§ II. On The Qualities Of Contrition

1349. - The qualities necessarily required for the validity of contrition, both perfect and imperfect, are numbered as these six, namely 1° that it be internal; 2° supernatural; 3° supreme; 4° universal; and, if there is question of receiving the Sacrament of Penance, 5° formal; and 6° elicited in order to Confession.

I. Internal or true, i.e. truly conceived in heart and soul. For contrition according to Trent is sorrow of soul.

II. Supernatural, i.e. elicited through the help of grace and from a motive known by faith. For natural means cannot conduce to a supernatural end. Cf. proposition 57 among those condemned by Innocent XI. p. XVIII, and Trent.¹

But suitable motives can be reduced to four: 1° to fear of punishment; 2° to hope of reward; 3° to the baseness of sin; 4° to the love of God.

III. Supreme, so that the sinner appreciatively, i.e. from a previous appreciation or intellectual estimation of sin as the supreme evil, detests his crime more than every other evil, and is prepared in soul to lose and suffer all things rather than commit sin.

IV. Universal, as regards all and individual grave sins committed and not yet remitted. - I said: 1° as regards GRAVE sins; for as regards venial sins it is not required that it be universal, as was said n. 1348. q. 3°, and will be said n. 1350. q. 4°. R. 2°. - I said: 2° as regards ALL AND INDIVIDUAL grave sins; not because individual acts of contrition must also be elicited concerning individual mortal sins - although it is expedient to detest one by one those sins toward which one is affected by a more vehement passion - but in reality one act of contrition suffices, extending itself at least virtually to all and individual sins, both known and forgotten, in the universal: namely, it must extend itself to all grave sins either from one universal motive, or from several particular motives which, at least taken together, extend themselves to all mortal sins committed, even those not occurring to memory. The reason is that no actual sin is remitted without sorrow; but one mortal sin cannot be remitted without another, since remission is made through the infusion of grace, which cannot stand together with mortal sin. I said: 3° As regards all and individual mortal sins committed and NOT YET REMITTED; for the precept of contrition does not extend to sins already remitted, except in the case in which these sins are necessary or free matter of Confession or sacramental absolution.

V. Formal, so that a desire for absolution does not suffice, although it be without affection for sin, - nor an act of charity; for by this desire or act alone the matter of the Sacrament is not yet posited.¹

VI. Elicited in order to Confession, at least practically, since this opinion is probable, although the opposite is more probable.²

1350. Questions. - Query 1° Must contrition be supreme intensively?

Resp. Negatively. The reason is that intensity is something merely accidental: for a greater or lesser degree of sorrow, or affection or effort, does not pertain to the essence of contrition, which can exist whole without a degree of this kind of intensity. Besides, how would you know that this or that degree of intensity must be attained? Moreover the intensity of sorrow is not always in our power. Hence, even when the sense is moved more vehemently toward temporal evil from God's offense, it is not therefore the case that the will itself, under which alone moral evil falls, is less affected by sin. It suffices, therefore, that the sin be displeasing appreciatively as the supreme evil.³

Query 2° Is a formal comparison required in appreciation between various evils and sin, or God?

Resp. Negatively. For it suffices that the sinner sincerely and truly detest sins, and not wish to sin anymore. Indeed confessors act very imprudently who, in order to explore whether sorrow is supreme, propose to penitents certain very dangerous comparisons, e.g. whether they would rather be burned alive, or suffer all the torments of the martyrs, or eat poisonous reptiles, than sin again? For such comparisons move the imagination more vividly, and when a strong temptation approaches, the true disposition which existed before is easily lost.¹

Query 3° What length of time is required for conceiving true and supreme contrition?

Resp. None per se, because length of time does not pertain to the essence of the act, but is merely accidental to it; wherefore it is enough that the act be substantially fulfilled, which can be done even in the smallest instant of time. Yet it is safer to elicit a more intense and more prolonged act of contrition, lest perhaps from levity or too much haste no act as to substance be conceived.²

Query 4° Must contrition concerning venial sins possess these same six qualities?

Resp. 1° It must necessarily possess the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 5th, and practically also the 6th; namely it must be 1° internal, because contrition which is not elicited from the intimate heart is not true; 2° supernatural, because, as was said, natural contrition cannot be a means to a supernatural effect; 3° supreme, or the sinner must detest venial sin more than all natural evils; 4° formal, so namely that the matter of the Sacrament be posited;³ 5° elicited in order to Confession. See n. 1349.

