By Cynthia Aralu

Hello everyone. Remember to pray the Rosary!

I had an unpleasant experience I wish to share, which God has used to bless me. I thought I would probably never talk about it because I did not want to sin. Then while praying and I felt so illuminated in prayer, I felt I ought to share. Then, as I thought of what I was going to write, I felt my anger, humanness and difficulty forgiving people come into play, so I thought it was better not to write it and also, if I do not write it, then it is easier for me to forget about it. However, yesterday, just before I began writing on a different topic, I came across a short reel about St. Catherine of Siena. How there were people in the Dominican community or Siena that tried to barr her from receiving the Holy Eucharist because they could not believe she was being sincere, when she sat in meditative trances for hours after receiving the Holy Eucharist, meditating on Who she had just received (The Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus). And when people tried to deprive her of the Holy Eucharist, miracles happened, where she received the Holy Eucharist in a miraculous fashion. It made me laugh when I heard about her story and I could relate to being barred from Jesus in a Sacrament (though not in nearly the same way). So, since I was laughing about what happened to me genuinely, I thought I could write about it.

I should say, I don’t think I am writing this because I always want to see the bad in people or because I want to hurt the priest or priests. I am writing this because it is a bad thing that is quite visible to me, that others may not seem so sensitive about, so they do not see it, and it is starting to seem to me that people show me the worst of themselves and show others the best, and I think this is how God feels.

This past Friday, as I made my way to church, I meditated on the verses in John which I had written about in my last blog post. I didn’t really have an understanding of habitual sin and was marvelling about how one who is in Christ cannot sin habitually. I read habitual sins can be venial or mortal sins (Please read more and fact check this), so, I thought to myself, that venial sins must be much more horrible than I think it has been taught to be. I knew it was horrible but I did not know it was so much more horrible to the extent that one would need prayer to be restored to life, though they are not cut off from Christ. I was quite amazed by my lack of knowledge. I also believed Jesus said something similar, that anyone who sins is a slave and I believed this is what He meant here (a quick research says Jesus also refers to habitual sin here).

Just before I could walk towards the steps leading to church, I did a bad thing. Though it was an act in the moment with not a lot of thinking to it. It lacked compassion for a man who needed it so very much. I made actions to try to repair it, but later on, upon entering the church, I could not go to my seat and sit still. I felt deep remorse and felt moved to go to confession, though it had only been one day since my last confession on Thursday and I had already asked God for forgiveness. I trusted in the power of confession more than I trusted in myself and all I knew was that I felt deeply and sorrowfully and I had to go to confession. Especially since I had come to a bigger understanding of how bad venial sins are, so this must even be so bad. This knowledge had not kept me from sinning in the moment though. Only love had reformed me.

I suppose to be clear, I already had a type of idea that venial sins were bad because God has graced me with deep sorrow for venial sin, such that one time, I think what I felt was myself being weighed down physically by the weight of my sin (this is only my perception at the time and I became a bit doubtful about it later on. God knows the full truth). The priest later clarified to me that the sin itself was venial and I was surprised because it had felt like mortal sin (quite grave).

Then there is a more recent event on Wednesday, where it felt so terrible as I tried to convince myself that I had not sinned, to the point that I pulled away from God in a spiritual practice. I did not realise it was my sin pulling me away from God until I listened to a video much later on. Though I didn’t mean to not admit to sinning. I was agonising and analysing the action that to my mind, did not seem like a sin but somehow it nagged at me. I also had come across the verse of Pharaoh going back and forth with repenting and hardening his heart, so, I wondered if it applied to me. I also sinned again that night, but I did not think it was sinful, but as I was sleeping, I had the worst acid reflux I have never had before, that made me shoot up quickly, awoken from sleep in shock, with a throat that was burning, the throat that took part in the other sin (sinful, irreverent speech and manner and resentful and ungrateful heart when speaking to God). I suddenly realised I had done so in the past but did not think much of it as anything bad, which made me realise that it must all be very serious and that I must go to confession. So, I went to confession on Thursday, and mentioned 2 sins, the exact way I felt without fully understanding all of it, until I watched another video which brought more understanding on one of it. The responsorial Psalm at mass that day was “If today you hear His voice, harden not your hearts“. I did not think I was hardening my heart. I did not feel any hardening, yet it appears that I did.

