Bogota – Prof. Cajiao

THE PRIEST; MINISTER OF RECONCILIATION

The Holy Father John Paul II has often invited us to "to rediscover for yourselves and to help others to rediscover the beauty of the Sacrament of Reconciliation." (John Paul II, Letter to priests, Holy Thursday 2002, no.3). For a variety of reasons, declared the Bishop of Rome, during a certain number of decades this sacrament has been going through a crisis. For this reason, the Pontiff requested that a Synod of Bishops should be dedicated to meditation on this subject, thoughts that he later assembled in his apostolic exhortation "Reconciliatio et Paentitentia", in 1984.

In Chinese the word "crisis" is written using two characters (cui-chi): one refers to the imminent danger (cui-sie), and the other expresses the opportunity (chi-jué). In other words, we are faced with the alternative of endangering a millenarian richness entrusted by Christ to His Church and continued by Paul the Apostle when he observed the central function of the redeeming economy (See Rec. et Pae. N. 7) with the words "all things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself by Christ and has given to us the ministry of reconciliation" (See Cor. II 5,18). Of course the ministry of reconciliation is not limited to the Sacrament of Reconciliation, but we know that from a sacramental point of view, it contains the fullness of the personal encounter with the Good Shepherd who gave His life so as to save His flock (See John 10). Ma let us not forget the other aspect of the crisis: opportunity. Undoubtedly, the current moment in the modern world, which emphasizes individualisms and subjectivisms, makes it even more difficult to identify the interpersonal reference points and therefore those for reconciliation and peace, but this does not mean that we must renounce, as ministers for reconciliation, to permitting our brothers, mankind, to experiment the quadruple sacramental reconciliation: the reconciliation with God Our Father, reconciliation with men who are our brothers, reconciliation with ourselves and reconciliation that allows us to be in peace with nature (See Rec. et Pae. N. 8).

This is why it is necessary to consider reconciliation as a priority in the rediscovery of God’s merciful and faithful love for mankind, and therefore confession must be a declaration of this immense love offered by the repentant sinner, when he knows that he has been reached by God; recently, John Paul II told us: " Confession, before being man's journey to God, confession is God's arrival at a person's home." (Holy Thursday 2002, no. 6). For the same reason it is essential that the ministry of Reconciliation should place the repentant in the perspective of this personal encounter with God in Christ; the Holy Father also said: ". In the sacraments, the penitent first meets not "the commandments of God", but, in Jesus, "the God of the commandments".(Holy Thursday 2002, no. 7).

Therefore the priest must not, above all, place the repentant in front of a merciless judge, but rather in front of the experience of the Loving God who in Christ has impartially acted for redemption, but he must also on the other hand help those who declare their sins to fully elaborate the necessary answer to this proposal of love, what the Gospels call the metanoia, meaning the real change that takes place not through the experience of being accused of a misdeed, but through being touched by love that is not deserved and that leads to wanting to reestablish the interrupted bond of love. The Holy Father tells us that we must avoid two extreme positions: "Severity crushes people and drives them away. Laxity is misleading and deceptive. " (Holy Thursday 2002, no.8).

"The truth is that those who fulfill this delicate ministry in the name of God and of the Church have a specific duty not to promote and, even more so not to express in the confessional, personal opinions that do not correspond to what the Church teaches and professes. Likewise, a failure to speak the truth because of a misconceived sense of compassion should not be taken for love.". (Holy Thursday 2002, no.10)