In the previous chapter, we discussed sin and the organic components of the “reality” that we call “sin.” Now, let’s talk about the forgiveness of sins, under what conditions sin is forgiven, and what it means to forgive a sin. This is crucial because we often misunderstand this action—forgiveness of sins—usually in a narrow, legalistic (rather than organic, ontological, and existential) manner, which prevents our moral life from rising above that of the pagans [do not kill, do not steal, do not commit adultery…]. And regarding spiritual life, life in Christ, in the Holy Spirit, there is almost no one to discuss this with. The most we are capable of is creating an appearance of piety, godliness, and wearing masks of various “good” deeds. And what’s most frightening, with such self-assured status—”not like everyone else, there are worse people: drug addicts, thieves…” or “like everyone else”—we call ourselves Christians.
Since the forgiveness of sins is almost always associated with the sacrament of confession, where, as we naively and “simply” think, they are forgiven [in the sense of being annihilated], and after confession, we emerge sinless, “clean,” “whitewashed” [at least of the sins we confessed], we then approach the “secondary” sacrament— the Eucharist, the Body and Blood of Lord Jesus Christ—with a “clean conscience.” We focus on confession, prepare for it, while considering the Eucharist [or other sacraments] as an addition that has nothing to do with the forgiveness of sins. We have already discussed such spiritual impoverishment, blindness, and insensitivity to the ecclesiastical way of life in previous chapters, but now let’s talk a bit about the Church’s sacraments [specifically repentance and confession] in the context of the forgiveness of sins.
To avoid flipping back, let’s briefly recall what we talked about (sin) and add a bit more. Sin is a human’s inability to live in communication and relationship with God. The essence of sin is to stop living by God, communicating with Him, choosing a path to realize one’s life without God, apart from God. This alternative path, symbolically in the Bible, is called “the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.” This “tree” indicates that the free creature can choose either Life in communion with God or death—existence in non-being—and it will stand until God becomes “all in all.” St. Gregory Palamas states that God is the nature of all that exists, meaning everything exists in a theo-anthropological way (completed, actualized in the Incarnation, the hypostatic union of the Divine and creaturely reality).
Therefore, Adam, by consuming God in the fruits of Paradise, was to grow to the full stature of Christ (example: Theotokos), but while he was still spiritually a “child,” the possibility to reject God existed—to eat the fruit from the forbidden “tree.” We won’t discuss here, due to lack of space, why Adam chose the unnatural path (not blessed by God: “Do not eat”), and why for Deification, humanity had to go through the crucible of history with countless sorrows, diseases, wars, sufferings, and misfortunes. But we will say that the path to Perfection, Happiness, is one—Jesus Christ, and there is no other, as testified by the Holy Church and the New Testament. Adam took a different path! Which one? One that actually does not exist! That is, Adam chose existence (one cannot “live” in illusion, only exist; illusion is the realm of death, non-being) in an illusory, fantastical world, which he himself created in his distorted, detached-from-God imagination. Adam became inadequate in relation to reality, which is and in which he was, and could not but be. Such a person, disregarding existing laws, is doomed to sufferings, which they themselves cause by inappropriate behavior (exits from the ninth floor via the balcony, drinks poison; commits adultery, envies, steals, etc.). You can read more and in detail in the “Recommended Literature,” about which we briefly and figuratively spoke here to make it easier to understand the father’s thoughts on repentance and confession. Thus, the concept of sin encompasses three components: the rupture of unity between God and man; the construction of an illusory world through distorted, warped will and desire; severe sufferings, pain as a result of incorrect life realization. Now let’s give the floor to Father V.A.
In catechisms, pamphlets that attempt to explain the Church’s faith, we can read such words:
“In the sacrament of confession, sins are forgiven,” “… all mentioned sins are forgiven,” “… all confessed sins are forgiven,” etc. For those uneducated in the Church’s spiritual life and illiterate in the dogmatic understanding of the reality of spiritual life, everything seems normal. Since the Lord gave the apostles the power to forgive sins, then priests, as successors of apostolic authority to administer sacraments, have the power to absolve sins. Such legalistic thinking undermines the foundation of a Christian’s spiritual life. We will try to shed light on the understanding of the sacrament of confession and clarify some concepts from the Church’s lexicon: understand what a sacrament is, what sin is, what it means to forgive a sin, when sins are forgiven, what power it is to forgive a sin and who has it (Father does not provide academic definitions, so we will try to understand the essence, expressed in unusual concepts and images – V.A.)