Hmmm…
It is not often that I interrupt a Pope for a Bishop, but I am making an exception this week. I just received a copy of Archbishop Carlson’s Pastoral Letter on Penance in the mail. Though I have just started reading it, kind of like the scene in Jerry McGuire “he had me at “Dear Sisters and Brothers…” So let me share a bit of the introduction by way of tweaking your interest.
“One of the major purposes of the letter is the attempt to move us away from a guilt-centered notion of sin and the sacrament: sin means that we feel guilty, that God is angry, and the Sacrament of Penance is about softening our guilt and God’s anger. I want to move us toward a different notion of sin: sin means that something is deeply wounded in us, that we have weakened or ruptured our relationship with God, and the Sacrament of Penance is where God’s desire to heal us meets our desire to be healed.
The first section of the letter, on sinfulness, is primarily about helping us grow in our knowledge of how sin works in our lives. In approaching the Sacrament of Penance, I think that many people don’t make the crucial distinction between sinful actions and the basic attitudes of heart at the root of those sinful actions. Because we don’t make this distinction we don’t celebrate the sacrament as fruitfully as we might. We confess the same sinful actions over and over and we don’t seem to make any progress in our lives. We conclude that the sacrament isn’t doing anything and, out of frustration, we stop coming. But perhaps we aren’t making progress because we are dealing with the fruit and not getting to the root of the sinful actions. Through this letter I want to issue an invitation: let the Lord’s healing love penetrate to the roots of sin in your life.
Sometimes a part of our heart doesn’t really believe in Jesus’ desire to heal us. Other times we don’t really believe in the role that our faith plays in that healing. Sometimes a part of our heart doesn’t believe that our physical presence at the sacramental encounter with Jesus matters: it can happen wherever and whenever and however we want. Other times we don’t believe in the role played by the sacramental minister, the priest, in the healing encounter. I think we can let Scriptures be our guide in overcoming those barriers of unbelief. As each layer of unbelief is overcome, we will be led more deeply into the fullness of the Church’s sacramental tradition.
The pastoral letter can be ordered at www.archstl.org/store, or may be downloaded at http://archstl.org/archstl/page/most-reverend-robert-j-carlson