A reader writes:
Can you invalidate a confession by not being specific enough in
confessing your sins?In particular, if you say "I read something I shouldn’t have" instead
of "I read a book with sexual material that I knew might or would be an
occasion of sin," have you actually confessed the sin?I have made several confessions like this, assuming it was okay, but
now I am suddenly not sure.
It is possible to invalidate a confession if one deliberately refuses to confess in adequate detail, however that does not apply in this case. I’ll explain why.
First, a word about what adequate detail is: We are expected–to the best of our reasonable ability–to confess our mortal sins in number (how many times you did it) and kind. Kind is where the question of specificity comes in, and the rule is that we are to confess specifically enough that anything that affects the species of the sin is mentioned.
To understand that, one needs to have a grasp of the difference between genus and species. Genus is the general category to which a sin belongs. Species is the variation that distinguishes one sin from others in the same general category.
For example, saying "I committed a sexual sin" would cover only the genus of the act but does not address the species of sexual sin that has been committed. One would thus need to say "I committed adultery" or "I committed fornication" or "I committed a homosexual act" or "I committed masturbation" or "I committed incest" or whatever the case may be. Adultery, fornication, homosexual acts, masturbation, incest, etc., are all the various species of sexual sin.
Now, because of the shame involved in confessing many of these things, penitents often use circumlocutions to convey the idea while blunting the sense of shame that is involved. For example, they may say, "I had impure thoughts" rather than "I wilfully engaged in sexual fantasies about someone I’m not married to." "Impure thoughts" is code for what they did, and priests understand what it means. Technically, your thoughts could be impure in all sorts of way not involving sex (i.e., they could be tainted, and thus not pure, by any kind of sin you wilfully entertained), but priests know people mean they entertained improper sexual thoughts when they say this.
The important thing is not the words that are used but that the priest understands the species of the sin that is being confessed. As long as he understands–or as long as you reasonably believe that he understands–then you have confessed adequately.
If you said something like "I read something I shouldn’t have" then priests are quite likely (given a knowledge of penitents and how often sex comes up in confession) that you were confessing deliberate exposure to materials that could produce sexual temptation. If someone says that they read something they shouldn’t have, and they’re too embarassed to say why they shouldn’t have read it, sex is going to be the first thing that suggests itself. Unless a priest knew that you were in the habit of reading things likely to produce grave temptations of some other nature, a normal priest is going to assume that you’re talking about sex.
If he has doubts about what you’re confessing then he should ask for a clarification, and in these cases it seems that the priests you confessed to didn’t ask, indicating that they understood your meaning.
It thus seems to me that "I read something I shouldn’t have" is basically the same kind of thing as "I need to confess impure thoughts." Neither is an explicit statement, but both are going to be understood by a confessor.
Even if they weren’t, though, you would not have invalidated the confession because you believed that you were adequately confessing. You therefore were not deliberately holding anything back that you knew you needed to confess. As long as that’s the case, your confession is formally integral (to use a bit of technical jargon that means you intended to make a complete confession, or one complete enough for validity) and the absolution will be valid.
20
