Last Updated:Friday - 09/24/2010

WCR Letters to the Editor

A plea for the third rite of Reconciliation

It upsets me that Bishop Faber MacDonald of the Saint John, N.B., Diocese perceives general absolution, Vatican II's third rite of Reconciliation, as a form of "dissent or rebellion" detrimental to priestly vocations (WCR, Dec. 19).

The bishop attacks this much-loved rite without explaining why or how it has been misused or become such an expression of discord.

During the brief, grace-filled period of the third rite, a communal service of recognition of sinfulness, general confession and absolution, men, women and children packed churches, celebrating the experience of an all-loving and merciful God, and seeking forgiveness, reconciliation and peace as members of a faith community.

Unfortunately, this overwhelming lay response to the communal penitential service triggered an ecclesiastical response to the use of the third rite in such a context as an "illegitimate use of general absolution."

If the hierarchy feared that the large number of penitents receiving general absolution somehow signalled the moral conscience of the faithful could not be trusted, that modern Catholics as a whole had lost their sense of sin, and hence must return to "the box" (and the medieval monastic understanding of sin as solely a private matter) then that fear was terribly misplaced and the faithful seriously misjudged.

Far from being a form of rebellion or dissent, Catholics found that the celebration of the sacrament under the third rite replicated the early Christians' understanding of sin as an offence against community.

Sensitive to the public nature of sin - that is, to their personal responsibility for the suffering world their choices created - Catholics joined each other in guilt, sorrow and a yearning for conversion of heart, forgiveness and reconciliation with God and the Church.

The vibrant liturgical expression and spiritual power of this celebration of the sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation brought many peace and joy, strength to amend their lives and a renewed desire to heal the community they had wounded.

Veronica Marie Rochford
Whitecourt

Applause and support for Bishop Fred Henry

I am so glad to see someone who isn't afraid to stand up and say no.

I do not understand the politicians saying keep the Church out of politics when in fact politics has invaded the Church.

I cannot accept gay marriage, or saying happy holidays instead of Happy Christmas.

Under the facade of equality and political correctness I am supposed to set aside my beliefs and moral code, my nurse's training where deviant sex included homosexuals, and my childhood when it was illegal.

I applaud anyone prepared to stand up and be counted.

I too cannot live a lie.

Diana Reid
Guelph, Ont.

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