CHAPTER
III
The Confessional is the Modern Sodom
IF anyone wants to hear an eloquent oration, let him go where the
Roman Catholic priest is preaching on the divine institution of
auricular confession. There is no subject, perhaps, on which the
priests display so much zeal and earnestness, and of which they
speak so often. For this institution is really the corner-stone of
their stupendous power; it is the secret of their almost
irresistible influence. Let the people open their eyes, to-day, to
the truth, and understand that auricular confession is one of the
most stupendous impostures which Satan has invented, to corrupt and
enslave the world; let the people desert the confessional-box
to-day, and to-morrow Romanism will fall into the dust. The priests
understand this very well; hence their constant efforts to deceive
the people on that question. To attain their object, they have
recourse to the most egregious falsehoods; the Scriptures are
misrepresented; the holy Fathers are brought to say the very
contrary of what they have ever thought or written; and the most
extraordinary miracles and stories are invented. But two of the
arguments to which they have more often recourse, are the great and
perpetual miracles which God makes to keep the purity of the
confessional undefiled, and its secrets marvellously sealed. They
make the people believe that the vow of perpetual chastity changes
their nature, turns them into angels, and puts them above the common
frailties of the fallen children of Adam.
Bravely, and with a brazen face, when they are interrogated on
that subject, they say that they have special graces to remain pure
and undefiled in the midst of the greatest dangers; that the Virgin
Mary, to whom they are consecrated, is their powerful advocate to
obtain from her Son that superhuman virtue of chastity; that what
would be a cause of sure perdition to common men, is without peril
and danger for a true Son of Mary; and, with amazing stupidity, the
people consent to be duped, blinded, and deceived by those
fooleries.
But here, let the world learn the truth as it is, from one who
knows perfectly everything inside and outside the walls of that
Modern Babylon. Though many, I know, will disbelieve me and say, "We
hope you are mistaken; it is impossible that the priests of Rome
should turn out to be such impostors; they may be mistaken; they may
believe and repeat things which are not true, but they are honest;
they cannot be such impudent deceivers."
Yes; though I know that many will hardly believe me, I must tell
the truth.
Those very men, who, when speaking to the people in such glowing
terms of the marvellous way they are kept pure, in the midst of the
dangers which surround them, honestly blush—and often weep—when they
speak to each other (when they are sure that nobody, except priests,
hear them). They deplore their own moral degradation with the utmost
sincerity and honesty; they ask from God and men, pardon for their
unspeakable depravity.
I have here—in my hands, and under my eyes—one of their most
remarkable secret books, written (or at least approved) by one of
their greatest and best bishops and cardinals, the Cardinal de
Bonald, Archbishop of Lyons.
The book is written for the use of priests alone. Its title is,
in French, "Examen de Conscience des Pretres." At page 34, we
read:—
"Have I left certain persons to make the declarations of their
sins in such a way that the imagination, once taken and impressed by
pictures and representations, could be dragged into a long course of
temptations and grievous sins? The priests do not pay sufficient
attention to the continual temptations caused by the hearing of
confessions. The soul is gradually enfeebled in such a way that, at
the end, the virtue of chastity is forever lost."
Here is the address of a priest to other priests, when he
suspects that nobody but his co-sinner brethren hear him. Here is
the honest language of truth.
In the presence of God those priests acknowledge that they have
not a sufficient fear of those constant (what a word—what an
acknowledgment—constant!) temptations, and they honestly confess
that these temptations come from the hearing of the confessions of
so many scandalous sins. Here the priests honestly acknowledge that
those constant temptations, at the end, destroy forever in
them the holy virtue of purity.*
"Ah! would to God that all the honest girls and women whom the
devil entraps into the snares of auricular confession, could bear
the cries of distress of those poor priests whom they have
tempted—forever destroyed! Would to God that they could
* And remark, that all their religious authors who have written
on that subject hold the same language. They all speak of those
continual degrading temptations; they all lament the damning sins
which follow those temptations; they all entreat the priests to
fight those temptations and repent of those sins.
See the torrents of tears shed by so many priests, because, from
the hearing of confessions, they had forever lost the virtue
of purity! They would understand that the confessional is a snare, a
pit of perdition, a Sodom for the priest; and they would be struck
with horror and shame at the idea of the continual, shameful,
dishonest, degrading temptations by which their confessor is
tormented day and night—they would blush on account of the shameful
sins which their confessors have committed—they would weep over the
irreparable loss of their purity—they would promise before God and
men that the confessional-box should never see them any more—they
would prefer to be burned alive, if any sentiment of honesty and
charity remained in them, rather than consent to be a cause of
constant temptations and damnable sins to that man.
