It is a crime to administer a sacrament without following the proper formulas and rites established. In the Old Testament we see God punishing with immediate severity when His law was violated. God has not changed, God does not change. It consists of something of extraordinary gravity when a failure or defect is committed at the moment of administering the sacrament such that said problem ends up making it invalid. Yes, this is a recurring reality in seemingly Catholic environments today. In particular, we are going to talk about a supremely pernicious defect propagated everywhere and which the hierarchy has not even recognized its existence as such. It consists of a change in the obligatory words to perform the Sacrament of Penance. Let’s say it even more plainly: Father, it is said ABSOLVE.
The Church teaches
Let’s get to the point without further delay. The Roman Catechism, emanating from the sacrosanct and infallible Council of Trent, states the following textually: “What is the form of the Sacrament of Penance.” -and immediately afterward the Catechism responds clearly and directly- “Nor should Pastors omit the explanation of the form, for this knowledge will move the minds of the faithful to receive with utmost devotion the grace of this Sacrament. The form is this: ‘I absolve you’, which can not only be deduced from those words: ‘Whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven’, but we have received it from the same doctrine of Christ our Lord taught by the Apostles.”
As if that were not enough, the same Council of Trent, in Session XIV, Chapter III, explains directly the absolute and unalterable necessity of using these exact words: “The holy Council further teaches that the form of the sacrament of Penance, in which its efficacy principally consists, is enclosed in those words of the minister: Ego te absolvo, etc.”. Everything that has been listed up to this point is infallible, immovable, for all times and cannot be questioned under any circumstances.
The exact formula, copied and pasted from the Catechism of John Paul II -for those with an excessive zeal for novelty- in its number 1449, where it quotes the Rite of Penance, states literal terms: “God the Father of mercies, through the death and resurrection of his Son has reconciled the world to himself and poured out the Holy Spirit for the forgiveness of sins; may he grant you, through the ministry of the Church, pardon and peace, and I absolve you of your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” Having read this, one can pose a rhetorical question that says: what argument can exist to dismantle or contradict this?
Case closed. Yes, effectively, case closed. Continuing to write after this is just wasting ink. This is as far beyond debate as putting up for discussion and vote whether human beings really need to breathe or if there is another way to live. It does not cause sadness, but indignation and anger to know of thousands of cases where entire parishes have changed the absolution formula to be any sentimental invention coming from the personal improvisation of the priest on duty. Claiming ignorance or poor formation is also not an escape route because by taking a basic catechism, one learns what the formula instituted taught by apostolic tradition and faithfully transmitted to our times is.
Brothers, employing a different term from ABSOLVE makes the sacrament INVALID. It sounds harsh because it is a raw situation that deserves to be confronted using the only weapon capable of dismantling the error: the truth.
A problem that reveals a reality
In the experience of this author, more than 4 years ago there was an incident with a priest from a well-known parish in this country that was a bombshell of reality. After having listed each sin committed and heard the advice of the priest, he proceeds to give the absolution with the words “…I FORGIVE you…”. Brothers, to forgive and to absolve are not the same. I make a claim in the form of a question about the use of the word forgive. The worst was his reaction to my claim; since he proceeded to pull out the comfortable and modernist card of a false biblical interpretation totally detached from the doctrine of the Holy Mother Church. He set about performing a small mocking dynamic of reciting the verse where he claimed, based on the words of Christ in the Gospel when it says forgive, that this was the correct word for the present sacrament. It is worth noting that the entire defense carried out by the priest was with a tone both sarcastic and annoyed by hearing the justified claim of a parishioner who knows his faith. Upon leaving that confessional -it can’t even be called that place as such, but for practicality’s sake we will use it–, I noticed a line of around eight more people waiting to enter and confess. I was stunned because, having experienced what happened moments before, I realized the reality that these eight people were not going to receive the absolution of their sins, but were heading straight into the abyss of an invalid sacrament due to the revolutionary pride of the soul assassin sitting in there.
Yes, dear brothers, this is a real problem. Have you ever heard of a single diocesan bishop taking strict measures to order the immediate amendment of this? One will wait a lifetime for an answer. One’s obligation is to save one’s soul. If one finds oneself in this bitter and filthy situation, what must be done consists of three steps:
- Tell the priest the truth of the matter textually. Expose the problem to him. If this fails, go to his superior in writing (so that there is a record). Warn about what happened.
- Go to a traditional priest who gives absolution as it is.
- In case there is no amendment of the problem, one must act and publicly denounce the plague propagated in that place.