Sixth, it was not used in the early church.
Sixth, it was not used in the early church.
§ 109. (VI) The sort of confession the Romanists demand was not used in the early church which succeeded the apostolic church. In that church no scrupulous enumeration of all sins under peril of salvation was demanded as necessary from those who confessed as if by divine Law. Gratian ([Ius canonicum,] De poenit., dist. 5, c. In poenitentia): “Many religious have also been of the opinion that secret confession was unnecessary, such as Ambrose, Augustine, Chrysostom, Theophylact, and other Greek fathers.”
** Gratian sets forth the truth with the question: “Whether someone can make satisfaction to God only by means of contrition of the heart and secret satisfaction without oral confession?” He provides three responses. First, some say that any pardon for crime can be earned without making a confession to the church and the use of the priestly judgment; [Gratian] takes up thirty-seven chapters of the first distinction dealing with this. The second response is that of those who think that no one can be cleansed of sin without oral confession and the satisfaction of work. In accomplishing this he passes through fifty chapters, that is, to ch. 87. In chs. 88–89 he explains in what way the authorities who favor the first response can be explained by another interpretation. The third response is that of Gratian himself, which he supplies in these words after ch. 89: “We have openly and briefly explained on what authorities and on what foundations of reason both opinions of satisfaction and confession depend. We reserve for the judgment of the reader to which of these he should rather adhere, for both have wise and religious men as their supporters.” **
See above. B. Rhenanus (preface to Tertullian, De poenit., p. 544): “We have used the testimonies of very many for no other reason than in order that one might not be amazed that Tertullian said nothing about that secret confession of sins which, as we gather, was born from the public confession [exomologesis].” In some copies it reads as follows: “The ancients used public confession [publica exomologesis] for many centuries before the secret one developed. Tertullian has nothing to do with that; it was completely unknown at his time.” The Index expurg. (p. 19) orders this testimony of Rhenanus to be deleted.
Polydorus Virgilius quotes the same thing (De rer. inventoribus, bk. 6, ch. 1), but that is falling to the same eraser: “Let it be deleted,” says the Index expurgat. (p. 196).
Furthermore, the judgment of Gratian about private confession is quite true, as is evident from the following. Ambrose (bk. 10, commentary on Luke, ch. 22): “So Peter wept because the blame comes suddenly upon him. I do not find what he said. I do find that he wept. I read about his tears, but I do not read about his satisfaction. However, what cannot be defended can be washed away. Tears wash away a sin which one is ashamed to confess orally and which the weeping of truth and pardon display.”
Augustine (Conf., bk. 10, ch. 3): “Therefore what is it to me that people listen to my confessions, as if they themselves will cure all my weaknesses? It is a strange way to learn about the life of someone else and a lazy way to correct their own. Why do they ask me who I am when they do not want to hear from You who they are? And from what source do they know if I speak the truth when they hear about me from my own self? Certainly no one knows what is going on within a man except the spirit of man who is within man [1 Cor. 2:11].”
Chrysostom (on Psalm 50, homily 2): “God alone should see you as you confess. If you are embarrassed to tell someone what you have done wrong, tell that daily in your soul. I am not telling you to confess to a fellow slave. But now, it is unnecessary to confess to witnesses who are present. A searching out of sins may be done without a witness, by thinking. Let this be the judgment: God alone should see you confessing, the God who does not accuse your sins but absolves sins because of your confession.” “I am not leading you into the arena of your fellow slaves. I am not forcing you to uncover your sins to people. Go back to your conscience before God. Explain yourself. Show the greatest Physician your wounds, and ask Him for medicine” (De incompreh. Dei natura, homily 5, vol. 5, col. 1185). “Be first to tell your own sins, that you may be justified. I ask you, why, then, are you ashamed and embarrassed to tell your own sins? Take care to tell them to the person who accuses you, for you are not confessing to a fellow slave so that he may make them public. Rather, show your wounds to Him who is the Lord, to Him who is man, to Him who is the physician” (De Lazaro, homily 4). “I am not telling you to betray yourself publicly nor to accuse yourself in the presence of others. Rather, I want you to obey the prophet when he says, ‘Reveal your way to the Lord’ [Ps. 37:5]. Therefore confess your sins before God. Declare your sins with prayer before the real Judge, not with your tongue but with the memory of your conscience. Then, finally, believe that you can receive mercy if you are always mindful of your sins” (on Hebrews 11, homily 31).
