About the Mass Series Vol 2: The Penitential Rite: The Confiteor Part 2.

The Confiteor is one of those prayers every Mass-going Catholic knows, but may not be aware of its name. The name is taken from the very first word of the prayer in Latin, Confiteor, which essentially means “I confess”. Since Catholics have a whole sacrament dedicated to the confession of sins they might wonder why the Confiteor is part of the Mass. Essentially the Confiteor is a necessary preparation for what we participate in at Mass, a work of the Lord.

Often before participating in a great work of the Lord men cleansed themselves. In scripture we see that a servant of God might have fasted, journeyed into the wilderness to pray, or even had his lips cleansed with hot coals by an angel (Isaiah 6:6) to prepare him for his work for the Lord. Although fasting before Mass is still our practice today, properly conforming our heart and soul to Christ also requires contrition for our sins. Through the Confiteor we fittingly offer contrition to God for our sins and prepare for our participation in the Divine Mystery of the Eucharist.

The prayer used for the last 40 years is familiar to us all:

I confess to almighty God,

and to you, my brothers and sisters,

that I have sinned through my own fault,

in my thoughts and in my words,

in what I have done,

and in what I have failed to do…

The new translation, which is closer to the original Latin, is more emphatic and draws more attention to a particular pious practice. Although in the rubrics (i.e. the prescribed actions to accompany the words said) of the Mass, this practice was often forgotten in the last few decades. We will discuss that in a moment. Here is the new translation (which will sound familiar to many older Catholics):

I confess to almighty God

and to you, my brothers and sisters,

that I have greatly sinned

in my thoughts and in my words,

in what I have done

and in what I have failed to do,

through my fault, through my fault,

through my most grievous fault…

When the penitent recites the last two lines of the Confiteor he takes his right hand, curls it into a loose fist and strikes his left breast. Immediately a couple of Bible verses come to mind. In the Old Testament, we find Jeremiah (Jeremiah 31:19) saying, “I turn in repentance; I have come to myself, I strike my breast; I blush with shame, I bear the disgrace of my youth.” In the New Testament, the contrition of the publican, the tax collector, in Luke 18:13 is recalled: “But the tax collector stood off at a distance and would not even raise his eyes to heaven but beat his breast and prayed, ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner.’”

In ancient Judaism, striking one’s breast was a sign of deep sorrow our one’s sinfulness. This continued into the Christian era. St. Augustine, one of the greatest Early Church Fathers, noted that,

"No sooner have you heard the word 'Confiteor' than you strike your breast. What does this mean except that you wish to bring to light what is concealed in the breast, and by this act to cleanse your hidden sins ?" (Sermo de verbis Domini, 13).

The secular world today, however, shuns such displays, but the Church most certainly does not. As the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has noted: “During the Confiteor the action of striking our breasts at the words through my own fault can strengthen my awareness that my sin is my fault.” Our physical actions, when done piously, help bring home to us spiritual truths.

At this time, using the current translation of the Mass, we strike our breast once. In the old Latin Mass, Catholics struck their breast three times – once for each use of the word “fault”. It is not entirely clear at this time whether we will still use one strike or three. In any case, the importance of such gestures should not be underestimated. As Pope Benedict XVI wrote in Sacramentum Caritatis,

“the Synod of Bishops asked that the faithful be helped to make their interior dispositions correspond to their gestures and words… This is particularly important in a highly technological age like our own, which risks losing the ability to appreciate signs and symbols.”  (Sacramentum Caritatis, 64)

But what is the point of all of this? When we pray the Confiteor – and we have to remember it IS a prayer – we are professing our contrition to God, His saints in heaven, and the faithful on earth. We are asking for forgiveness for all those sins - thoughts, words, deeds and omissions – which we have committed. Such a confession of sins makes it possible for our venial sins to be forgiven during the Mass itself. However, it should be noted that it does not replace and is never intended to replace the Sacrament of Penance/Reconciliation.

The next time we are at Mass, let us keep in mind the following written by Fr. Nikolaus Gihr many years ago:

“The Confiteor is an open avowal of compunction of heart, a contrite and penitential prayer which should cleanse the soul from even the slightest stains of guilt and from all sinful defects. But in order that its recital, together with the threefold striking of the breast, may prove cleansing and salutary to the soul, it must in truth be the outpouring of a contrite spirit, proceeding from the depths of a heart touched with love and sorrow.”

(Nikolaus Gihr, The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass: Dogmatically, Liturgically, and Ascetically Explained, St. Louis: Herder, 1902, page 358).