By Deacon Mike Seibert
Connecting Liturgy and Life
Editor’s note: For 2026, the weekly “Connecting Faith and Life” column has been renamed “Connecting Liturgy and Life.” The column consists of reflections on Part Two of the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC), which focuses on the Liturgy and the Sacraments.
cf. CCC 1420-1426
Imagine I punched you in the nose. You’d be pretty ticked, wouldn’t you? What if a friend was standing there when I hit you and they turned to me and said, “I forgive you”? How would you react? You’d probably be incredulous, and rightfully so! It makes no sense for HIM to forgive me. Only the person who was wronged can offer forgiveness. Do you agree? Only the offended person can forgive.
Why then, in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, can the Priest forgive ME for punching YOU? The person most offended by our sins is God himself, because our actions are counter to charity (love) — breaking relationships rather than building. Any sin against charity is a sin against God, so it makes sense that only God can forgive us. Jesus said so himself in Luke 5:21, “Who can forgive sins but God alone?” That is what happens in the sacrament: It’s not the priest forgiving you; it’s God forgiving you. The priest acts in persona Christi (in the person of Christ). Catch that? In the sacrament, the priest acts in the place of God to forgive you. This authority was given to the apostles by Christ himself in John 20:23, where Jesus tells his disciples, “If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you withhold forgiveness from anyone, it is withheld.” Now, to be clear, we still should seek reconciliation with anyone we’ve wronged in order to restore earthly relationships, but the relationship with God is restored.
Why do we need to keep going back to confession? If God can forgive us, why can’t he go a step further and remove our inclination to sin? The Catechism covers that in paragraph 1426: “… the new life received in Christian initiation has not abolished the frailty and weakness of human nature, nor the inclination to sin that tradition calls concupiscence, which remains in the baptized such that with the help of the grace of Christ they may prove themselves in the struggle of Christian life. This is the struggle of conversion directed toward holiness and eternal life to which the Lord never ceases to call us.”
It’s like God purposely leaves our inclination to sin to give us something to struggle against — to prove ourselves — to continually struggle toward holiness. God knows we need the struggle. It reminds me of a story: There was a scrawny boy who was getting beaten up constantly. In tears, he approached a wise man to ask what to do. The man led him to a cliff where a large boulder was perched. “To overcome your problems, you need to try to push this rock over that cliff.” The boy pressed his shoulder to the rock and pushed with all his might, and nothing happened. The man encouraged him and challenged him to keep trying. “If you persevere and push with all your might for three months, your problems will be solved.”
The boy dutifully took on the challenge — and was quickly frustrated as he couldn’t budge it at all. He tried lifting, pushing, even prying it. Many times, he wanted to quit, yet kept his promise and kept pushing. Ninety days later, returning to the wise man, he was ashamed to report that despite all his effort, he never did move the rock. The wise man pointed out that the young man’s muscles had tripled in size, giving him amazing strength. He explained to the boy, “I never told you to move the rock. I only told you to TRY to move it! Keeping your commitment, you not only learned perseverance, but you are no longer the scrawny little kid who approached me three months ago.”
God gives us free will, and with that freedom comes the chance, even certainty, that we will sometimes choose unwisely. Like the heroes of the Bible, we struggle against our tendency to prefer sin over what is truly good, and that inclination continues to trip us up today. But that very struggle is the rock against which we all push. We persevere in pushing against our disordered inclinations to sin — and as we do, we build strength of will and grow in holiness.