Are there special Lenten programs for penance in your dioceses or parishes?
From a reader:
FYI, the Diocese of Paterson (NJ) is for the second year offering confessions at every parish on Monday’s throughout Lent.
Here is the link to the website with further information should we wish to read more.http://www.welcomehometohealing.org/
It is promoted with billboards throughout the area.
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Our parish will be offering Mass in the Extraordinary Form every Wednesday during Lent (Missa Cantata) with confessions being heard after all weekend Masses in addition to their regular schedule (half-hour before every Mass).
Archdiocese of Baltimore will again have ‘The Light is on for You’, confessions at every Catholic Church on every Wednesday through Lent.
At my parish, after the Stations of The Cross on Fridays, we will have a program of teaching on the Mass! Wow. Fancy that, I’m hoping & praying for a good turnout. It will be taught by our Pastor!
The Diocese of Bridgeport (CT) is doing the Diocesan Confession Campaign again this Lent. Every parish, every Tuesday from 7-9 pm. This is the second year of the program.
The priest at my local FSSP parish has a useful approach to confession throughout the year:
He holds confession before and after every Mass. And he holds a Mass everyday, so confession is available all week :)
This is also great for families who travel long distances for the EF Mass on Sundays, since the long distance might preclude them from traveling twice a week.
FSSP Sacramento – confessions before every Mass on weekdays (2 or 3 a day) and Saturdays, including 8:30-10am Saturdays, before and after all three Sunday Masses, and during Mass, for as long as necessary and possible. This is all year, not just during Lent. Here, too, people come from several counties and travel long distances; so confession is offered as often as possible and particularly on Sundays and Holy Days, for as long as necessary.
My parish holds “Reconciliation services” during both Advent and Lent. These aren’t abusive general-absolution events, but rather a group of priests that get together at one parish at a time to hear the confessions of massive numbers of people. I don’t know if there’s a liturgy attached because I haven’t visited one yet (I’ve been going during regular hours).
Our parish also has “penance services” 3 times a year, which are pretty heavily publicized (Advent, Lent, and one in the summer). Just as Gingko100 describes, there are individual confessions heard by not only each of the parish priests but priests who are from other parishes, retired, etc.
There is a prayer/reflection service beforehand, but it is made clear that this is not a substitute for confessing to a priest. It’s more of a spiritual preparation. Everyone can pick up an “examination of conscience” that is printed for distribution beforehand.
Father – if I may share part of a meditation I noticed in “Magnificat” last Sunday – from Father Lorenzo Scupoli (d. 1610):
“…the enemy strives hard to suggest that you should not start on the work of inner purification immediately the sin is noticed [sic], but should wait just a little – not a day, not an hour, but just a little while. But as soon as you agree to this, he brings along another sin: after a sin with the tongue, a sing with the eye, and again with some other sense; and so you willy-nilly postpone the purification of this second sin, since it is first necessary to purify yourself of the first. And in this way, putting it off continues for a whole day and sin after sin fills the soul…”
My parish priest – Deo gratias – mandates that all catechism students go to Confession (at a special service) both at Advent and Lent. At least three times a week he avails himself – for hours – in the confessional.
The devil must hate him.
Que St Jean-Marie Vianney vous garde, mon père!
Are there special Lenten programs for penance in your dioceses or parishes?
Yeah – every Saturday of the year from 2:30-3:30pm; every Sunday of the year before the 9:30am and Noon Masses, and on weekdays before the 7:30am Mass and 7:00pm Mass. Priests often go to their confessionals whenever something is going on with people in the church and folks usually respond to a priest heading to his confessional like that.
Our Lenten program for Confession at Assumption Grotto follows our regularly scheduled program until we get close to Easter. Then, the priests who were so generous throughout the year add a few more time slots.
I hope many priests will talk about Confession, and about how the 7 sins play themselves out in today’s world during this lent. Hint: Think fathers, about all the ways we can sin through the media we use. How about venial sins and that media?
I witnessed people flock over to the confessionals after a great sermon. It wasn’t condescending, nor was it fire and brimstone. It was actually a great soul-searching content that stirred the conscience. You can read it here: A young priest, a good sermon, and a long confession line…. Reading it doesn’t do the sermon justice because the gentleness, and the passion with which he delivered the sermon, can’t be experienced.
There are penance services in all the parishes of our diocese during both Lent and Advent. It seems to give people the idea that twice a year is good enough. I would prefer to see aomehting that encourages regular confession.
Visigrad – I have to agree; although I appreciate the seasonal services, I do think that they encourage a lot of people to think they only need to go then. A larger problem, of course, is the number who think they never need to go. There really needs to be more emphasis on why this Sacrament is so important!
I find that the penance services no longer work, people are to busy. I have whole days of Confessions during Advent and Lent.
Lenten Day of Confessions
March 23, 2010
7:30 AM thru 9:00 PM
Holy Ghost Church
316 Judson St.
Tiverton, Rhode Island
We have confession before every Mass on Saturday evening and Sunday. During Lent, we have a couple of services where we have 4 or more priests available to hear confessions. Plus, I am very lucky that I live so close to the Fathers of Mercy Chapel of Divine Mercy. They are always ready to hear a confession any time.
Brief rundown of our diocesan NO parish’s Lent “extras”:
*two Ash Wednesday Masses
*Chaplet of Divine Mercy and Stations of the Cross every Friday at 2:30 and 7 pm (which we already have in the afternoons all the time)
*Tuesday evening soup and Bible study
*communal penance on two Wednesdays (others available in the vicariate)
*the occasional parish fish fry ;)
*Mass of the Lord’s Supper on Maundy Thursday
*Stations of the Cross, service and Tenebrae on Good Friday
*Basket blessing on Holy Saturday
*Easter Vigil
We’ll be having evening Lenten Masses Monday-Friday, Stations of the Cross every Friday, and Friday Lenten Fish Dinners (yum-yum!). There’ll also be a Lenten retreat. :-)