CONFESSION: Why and How.
Why? Because we are not perfect. If we were perfect repentance would be as simple as knowing that God is always more than we can see of him and he is always finding ways to reach us in our limitation. It would simply be learning and growing. In other words, true perfection is to desire a REAL life, a life of constant growth, rather than a life that declines into a static and ever more limited and reduced sense of who we are. This is what happens when we don’t grow spiritually. Spiritual growth is why we confess. It is also how we confess: I have not done this, I have not grown here—perhaps I have even gone backwards or found myself trapped in emotions, behaviors or bad interactions with others. If we identify where we are stuck and not yearning for God and thus also not loving our fellow human being, that is how we confess. If we can’t identify, and we just have a vague feeling, perhaps the symptoms of a deeper spiritual problem, still we have to identify those and seek the mysterious power which Christ passed to the apostles who passed to the Bishops and priests—to forgive by the peace and power of the Holy Spirit that they received from him when he appeared to them as the Risen Lord of Glory. It means we treat spiritual things less as distant things that we will only discuss and speak aloud at the end before Christ’s throne, but as a real responsibility and task we take in hand now. We, by speaking, put out our sins out of the hidden place of the heart, in order to make better and purer offering of our hearts. I quote below the guidance the Church was directed to follow from the 1970’s, when the OCA began to push for more frequent communion (and confession).
“the relationship between the rhythm of confession and that of communion must be left to the decision of the priest, confession remaining regular, however, and heard not less than once a month.” (On Confession and Communion: Excerpt of the Minutes of the Meeting of the Holy Synod of Bishops of the Orthodox Church in America: February 16-17th, 1972, https://www.oca.org/holy-synod/encyclicals/on-confession-and-communion ))
HOWEVER, if we have not previously confessed, how do we begin? Here are helpful questions:
1. How have been been hurt in life, and thus: what makes us subject to the passions of
a. Despair, depression, or something like this?
b. OR, resentment—the remembrance of evils?
2. What habits have we developed that are detrimental to our emotional and spiritual balance and good relations with others?
3. Do we pray in such a way as to ameliorate the above and seek blessing form God for ourselves and others?
4. How have we hurt others and pushed remembrance of God from our lives?
There are many other things to consider. This is enough to sart off confessing.
Fr. Elijah