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Daily reflections for Lenten Easter, written by Oblate Father Ron Rolheiser, OMI.

You are as sick as your sickest secret. That’s an axiom popular among people in 12 step programs. They know that until one faces oneself in searing honesty before another human being and there acknowledges openly his or her sins, there will always be addictions, rationalization and lack of transparency. This is a pivotal and non negotiable step in every 12 step program. Without it, at a certain point, all real growth stops.

The church has always had its own version of this step. We call it confession, the sacrament of reconciliation. Fewer people are going to confession these days. This is an unfortunate development because private confession is one of the pillars of the spiritual life. At a certain point in one’s growth, there is no progress without it.

The critics of the Sacrament of Reconciliation are right in saying that God is not tied to one vehicle as an avenue for the forgiveness of sins. They’re wrong, however, when they denigrate the importance of a good private confession.

Simply put, confession is the sacrament of the mature, and one grows mature by confessing one’s sins. One may not need to confess one’s sins explicitly to another human being in order to have them forgiven, but one does have to confess them explicitly if he or she hopes to live a, transparent life, free of dark skeletons in the closet, and to make progress in the spiritual life.