Resp. 2° But it does not have to be necessarily universal, whether in the Sacrament or outside the Sacrament. The reason is that since venial sin is not incompatible with sanctifying grace, one venial sin can be remitted without others.⁴

Query 5° Does fearful attrition (formidolosa), or that conceived from fear of hell, suffice for justification in the Sacrament of Penance?

Resp. Affirmatively, provided it be truly supernatural, absolutely efficacious, and only materially, but not formally or servilely servile. The reason is, 1° because attrition of this kind, since it is a true conversion to God and a true aversion from sin, removes that which stands in the way of the operation of the Sacrament; 2° because this is clearly drawn from Trent,⁵ which says that such attrition disposes the sinner to obtaining justification in the Sacrament of Penance. Cf. the Roman Catechism. Besides, 3° the same Synod² teaches that it sometimes happens that contrition is perfected by charity and reconciles man to God before this Sacrament is actually received. Therefore the Council supposes that perfect contrition is not necessary for receiving the Sacrament rightly; otherwise not only sometimes, but always, the sinner would be justified before he received the Sacrament.

Moreover attrition is called servilely servile when someone indeed grieves concerning sin and wishes to avoid it because of the punishments which he knows are to be inflicted by God; yet he would still be prepared to sin if those punishments did not exist. But it is called simply servile when someone abstains from sin indeed on account of fear of punishments, yet is not so disposed that he would wish to sin if those punishments did not exist, although he abstracts entirely from this thought: if those punishments did not exist. The former is evil, not insofar as it is fear of punishments, but on account of the depraved disposition of soul.

Query 6° Does attrition from fear of the punishments of Purgatory for venial sins suffice?

Resp. Affirmatively, with the very common and morally certain opinion; because all the reasons adduced above for the sufficiency of attrition from fear of hell are valid here also.

Query 7° Does attrition from fear of the temporal punishments of this life, to be undergone for sin as they are inflicted by God, suffice?

Resp. Affirmatively, and, as it seems, more probably, provided it is supernatural. The reason is, 1° because it seems to be clear from the words of Trent, where it says: Attrition is conceived from fear of hell and of punishments: for it distinguishes between the punishments of hell and other punishments; 2° because in fear of this kind all conditions of true attrition can be present. "Yet since" the opposite opinion, founded on the reason that Trent does not say of hell or of punishments, "is not lacking in its probability, at least extrinsic, I think that in practice it is safer that it be observed." Thus St. Alphonsus.³

Query 8° Is also a beginning of love required with attrition for obtaining justification in the Sacrament of Penance?

Resp. Negatively, if by a beginning of love there is understood some degree of perfect charity, by which God is loved above all things. The reason is that for rightly receiving the Sacrament an act which outside the Sacrament would essentially justify is not necessarily prerequired. But an act of charity, and therefore "sorrow which suffices for the nature of contrition, however small it is, deletes every fault," as St. Thomas says.¹ Therefore, etc. - St. Alphonsus² says that this is morally certain.

"But if by initial love of God there is understood a certain pious movement, by which the penitent, sincerely averse from sin, trustingly turns himself to God, and begins to love Him as the font of all justice, or as his justifier, liberator, and glorifier, you will most rightly affirm the necessity of some initial love, since a true conversion of the sinner to God cannot be conceived without a begun love of God of this kind, and besides Trent³ enumerates a certain beginning of love among the dispositions required for justification in Baptism (therefore by parity in Penance). ... But ... such beginning of love of God is had by the very fact" that "the penitent, truly attrite, has recourse with hope of pardon to the tribunal of Penance"; for: 1° "True attrition is a certain sincere conversion of heart to God. But he who is converted to God with a sincere heart is certainly moved of himself toward God as toward good, and therefore he is moved by love. 2° True attrition includes a firm purpose of observing the divine commandments, among which the commandment of love of God obtains the first place. But he who firmly proposes to love God already loves God inchoatively; since a proximate voluntary disposition toward something is of itself already the beginning or inception of that thing. 3° True attrition includes hope of pardon to be obtained from God. But from this, says St. Thomas,⁴ that we hope goods can come to us through someone, we are moved toward him, as toward our good, and so we begin to love him. - Moreover, even that salutary fear of God the avenger, by which true attrition is more often conceived, already contains in itself a certain beginning of the love of God, our liberator and justifier, according to that saying of Ecclesiasticus:¹ The fear of God is the beginning of the love of Him." Thus Van Egeren.