by Bob Sullivan
Catholics grow up with confession as a part of the faith. Converts come to appreciate it. But for most non-Catholic Christians, confession to a priest is either something to be ignored, or something to be declared a heresy. This is an annoyance for some Catholics, but it is a potentially deadly game played by such Protestants.
This is because to ignore or rail against the sacrament of reconciliation is to ignore or rail against Jesus Christ. After all, it was Christ himself who instituted the sacrament in the Upper Room on the day he rose from the dead. In John 20:19-23 it is written:
When it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and the doors of the house where the disciples had met were locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”
This is where the Catholic Church received the sacrament. This is where all of us look to find the origin of the sacrament of reconciliation.
Some non-Catholics will try to explain Christ’s words away, claiming that by using Greek, it merely says that if the apostles tell anyone that their sins are forgiven, they are merely telling them that Christ is the one who did it for them on the cross. In other words, the apostles would not be forgiving any sins because Jesus already did it. This theory contradicts itself due to the second half of that very sentence.
While the anti-Catholic theory is consistent with the Catholic interpretation for the first half of verse 23, it falls apart due to the second half of verse 23.
The Church teaches that our sins were forgiven on the cross, and in confession it is still Jesus doing the forgiving. He’s just doing it the way he designed it: through the priest. But the verse doesn’t stop with “they are forgiven.” It goes on to say, “if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” That is where this “Greek” argument falls apart. What sins did Jesus retain on the cross, or what sins did he NOT bear on the cross? All Christians agree (at least those of us who truly follow Christ) that Jesus bore all sin on the cross. So, the Protestant protest of John 20:23 sinks like a bag of sand.
It is clear that Christ was giving the apostles a role in the forgiveness of sins, even if all the forgiveness is related to His passion, death, and resurrection. But what about this “retention” stuff? What role do the Apostles play in the “retention” of sins? Well, the Catholic Church teaches that a successful reconciliation involves contrition and a firm disposition to avoid the sin again. Therefore, if the penitent person approaches the sacrament of reconciliation without sorrow for his or her sin, or with the idea they can return to those sins any time they like, the priest is obligated to inform them that their sins remain. They cannot be absolved of their sin, even though Christ conquered all sin and death 20 centuries ago. In order to avail ourselves of His mercy, we need to approach Him with a contrite heart and a firm commitment to go forth and sin no more.
The question could then turn to whether the apostles passed that authority down to their successors. Was it just the 11 apostles who received this authority? Maybe even only 10 of them since St. Thomas wasn’t there at the time? So, for some non-Catholics, it turns on the question of authority and apostolic succession.
Lo and behold, God had a plan for that, too. As all Christians know, even the apostles quickly realized that the Church needed leaders, and as leaders fell or died, replacements were necessary. Their fellow apostle, Judas, had just fallen, so they met, asked for help from the Holy Spirit, and appointed Matthias.i Then St. Paul was added to the episcopate.ii Then Timothyiii, Titusiv, and othersv were added.vi We see all this in Acts and in the letters of St. Paul. The Apostles also appointed bishops and deacons, and spoke of the Church in the sense of both its clergy and the lay faithful.vii
This is all consistent with the Jewish understanding of the priesthood in the Old Testament under Mosaic Law as well. Prior to Christ, the Jewish people had the high priest,viii the other priests of the Temple, the Levitical priesthood which were more like deacons, and the idea that all of it was handed down from generation to generation.ix Through Christ, today’s priests are ordained in the order of Melchizedek.x
It is also helpful to consider what the early Christians understood regarding apostolic succession, the priesthood, and the Church.