** Andreas Fricius (bk. 4, De eccles., ch. 9): “Consciences must not be burdened with an anxious enumeration of sins and their circumstances.” Pope Leo ([Ius canonicum,] De poenit., dist. 1, c. Quamvis): “Although a fullness of faith which is unafraid to blush before people because of its fear of God may appear laudable, nevertheless since the sins of all people are not of the type such that they are unafraid to publish those which demand penance, let so improbable a custom be removed, lest many people be called away from the remedy of repentance when they are either ashamed or afraid to tell their enemies the deeds for which the constitution of laws can strike them down.” Cassander (Consult., art. 11): “Surely there would not have been any controversy over this matter if unskilled and inept physicians had not infected and contaminated the salutary medicine of confessing with many useless traditions. They laid snares for the very consciences they should have freed and uplifted, and tormented them as if with tortures.” Joh. Ripa, a Papist writer (De peste curanda., ch. 8): “The Greeks, who confess in secret to God alone, do not sin, because the Eastern Church never accepted the constitution c. Omnis utriusque sexus, just as it never accepted the law forbidding priests to marry.” **
Cassian (Coll. 20, ch. 8): “If you draw back from the truth and are embarrassed to reveal it before men, do not cease to make confession with supplication to Him from whom sins cannot be hidden. He is accustomed to heal without the publication of any truth and to forgive sins without reproach.”
Bellarmine counters: (1) “Ambrose is speaking about the repentance of Peter made at the time when sacramental confession had not yet been instituted.”
We respond. That is correct, and a bit later [§ 111] we shall teach that neither was it instituted afterward.
He also remarks that “tears are a sort of confession.”
We respond. That is quite right, but they do not contain a specific enumeration of sins.
(2) “Augustine is not speaking about sacramental confession but about the confession of past sins remitted through Baptism.”
We respond. Some people assign the necessity of confession even to sins committed before Baptism. For so it stands in the Summa angelica: “Are all people bound to confession? The response: Yes, all who have committed a mortal sin, unbelievers as well as believers, according to Richard (Sent., 4, dist. 17), in such a way that one who does not confess a mortal sin committed either before or after Baptism will certainly be damned if he has the opportunity to see a suitable confessor, if he remembers the sin, and if he has the time and the words to confess, because this concerns a precept of divine Law. Nevertheless as the church has commanded confession to be made once a year, it binds only the faithful.” Thus the words of Augustine must conflict with these men. Let there be a demonstration of the inequality of forgiveness from the Scriptures such that a specific confession of sins committed after Baptism is required but not a listing of the sins committed before Baptism. Furthermore, Augustine’s reasoning is generally [applicable]: “How do those who are listening [to what I say] about myself know if I am speaking the truth?”
(3) “Chrysostom and Cassian are speaking about the public confession that was repealed by Nectarius.”
We respond. We shall see about the history of Nectarius a little later [§ 110]. Chrysostom always sets confession before God in contrast to the confession before men, confession made by thinking within the conscience and the confession made orally. The former he says is necessary but not the latter, as is clear from his very words.
Bellarmine objects: “Chrysostom says confession is ordered toward confounding and embarrassing, which can be said to be part of satisfaction; he is not saying that it is ordered toward the absolution of the priest.” This is begging the question. Note that Bellarmine is departing from Gratian, confirmed by the authority of the pontiffs; he acknowledges that Augustine, Ambrose, and Chrysostom were speaking about secret confession.