side benefit.  So why don’t more people do it?  Why don’t they exercise and diet more?  Why not read better books?  Why not expose themselves to well produced art?  Why not fix up their houses?  We know we would be so much happier in life.

Why not?

I MUST CONFESS: I'VE NOT THOUGHT OF THIS.

There is a guest blog today. C.K. who has guest blogged here before sent this along for my reading and I requested permission to post it. I hope it you get something out of it.

A psychology book I was reading online elaborated upon the assumed superior status of the psychotherapist vs. his patient. This is just the opposite in confession: the priest may be a greater sinner than the penitent, but this is of no consequence. The authority to absolve is not based on the merits of the priest. It is an undeserved grace of God, just like the forgiveness that the penitent receives. Both parties can greet each other in perfect humility, without the stigma of “mental illness” being applied only to the “patient”. We meet as equals, in a sense, in that we both meet with the same disease of original sin. It is possible for a therapist to treat a patient smugly with his own pet theory or worldview (I have even heard of a psychologist encouraging multiple personalities because of the notoriety it earns him). But a priest meets you with truth that even he must accept with obedience. He gives something that he doesn’t just accept from a book, but believes in his heart. In confession, a free, unselfish love can be given to a stranger that a therapist cannot give to a patient he has known for years.

If a person suffers from schizophrenia, he is justifiably grateful to the psychiatrist who prescribes the right treatment to silence the voices in his head. But the patient can be made “well” without being made happy. Everyone needs meaning and purpose in life to be happy, and many people with no detectable neuroses (Carl Jung said one third of his patients were in this category) are seeking peace of soul from therapy and anti-depressants. To paraphrase Fr. Mitch Pacwa, religion may be the opiate of the masses, but it sure beats opium. Can anyone really say that they expect to have a session with a psychologist and leave his office with a prescription and say to himself “Wow, now I have a reason to be happy for the rest of my life.” But I really think that’s what people expect from therapy.

What if you could offer the wretchedness and misery of your whole life to God and be absolved of it in a instant even though you don’t deserve it, and to go basking in the glow of unconditional love…that sounds like something a person could get happy about. To be able then to go one step further and be united to perfect love in Communion as a promise and foretaste of the perfect love, joy, and beauty that can one day be yours. But this is the more challenging route. Making peace with God requires the ultimate blow to the ego, the submission of your will. You have to force yourself through the neck of the bottle, so to speak, and arrive at the other side, converted. You have to stop torturing yourself with false guilt (it’s my fault my brother drank himself to death) and own up to the real spiritual cancers (hate, lust, greed). You have to stop silencing the voice of your conscience with TV, music, and internet and face your sins and place your trust in God over the things you fear but can’t control.

So many of my friends have an obsessive fear of illness, and I think this really points to the ultimate fear of death. Recently I was watching one of those old Technicolor films where the Christian Roman soldier goes bravely to his death rather than deny his faith. In a second, all the reasons to do this filled my mind: for honor, for heavenly merit, because denying my faith is out of the question, but all of these reasons filled me with repulse. But then I thought what about for love of God? In an instant I thought, “Oh, must I only die once?” Love of God is the only antidote for a fear of death. And it’s the only reason to be happy for the rest of your life.

Just some interesting quotes:

"One of the founding fathers of psychology, Sigmund Freud, is quoted saying, 'Catholics don’t need me; they have their little black box.' He was referring to our confessional." Found at 4marks.com

"One of this century's most famous psychologists, Carl Jung, noted that, even tho the area where he practiced was mainly Catholic, most of his patients were Protestants or Jews. He surmised that on a human level, what others achieved in psychotherapy, many Catholics realized just by going to confession."

"He quotes famed Swiss Psychiatrist C. G. Jung: 'During the past 30 years, people from all the civilized countries of the earth have consulted me. I have treated many hundreds of patients, the larger number being Protestants, a small number Jews, and not more than five or six believing Catholics. Among all my patients in the second half of life . . . there has not been one whose problem in the last resort was not that of finding, a religious outlook on life. It is safe to say that every one of them fell ill because he had lost that which the living religions of every age had given to their followers, and none of them has been really healed who did not regain his religious outlook.'"

One more here.