Would that respectable lady go any more to confess to that man,
if, after her confession, she could hear him lamenting the
continual, shameful temptations which assail him day and night, and
the damning sins which he had committed, on account of what she has
confessed to him? No! —a thousand times, no!
Would that honest father allow his beloved daughter to go any
more to that man to confess, if he could hear his cries of distress,
and see his tears flowing, because the hearing of those confessions
is the source of constant, shameful temptations and degrading
iniquities?
Oh! would to God that the honest Romanists all over the world—for
there are millions, who, though, deluded, are honest—could see what
is going on in the heart, and the imagination of the poor confessor
when he is, there, surrounded by attractive women and tempting
girls, speaking to him from morning to night on things which a man
cannot hear without falling. Then, that modern but grand imposture,
called the Sacrament of Penance, would soon be ended.
But here, again, who will not lament the consequences of the
total perversity of our human nature? Those very same priests who,
when alone, in the presence of God, speak so plainly of the constant
temptations by which they are assailed, and who so sincerely weep
over the irreparable loss of their virtue of purity, when they think
that nobody hears them, will yet, in public, with a brazen face,
deny those temptations. They will indignantly rebuke you as a
slanderer if you say anything to lead them to suppose that you fear
for their purity, when they hear the confessions of girls or married
women!
There is not a single one of the Roman Catholic authors, who have
written on that subject for the priests, who has not deplored their
innumerable and degrading sins against purity, on account of the
auricular confession; but those very men will be the first to try to
prove the very contrary when they write books for the people. I have
no words to tell what was my surprise when, for the first time, I
saw that this strange duplicity seemed to be one of the fundamental
stones of my Church.
It was not very long after my ordination, when a priest came to
me to confess the most deplorable things. He honestly told me that
there was not a single one of the girls or married women whom he had
confessed, who had not been a secret cause of the most shameful
sins, in thought, desires, or actions; but he wept so bitterly over
his degradation, his heart seemed so sincerely broken on account of
his own iniquities, that I could not refrain from mixing my tears
with his; I wept with him, and I gave him pardon for all his sins,
as I then thought I had the power and right to give it.
Two hours afterwards, that same priest, who was a good speaker,
was in the pulpit. His sermon was on "The Divinity of Auricular
Confession;" and, to prove that it was an institution coming
directly from Christ, he said that the Son of God was performing a
constant miracle to strengthen His priests, and prevent them from
falling into sins, on account of what they might have heard in the
confessional!!!
The daily abominations, which are the result of auricular
confession, are so horrible and so well known by the popes, the
bishops, and the priests, that several times, public attempts have
been in made to diminish them by punishing the guilty priests; but
all these commendable efforts have failed.
One of the most remarkable of those efforts was made by Pius IV.
about the year 1560. A Bull was published by him, by which all the
girls and married women who had been seduced into sins by their
confessors, were ordered to denounce them; and a certain number of
high church officers of the Holy Inquisition were authorized to take
the depositions of the fallen penitents. The thing was, at first,
tried at Seville, one of the principal cities of Spain. When the
edict was first published, the number of women who felt bound in
conscience to go and depose against their father confessors, was so
great, that though there were thirty notaries, and as many
inquisitors, to take the depositions, they were unable to do the
work in the appointed time. Thirty days more were given, but the
inquisitors were so overwhelmed with the numberless depositions,
that another period of time of the same length was given. But this,
again, was found insufficient. At the end, it was found that the
number of priests who had destroyed the purity of their penitents
was so great that it was impossible to punish them all. The inquest
was given up, and the guilty confessors remained unpunished. Several
attempts of the same nature have been tried by other popes, but with
about the same success.
But if those honest attempts on the part of some well-meaning
popes, to punish the confessors who destroy the purity of the
penitents, have failed to touch the guilty parties, they are, in the
good providence of God, infallible witnesses to tell to the world
that auricular confession is nothing else than a snare to the
confessor and his dupes. Yes, those Bulls of the popes are an
irrefragable testimony that auricular confession is the most
powerful invention of the devil to corrupt the heart, pollute the
body, and damn the soul of the priest and his female penitent!