From avoiding the use of confessionals to keeping a two-metre distance between priest and penitent, it just got harder to get to confession.
But that doesn’t mean forgiveness isn’t available, says Archbishop J. Michael Miller.
“It seems to me we’re at a point where a lot is left up to the creativity of the priest,” he said in a video interview March 27.
Pastors who are willing and able to provide confessions in alternate spaces are encouraged to do so, he told senior communications director Makani Marquis in the video, the second he has done since the COVID-19 outbreak closed churches.
At Holy Rosary Cathedral, confessions are taking place under an outdoor tent with a screen between priest and parishioner, said the archbishop, while at St. Clare of Assisi in Coquitlam, confessions are offered in the church’s crying room.
Archbishop Miller said “drive-thru” confessionals or other creative ideas are also welcome and not foreign to Church practice. He pointed out St. Damien, a missionary among lepers on the island of Molokai, would shout his sins to a waiting priest in a boat offshore.
He pointed out, though, that confessions must be done in person, not over phone or video call.
If a person still can’t get to confession, for example if they are in self-isolation, there is still a way to find peace, the archbishop said.
“There has always been the practice and custom of being able to make an act of contrition” that is based on the love of God, not fear, and made with the intention of confessing one’s sins through the sacrament of reconciliation as soon as possible, Archbishop Miller said.
“That’s why this crisis is so jarring, because as Catholics the sacramental order is so visible and tangible,” he said. “When we can’t use those signs, except in extraordinary circumstances, it is extraordinarily upsetting for a Church that is sacramental.”
In his video interview, which is becoming a weekly tradition during the COVID-19 crisis, Archbishop Miller also fielded questions about weddings and about participating in a livestreamed Mass.
Weddings are still taking place in the Archdiocese of Vancouver, he said, although circumstances depend on the priest who is celebrating and the ability of the parish to keep proper social distancing, as well as sanitary and other measures, including limiting the number of participants to 50.
As for watching a live Mass from the comfort of one’s own couch, Archbishop Miller said parishioners don’t need to fast for one hour before watching the liturgy or kneel and stand when the congregation usually would.
That said, they are free to “impose practices on yourself that could help your devotion.”
His weekly videos are available on the Catholic Vancouver YouTube channel.
Do you have a question about COVID-19 and how it affects some aspect of your faith life? Send it to communications@rcav.org or comment on Catholic Vancouver social media, which are monitored.
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