Pope Francis meets with participants in an annual course on the internal forum, organized by the Apostolic Penitentiary
By Vatican News staff reporter
Pope Francis told confessors on Friday that love is at the heart of a good confession.
He spoke to participants in an annual course on the internal forum, organized by the Apostolic Penitentiary.
This year’s course was conducted online due to the Coronavirus pandemic.
Abandonment
During the audience, which took place in Sala Paulo VI, the Pope spoke about three expressions that explain the meaning of the Sacrament of Reconciliation: the first, “abandoning oneself to Love”; the second, “letting oneself be transformed by Love”; and the third: “corresponding to Love”.
Addressing the assembled people, the Pope noted that “confessing is not going to the dry cleaner to remove a stain. No. It is something else”.
The first step towards a good confession, he said, “is precisely the act of faith, of abandonment, with which the penitent approaches mercy”.
The Pope went on to say that “every confessor, therefore, must always be able to marvel at the brothers who, by faith, ask for God’s forgiveness … Pain for their own sins is the sign of so confident abandonment to Love.
Transformation
“Living like this in confession means letting oneself be transformed by Love”, he stressed.
Reflecting on this second expression, the Pope noted that the penitent who finds “a ray of this welcoming Love, allows himself to be transformed by Love”, which transforms “a heart of stone into a heart of flesh”.
He added: “It is the same in emotional life: the person is transformed by the encounter with great love”.
Pope Francis told those present that a good confessor “is always called to perceive the miracle of change, to perceive the work of Grace in the hearts of penitents, encouraging as much as possible the transforming action”.
Responding to love
Turning his attention to the third expression – to correspond to Love – said the Pope, “the true will to conversion is realized in correspondence with the love of God received and received”.
In loving our brothers and sisters, he underlined, “we show ourselves, the world and God that we truly love Him and respond, always inappropriately, to His mercy.”
Forgiven sinners
Pope Francis continued: “The good confessor always highlights, beside the primacy of love, the indispensable love for one’s neighbor, as a daily gym where love for God is trained”.
The Pope also stressed the importance of frequent confession as “a path of sanctification, a school of faith, abandonment, change and correspondence to the Father’s merciful love”.
In conclusion, Pope Francis observed: “Each of us is a forgiven sinner, placed at the service of others, so that they too, through the sacramental encounter, can find that Love that fascinated and changed our lives”.