Does this bug anyone else as much as it does me? Hollywood movie confessional scenes.
How hard could it be to just phone up the nearest parish and ask how a Catholic makes confession?
And once and for all, it's "BLESS me, father, for I have sinned..." not "Forgive me father..."
Urgh!
One of the funniest confessional scenes I've yet seen...
...and obviously, because it was the BBC, they knew to give a call to find out how to say it right.
(And for the girls in the audience, isn't David Tennant a cutie pie!)
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Well I for one never say "Bless me etc." since in that special place you know about in Toronto, the priests will always immediately bless you before you say anything, and because in all those "other" places in Toronto I infrequently visit, the priests NEVER give you the blessing "May the Lord etc." even if you should ask it. So no point really. By the way, the only right way of making a confession is by being honest. There is no formula on the part of the penitent that needs to be followed. I once read a "guide" from the early 20th century for making a good confession, and the formula provided was "I accuse myself of breaking the ___ commandment this may times, and such were the circumstances" which I find all rather complicated. I guess Catholics knew the 10 commandments back then. (By the way, I do know them, just not what the particular order is after #4). There is still a great variety of formulas today. While I was in a Peru over Christmas, the formula is that the priest says "Ave Maria purissima" to which you can respond in Latin "sine labe concepta" or Spanish "sin pecado concebida" as suits your fancy. Then you have to state your age, gender and state in life! It took me a couple of tries before I was able to figure all this out, and I didn't quite understand at first why the priests were treating me like a retard/heathen.
But no one, unless he has learned his confessional practice from the silver screen, ever asked a priest to "forgive" him. These days the ten of fifteen Catholics in the world who still go to confession know enough to know that the priest has no such power, or at least no more than anyone else. Absolution.
I know a chap who will go to confession (in places other than 1372 King st.) and bring a copy of the formula of absolution with him for the priest to recite in case he doesn't know it.
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