> Around the year 80, Pope St. Clement I wrote that bishops and deacons were appointed by the apostles since the “very ancient times.”xi
> Around the year 189, St. Irenaeus wrote some of the clearest references of all the early Church Fathers, regarding apostolic succession and the authority of the bishops, including the pope:
“It is possible, then, for everyone in every church, who may wish to know the truth, to contemplate the tradition of the apostles which has been made known to us throughout the whole world. And we are in a position to enumerate those who were instituted bishops by the apostles and their successors down to our own times, men who neither knew nor taught anything like what these heretics rave about.” xii
This is just one of many such writings of St. Irenaeus. xiii
> Tertullian, who lived from 160 to 240 called confession the second plank of the faith. This would support the idea that the apostles certainly received some authority from Christ in John 20:19-23, and that nearly a century later, it was being practiced in the Church. But that wasn’t all he had to say about apostolic succession. He seems to have written about as much as St. Irenaeus, including:
“[The apostles] founded churches in every city, from which all the other churches, one after another, derived the tradition of the faith, and the seeds of doctrine, and are every day deriving them, that they may become churches. Indeed, it is on this account only that they will be able to deem themselves apostolic, as being the offspring of apostolic churches. Every sort of thing must necessarily revert to its original for its classification. Therefore, the churches, although they are so many and so great, comprise but the one primitive Church, founded by the apostles, from which they all spring. In this way, all are primitive, and all are apostolic, while they are all proved to be one in unity.” xiv
> In about the year 253, Cyprian of Carthage wrote:
“[T]he Church is one, and as she is one, cannot be both within and without. For if she is with [the heretic] Novatian, she was not with [Pope] Cornelius. But if she was with Cornelius, who succeeded the bishop [of Rome], Fabian, by lawful ordination, and whom, beside the honor of the priesthood the Lord glorified also with martyrdom, Novatian is not in the Church; nor can he be reckoned as a bishop, who, succeeding to no one, and despising the evangelical and apostolic tradition, sprang from himself. For he who has not been ordained in the Church can neither have nor hold to the Church in any way.” xv
> St. Augustine also wrote about, “the succession of priests, from the very see of the apostle Peter… up to the present episcopate….” xvi
Therefore, if anyone tells you, as they have me, that they do not believe in apostolic succession, the ordination of priests, and the hierarchical design of the Church, they are either ignorant of Scripture and Christian history, or they are misleading you.
So, in closing, let’s go back to the Upper Room and look at two key phrases from John 20:19-23 one more time in light of all of the biblical and historical references in this column.
“As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” This certainly fits with the Catholic teaching of apostolic succession. And while it could mean that the apostles would become martyrs, we know that St. John died a natural death. Christ was certainly sent to die for our sins, but if that is all he did, we wouldn’t have a faith. The real work was the forgiveness of our sins. God sent us His Son to forgive our sins. The cross was part of that, and symbolizes it, but it was not the sum and total of Christ’s mission. So, if the apostles were “sent” for the same purpose as Christ, that purpose would not only include their own crosses, but the forgiveness of sins. And just as Christ handed this authority down to the apostles, they handed it down to Timothy, Titus, Silvanus, the deacons, Clement, Irenaeus, Augustine, and on and on.
When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”
As Catholics, we certainly believe that Christ’s passion, death, and resurrection accomplished all which God the Father desired, namely the forgiveness of all sin, however, everyone since Calvary has continued to commit new sins every day. Therefore, Christ granted the apostles a role in the forgiveness or the retention of peoples’ sins, and this authority was obviously handed down as shown in the verses and historical quotes above.
If anyone tries to explain this away, you can hand them this, and encourage them to read it with humility and an open heart. Their eternal life depends on it.
i Acts 1:20-26
ii. Acts 9:1-19, 1 Corinthians 1:1, Romans 1:1
iii. 1 Timothy 4:14, 1 Timothy 5:22
iv. Titus 1:5, 2 Corinthians 1:19
v. Titus 1:5-9, Ephesians 4:11-13, 1 Timothy 5:22
vi. Acts 6:2-7, Acts 14:23
vii. 1 Timothy 3:2-12
viii. Exodus 30:30
ix.Exodus 30:30-31, Exodus 40:15
x. Psalm 110:4, Hebrews 7:11, See generally Hebrews Chapters 5 through 9
xi. First Epistle of St. Clement 42:4-5
xii. Against Heresies 3:3:1
xiii. Against Heresies 3:3:2, 3:3:4, 3:4:1, 4:26:2, and 4:33:8
xiv. Demurrer Against the Heretics 20
xv. Letters 69[75]:3
xvi. Against the Letter of Mani Called “The Foundation” 4:5
