Church asked to relax rules on general absolution

The Catholic Church has been asked to "relax the rules governing the use of general absolution".

The Jubilee Year (next year) would be an appropriate time to allow individual parishes use the rite "to enable people who have been away from Confession for a long time to approach the sacrament," said Father Gerard Moloney, editor of Reality, the Redemptorist magazine, in the current issue.

"Special celebrations could be organised and personal invitations issued to every parishioner. Sensitively and creatively done, it would be a wonderful Jubilee Year gesture," he said. "Business in the box is in crisis today and it poses a particular challenge to the church as we enter into the new millennium."

Father Moloney said that too often in the past, people's experience of the sacrament had been negative. "Too much stress was placed on the guilt and unworthiness of the sinner and on the specifics and number of sins and far too little on the unconditional forgiveness of God. In particular, too much emphasis was placed on sexual sins. Confession was experienced, not as the sacrament of forgiveness, but as a stressful and fearful inquisition."

Even today there were priests, who, in the confessional, did not so much represent a loving God as an eager judge, "who abuse their role in an appalling manner". The result was that Confession became a frightening experience for many people. "It put them off for life," he added.

If the current decline was to be reversed, a proper understanding of the sacrament had to be presented by the church. It should be explained and experienced "as a wonderful celebration of God's unconditional love for his people".