Fr. Z's Blog

From a reader…

QUAERITUR:

I have a question about confession. If you want to remain anonymous during confession, is it OK for the priest to not allow it? I did something horrible and it had a lot of ramifications in my life so it still comes up, but I have a really good reason to want anonymity. I’ve “tried out” many confessors looking for help with the problems I have now in my spiritual life, but I’ve found that many times the priest won’t let me be anonymous. Sometimes they ask to talk to me afterward, but sometimes they just come around the screen in the confessional or pop out of the confessional immediately after my confession so they can see who I am. Is that normal? Oddly enough, none of them really want to talk to me, they just want to know who I am I guess? Is that OK?

It is wrong wrong wrong for a priest confessor – let’s call him Fr. Ficcanaso – to require face to face confession and/or to come out of the confessional to see who just finished.

A note to priests or seminarians reading this:   On your way to the confessional to start to hear confessions keep your eyes lowered to the ground and do not look at the people standing in line waiting.  Don’t engage them, greet them, or even look at them.  Keep your eyes lowered.

According to the Code of Canon Law for the Latin Church a penitent has a right to have his confession heard anonymously behind a fixed grate between the penitent and the confessor.

Can. 964 §2: The conference of bishops is to establish norms regarding the confessional; it is to take care, however, that there are always confessionals with a fixed grate between the penitent and the confessor in an open place so that the faithful who wish to can use them freely.

The code also says that confessions are not to be heard outside a confession (which must have a fixed grate) except for a good reason (964 §3).

While the canon does specifically used the word “anonymous” or “anonymity”, it is clearly implied in the fact of the need for a fixed grate so that a penitent who wishes to use it may do so.  The grate is also there for the sake of propriety, to protect the priest and the penitent.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church says (CCC 1467):

Given the delicacy and greatness of this ministry and the respect due to persons, the Church declares that every priest who hears confessions is bound under very severe penalties to keep absolute secrecy regarding the sins that his penitents have confessed to him. He can make no use of knowledge that confession gives him about penitents’ lives. This secret, which admits of no exceptions, is called the “sacramental seal”, because what the penitent has made known to the priest remains “sealed” by the sacrament.

And…

Can. 983 §1. The sacramental seal is inviolable; therefore it is absolutely forbidden for a confessor to betray in any way a penitent in words or in any manner and for any reason.

§2. The interpreter, if there is one, and all others who in any way have knowledge of sins from confession are also obliged to observe secrecy.

Can. 984 §1. A confessor is prohibited completely from using knowledge acquired from confession to the detriment of the penitent even when any danger of revelation is excluded.

A priest confessor who takes action to discover the identity of the penitent who desires to be anonymous has already acted to the detriment of the penitent.

Moreover, it is easier to honor the Seal if the priest doesn’t know who the penitent is.

I think that, salvo meliore iudicio, a priest who forces face to face confession or who comes out to see who it was has already come dangerously close to violating the Seal.  He certainly has violated the point of can. 964.

What can one do about this?   If this priest is not the pastor of the parish, you should inform the pastor about this.  If this priest is the pastor, you should tell him that what he does has upset you.   If there is no change in practice, you should inform the diocesan bishop.  If that does not produce results, you should write to the Apostolic Nuncio.

The 2004 document Redemptionis Sacramentum is mainly about the Eucharist but it is applicable to other liturgical moments. It says:

[184.] Any Catholic, whether Priest or Deacon or lay member of Christ’s faithful, has the right to lodge a complaint regarding a liturgical abuse to the diocesan Bishop or the competent Ordinary equivalent to him in law, or to the Apostolic See on account of the primacy of the Roman Pontiff.  It is fitting, however, insofar as possible, that the report or complaint be submitted first to the diocesan Bishop. This is naturally to be done in truth and charity.

Sacramental confession is a liturgical act.   Forcing face to face confession or violating anonymity is a liturgical abuse.

AND ANOTHER THING… (update):

There are occasions in which the penitent has incurred a censure which the priest does not have the faculty to absolve.   In that case the priest has to make recourse to the competent authority, for example, the Apostolic Penitentiary in Rome (AP), which has competence in matters of the internal forum (confession).   In that case, the priest must gather some basic information from the penitent.   He doesn’t have to know the penitent’s name, but he needs to know their state of life, the basics, so that he can give the AP a bare bones idea of who the penitent is (age, maturity, etc.).   Then the priest must advise the penitent to make an appointment with him, say 2 weeks later to allow time for communication, to return for the verdict of the AP and, if the AP is favorable, to be absolved from the censure.

The AP usually responds to a communication within 24 hours.   So if a priest were to fax something to the AP, they would write by letter back to the priest confessor sending the response in an envelope inside another envelope through the mail bags between the Holy See and the Apostolic Nuncio, who in turn forwards the AP’s envelop to the priest.  That could be fast than 2 weeks, but that permits enough time to pass.

Again, when the priest writes to the AP, he gives just the bare bones minimum of information and circumstances to make the case plain.

This procedure should be part of the training of seminarians.  But it mostly isn’t.  Here is a book about how to have recourse to the AP.  It’s Italian but… hey… HERE.

FATHERS!  If you wind up with a penitent whose censure you can’t absolve, and you are not sure about what to do, fix an appointment with the penitent to meet again in the confessional in a couple of days or when convenient.  Then get informed about the next step.

Finally, if a priest needs to know more about how to do this, I’m willing to coach him up a bit.