Why would I want to go to Confession?

Many people will ask why they need to go to confession. In asking this question, as is the case for asking most questions, there are usually many facets to answer the question, depending on the experience and understanding of the person asking the question. At the human level, it is good to know that Jesus truly does forgive us by hearing the words of absolution from Him through the priest. The words the priest says is not just his own, they are the words of God. He commissioned the apostles to go and give his mercy to all.

Jesus knows we are human, and that we need to hear the words, not just hope it is true. When we teach our children, we have them sing songs and even act them out. maybe we even have them spell it our with their bodies. Most teachers acknowledge that this is the best and most integrated way to learn. In the same way, when we physically go confession, God is teaching us about His love and mercy. It builds our faith in Him. The fruit of this is that we no longer have to have that white knuckle faith. If we believe that we are saved by faith without works, then we must hold on to that faith with all our might. We may say to ourselves, "I believe in Jesus, I believe in Jesus, I believe in Jesus" over and over in order to psyche ourselves into belief so we can feel we are saved. But this is not faith. Faith is lived freely. There is joy in it. So when I hear the words of love from God Himself, I can let go of all the garbage I have been holding on to and be the saint I am called to be. That is why faith leads to justification. In short, confession is a faith builder.

Yet another human aspect is that it keeps us on task. It convicts us. We do not like to confess our sins to others. Not only that, but saying them out loud so we can hear ourselves makes it real. There is no more hiding or denial. We must accept this truth that we are sinners. This is something nobody likes to look at, but it is the truth. If we do not accept this truth, we will be locked in denial and never be able to come to true freedom.

It is part of the graces that Jesus uses to transform our lives. It is not until we go to confession that we know that we are still loved despite our offenses. In other words, we are still lovable because God who is all good still loves us. An example of this is how we go about our lives pretending everything is fine and that we are in good with God on the exterior, but we get this huge God complex where we think God is just waiting there to condemn us. So we walk around thinking evil about ourselves, but we never really know why. We can't think of any wrong we have done because we are good at denying it. If we go to confession, we know and acknowledge our offenses, but we are able to put them behind us and be the people we are called to be and want to be.

So the question is no longer, "Why do I have to go to confession?", but becomes an exclamation, "I get to go to confession!" This just explains the human aspects of confessions. For scriptural support of Confessions, you can look up Mt 16:18 & 19, Mt 18:18 and James 5:14-16 for starters. Implicit in the question of confession is also the authority of the Church which answers the question why we must go to a priest.