Confession Series
Reflection
Our Scared Straight Encounter
by Fr. Richard Colbert, c.pp.s.
On Wednesday, May 6, Fr. Timothy Armbruster and
I were invited to participate is an intense five hour
workshop at the Western Reception Diagnostic and
Correctional Center in St. