Question — Noldin, Summa of Moral Theology
Question First. On Annual Confession
692. On the precept itself. The Church establishes that all the faithful who have arrived at the years of discretion should confess their sins at least once a year to their own priest.
a. Annual confession was first prescribed by the Fourth Lateran Council, c. 21: "Every faithful person of either sex, after he has arrived at the years of discretion, should faithfully confess all his own sins alone at least once a year to his own priest ... reverently receiving at least at Easter the sacrament of the Eucharist, unless perhaps by the counsel of his own priest, for some reasonable cause, he judges that he should abstain from receiving it for a time." The same precept was renewed by the Council of Trent.1
b. Since a certain time of the year in which confession must be made from the prescription of the Church cannot be determined, the precept of annual confession is satisfied at whatever time of the year confession is made. It is not certainly established how, from the will of the Church, the year within which the prescribed confession is to be made should be computed. De Lugo indeed maintains that the year must be computed according to civil use, from January to January, because the word year naturally has this sense;2 nevertheless the opinion seems preferable which Suarez holds with others, that the year must be computed from Easter to Easter, both because universal custom has interpreted the law in this sense, and because the Church, prescribing communion at Easter, seems at the same time to prescribe confession as a necessary preparation.3
1 Cf. sess. 13, can. 9; sess. 14, can. 8 and c. 5.
2 Lugo, De poenitent., disp. 15, n. 157.
3 Suarez, De poenitent., disp. 35.
693. Its declaration. 1. The precept of annual confession obliges under grave obligation; this is gathered both from the gravity of the matter and from the grave penalty added (privation of ecclesiastical burial).
- This precept of itself obliges all the faithful who have arrived at the years of discretion, that is, who are capable of grave sin; therefore, after the seventh year has been completed, the faithful are bound to confession, unless it is established that, beyond the ordinary course of nature, they have not yet arrived at sufficient use of reason.
Pastors are not excused from the obligation of admitting to confession children who have reached the eighth year of age, unless they prudently suppose that they have not yet sinned gravely. Therefore, as Busembaum warns, "if the child seems, at least in a crude way, to know that God is offended by this or that, and shows sorrow and purpose, he must be absolved; otherwise, however, if sufficient use of reason is not noted; but if it is doubtful, he can (indeed in the article of death must) be absolved under condition."
- The precept of annual confession obliges only those who have committed grave sin: for we are not held to the confession of venial sins by divine law, because according to the Council of Trent venial sins can be kept silent in confession without fault,1 nor by ecclesiastical law, because by this precept the Church does not intend to impose a new obligation as regards the matter of confession, but only to prescribe the time for making confession.
Only he satisfies the precept of annual confession who confesses necessary matter, which alone falls under the precept; but not he who confesses only venial sins (or mortal sins already remitted), because these do not fall under the precept. Therefore he who, for example, at Easter confessed only venial sins and then, as the year passes, commits a mortal sin, is by that very fact held to another confession in the same year. Many authors defend this doctrine with Lugo;2 but Ballerini, with many others, judges that he who has committed only venial sins indeed is not obliged to confession, but that by the confession itself of venial sins the precept is satisfied. And indeed the use and persuasion of the faithful certainly confirm this opinion: for he who in Paschal time confesses his venial sins with the intention of satisfying the precept judges that he has satisfied it, and does not think that he is obliged to make confession again in the same year if perhaps he commits a mortal sin.3 Moreover, it is not equitable that he who has confessed mortal sins in the same year should be in a better condition than he who has confessed only venial sins. Hence Lehmkuhl (n. 1204) rightly advises that the faithful are not to be warned of a further obligation.
This precept is not satisfied by invalid confession, and much less by sacrilegious confession: for the divine precept requires confession by which the sinner is reconciled with God, which can happen only through valid confession. Hence the contrary proposition was condemned.4
The proper priest is the pastor, the bishop, and the pope; but confession now can be made to any approved priest, nor is it any longer required that it be made to the pastor or in the parish church: for after pontifical privileges granted to regulars, the custom prevailed of making annual confession before any approved priest, by which custom the contrary disposition of the Lateran Council was abolished.
Whether the obligation of confessing is affixed to the time of one year for ending the obligation, or rather for urging the obligation, authors do not agree; but it seems that one must altogether say with St. Alphonsus that the time is determined by the Church for urging the fulfillment of the divine precept.5
Therefore he who did not fulfill the precept within the year is held afterwards to confess as soon as possible in order to fulfill the precept, because the obligation of the preceding year still urges.
1 Sess. 14, c. 5.
2 Cf. Lugo, De poenitent., disp. 15, n. 162 ss.
3 Ballerini-Palmieri V, n. 696.
4 Proposition 14 condemned by Alexander VII: He who makes a confession voluntarily null satisfies the precept of the Church.
5 Cf. Lugo, De poenitentia, disp. 15, n. 177 ss.