As a result of my shortcomings and deep sorrow, I had gone to confession on Wednesday (less than a week apart), then on Thursday (one day apart), and then on Friday (one day apart). It was the same priest, and on Friday he got angry. He scolded me that I cannot come everyday for confession, that confession is such a sacred and holy sacrament and that I was abusing confession. He told me I was only to confess sins. I asked him whether he did not believe I had done something bad. He mentioned that they were just everyday human weaknesses and asked me where the sin was in what I had shared to him. There were 2 sins I had confessed, but the focus of this analysis was one of the sins, so I told him that I did not show a man compassion, and I would be lucky if the man did not hear me when I grumbled and groaned, although I helped him afterwards. (The man whom I had not been compassionate to had even asked me later on as I helped him, quite out of the blue, whether I had the time to do what I was doing, so now I wonder if he was really a man or if he was a man, it is possible he had sensed my initial grief, but I did not say all this to the priest). Though, then there is God who sees all things. I didn’t say this too. I was told by the priest that it is venial sin and I should only confess grievous sins at confession. I told him that I was taught growing up to confess both venial and mortal sins at confession. And I know that growing up, the people from Opus Dei practiced daily confession (I called it an order when I spoke to him, but it is actually a personal prelature). I referred to what I had heard of in passing, as a child going to an Opus Dei Centre but I have become unsure of whether this is true because this statement seemed to make the priest more upset. To the point that he told me not to bring that there, and “are the people at “Opus Dei” better than the saints?” I thought, “this (the church) is not yours.” but I kept it to myself. Then, he told me to just say a prayer to God to forgive me and that’s it and the way I live is not the way to live my life. He also mentioned that I was getting in the way of other people on a long queue who needed confession. Only God can judge the truth of this.

I was worried about not getting absolved of my sins. I wondered if that was going to be my ordeal since I did not understand why he was yelling at me and why this was happening or why he thought it was okay to speak to me in this way. However, I give thanks to God for the grace to be silent, and to speak when he gave me the chance to, calmly and full of reason. While explaining to him where the sin was, I came to a better contrition for my sin, as I think, if I remember correctly, I had to hold back tears as I responded to him with a shaky voice.

He absolved me of my sins and I left the confessional dazed. I stared when I got in front of the tabernacle and then stared some more when I got to a seat, as the congregation prayed the stations of the cross in the background. Then I jerked myself out of my daze, just enough to join them as they began the recitation of the tenth station of the cross: Jesus is Stripped of His Garments. I suppose it may have struck me.

Then, I prayed to Jesus not to sin against the priest and Him or because of the priest (thinking more directly of the event with the priest and not the priest himself). Then I walked past the priest with a smile on my face when he almost bumped into me and told me, “sorry”. Then, I listened to him preach about doing everything from a place of love, since the reading of that day was Jesus’ response to the Scribe that the first commandment was to love God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength, and the second to love your neighbour as yourself. I prayed to God to help me not to sin, because I knew this was hard for me, since I struggle with forgiving people and such ironies do not help me. I thanked God before reaching the priest for Communion, and a smile brightened up my face, and then, I received communion from the priest on my knees and looked at him afterwards and he looked away (to my perception, it seemed angry but I don’t know his heart). Then, I did a deep bow after mass in front of the altar and I thanked God for all the grace. Then, over the next days leading up to now, my mind has opened to just how good and loving and merciful God is and why people take God for granted. If all you had to do was make a prayer of contrition and your venial sins are forgiven, it is easy to take God for granted and lose a Fear of God, and easy for people to be fooled that it is easy to be a “good Christian” and get into heaven. I began to feel fearful about being like the priest and everyone else who had this knowledge as a teaching of the Catholic Church, and might take God for granted. I began to pray that I do not take God for granted because I have a wicked and proud and bandit heart, and it would be so easy for me to in fact do so. I was not better than that priest, just blessed by God with the grace not to have fallen like he did. I have also cried in pain multiple times because of this event. I think because I have tried not to feel hate and to love the man, and have prayed for the priest so many times, so that all I have been left with are tears, because what else could I do? I mean, it is allowed, to cry, and yeah, God gets to see all my tears and He gets to heal me of my wound.

I also tried to understand what it means by internet’s definition “to abuse confession”. I learnt it could be clerical abuse of confession or violation of the seal of confession from the perspective of the clergy and from the perspective of the penitent, it could be when a person does not have contrition, or when someone is concealing sin, presumptuous of mercy, committing repetitive sin without intent to change or when someone is scrupulous.

When I had confessed the sin initially, I had added how I had tried to help the man afterwards, because I did not want to appear like a horrible person, on the one hand, and on the other hand, I wished to paint a very clear picture of all that happened. On thinking back on it now, I see how that had diminished my contrition, and Mother Mary does not play about. So, indeed, if one reflects upon it that way, I was abusing confession, though I did not intend to, and not in the way the priest had understood it or used the phrase, “abused confession”. So, I did come to believe that I had deserved what happened to me on Friday, and even on my journey home, I had prayed for God to correct me if I had indeed abused confession.

Then, I learnt that the Church teaches that there are various practices that remove venial sins, like the reception of communion, praying “The Our Father”, “The Confiteor at Mass”, almsgiving, blessing yourself with Holy Water and others. My mind has been inundated and amazed and in awe of the Goodness and Love and Mercy of God. Although, I knew it was a pious opinion that receiving communion is believed to do so, I thought it was only said out of faith which is not bad, since God loves faith, and I had written in past, posts that I’d come to believe through study of the bible that when I read the bible, pray, receive communion, go to adoration/benediction, I am cleansed by Jesus. I believed as a personal belief. I did not know the church may teach it. Correct me if I am wrong about church’s teaching on this, since I have confirmed this from Google AI, or better still, do your own research. I will research more later.

