Forums » Smalltalk » Any Christians out there?

I have questions about it, confession in particular. This is because I want to write about important aspects of one of my characters, but I'm not religious myself, so I'd like to hear from someone who has first-hand knowledge.

For one person who helps me out I'd like to offer a month Epic! Just spreading some love

I'm not a theologian and its been a long time since I did a confession, but from my understanding the purpose of confession is absolve you of your sins so you will able to go into heaven. The priest in the Catholicism operate as a mediator between us mortals and god for they represent an apostle, a follower of Jesus Christ and his teachings. However its not as simple as simply the priest saying "Your sins are absolved" but instead the priest tells you what you need to do to absolve your sins. For such a sin you did, the priest will tell you do X amount of hail Mary's or anything else that typically ties to the the rosary, the necklace that people wear with the various beads and the cross on it, you do prayers on each bead. In a way you are confessing to the priest, so the priest can tell you what you need to do to be absolved of such sin and thus become closer to god.

I don't know how it works with Protestants or Orthodox churches, but this was my understanding of it which I can completely wrong. Its been a long time since I did a confession and even longer when I went to a bible study to get my Communion in which we are taught about confession.

As a former Catholic I can corroborate with max234, this is how I remember confession being. The room in which you confess is small and there is a barrier between you and the priest with only a screen of sorts to vaguely see the priest, a chair in there and a place for kneeling. Also very dim lighting I assume so that way the priest can't identify who is confessing since it supposed to be anonymous in a way. Only God is supposed to know who is confessing. And usually you have to say the act of contrition, I can't remember if it is before or after confessing. Depending on the sin you get the amount of hail marys and our fathers. Sins like missing church was five hail marys and one our father.

But again this is for the Roman Catholic faith, Christians and even other sects of Catholicism tend to do some things differently.

I was raised in a loosely Protestant/Methodist house and the way I remember forgiveness being explained to me was more that you seek a priest's counsel but your business is between you and God ultimately, and all a priest can do is give you sage advice.

I don't know if that's how it actually works though. Not a lot of my family went to church, and only a few people actually read the Bible. Of those people was my mother, who is an atheist.

We stopped doing the God thing when I was around 6 so all my personal memories of it are of the things you tell a young child, like saying grace before meals or the children's prayer before sleep. There was also something about being able to speak to God whenever you needed to through prayer, even to confess a sin and ask forgiveness, but you had to still work to better yourself or God would know you weren't sincere. I don't really know if adults hear the same thing though.

I'd like to thank all of you for answering, you've been very helpful!

People can continue to respond if they want to, but I do feel like I've received the vital information I needed.