Then, I learnt about the saints that went to daily confession although I do not know how true this is. I will list those I have read about and you can confirm for yourself how true: St. Ignatius of Loyola, St. Francis Xavier, St. Plilip Neri, St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori (taught it), St. Charles Borromeo, St. Catherine of Siena, and there is a past pope: Pope Pius XII.

I don’t typically go to confession daily. I go when I feel quite bad. There have been times when it was about every week or 2 weeks, give or take, like an internal clock, without me necessarily timing it, and other times like monthly or a little longer. But lately, it has become more frequent (less than a week). I don’t know why but it is just how it has been. I am sensitive to how sinful I am, and I feel a need to go to confession and I try my best at confession, though I don’t say I am perfect at it because sometimes I wonder if this is something to say at confession, though it comes to my mind, or how do I say this?, and I have omitted something I didn’t know how to voice or didn’t think was a sin, or other times, I forget sins at confession. Confession has been such a tremendous good for me. I have been illumined just by going to confession even when I did not have full understanding of the sin I had committed, just that feeling that something I did was wrong and so I shared the event of it, and my mind became opened in confession or after confession, or other times, what I confessed was related to the mass reading of that day.

In my research about what the saints did, I came to a method of preparation for confession revealed from a dialogue from God The Father to St. Catherine of Siena, to have perfect contrition and skip purgatory. I will include it briefly: 1. Meditate on the Passion/sufferings of Jesus, to move my heart towards Him in love, 2. Be aware that Jesus suffered specifically because of my sin through a heartfelt mental connection between my action and the particular suffering and pain of Jesus, so that I feel a contrition because of the pain I caused to Jesus and not because of me, 3. Have true humility and think I deserve suffering and punishment, 4. I must see His blood and let His Blood inflame me with a supernatural love within me to suffer for other people like Jesus, instead of relieve myself, 5. Be sorry not only for my sins but for the sins of other people that offend God. Here is St. Catherine’s prayer: Holy Spirit, come into my heart, by Your power, I journey to You, God, and grant me charity with fear. Protect me, O Christ, from every evil thought, Warm me with Your Sweet Love, so that every burden seems light to me. My Holy Father, and My Sweet Lord, help me always in all my endeavours. Christ Love, Christ Love. Here is a link about this: St. Catherine’s Method of Having a Good Confession

Curious thing is that I had been watching videos of Mother Angelica of EWTN, and she advised someone who called on her show, after an unpleasant experience at confession, to find a good priest who will not talk you out of your sin and your going to confession, and that you should confess both venial and mortal sins. I’d wondered why she would give that advise because how many priests are there and how can somebody even know who is a good priest? But you see, I had to apologise to Mother Angelica after this event, because I understood it. But still, where shall I go to? Shall I avoid this priest, and avoid going to confession, which is so beneficial for my soul? How do I know which priest is in the confessional, to even begin to avoid? How do I know a priest is a good priest? How many priests are there in the first place, in easy proximity to me, that one can be so selective? This is all too complicated for me. I am very simple. So, I decided that I will have to be strong and courageous and go to confession. I just have to focus on Jesus. This is between me and Jesus. And like Father Mark beard said, “Don’t let anyone get between you and Jesus.”

Eternal rest grant unto Mother Angelica and Father Mark Beard, O Lord, and may Your Perpetual Light shine upon them. May their souls and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the Mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

I also couldn’t help but wonder, “how upset is the enemy over the power of confession?” It has given me freedom. It has given me God and a Heavenly Family that watch over me and do not play about my salvation.

I give thanks to that priest, for though he did not do what he did out of love, though he might actually believe he did or perhaps he knows he did not, he has done me such a huge favour. I give thanks to God for using this to give me a greater knowledge and understanding of Him, of His Love and Mercy. I pray that I never take God for granted. in Jesus’ name. Amen.

On a final note, pray the Rosary and entrust yourself to Jesus through Mary through the method of St. Louis Marie de Montfort! And if you need help with this entrustment/consecration to Jesus through Mary, look up the course provided by the Heralds of the Gospel on their Reconquest Platform. It is a solid 33-day course. There’s an upcoming course starting on March 23rd, 2026.

Thank you for reading today’s post. Remember to like this post and share it with your friends if you enjoyed it. Follow me on my blog, Katmira’s blog, to receive notifications whenever I have a new post. You can also subscribe below to get an email notification whenever a new post is out. This is particularly helpful if you don’t have a WordPress account.

Let it be, until we meet again or “Ka ọ dị” as it is said in Igbo.

Note: Co-pilot was used as an editing tool. Google AI was used as a research and editing tool.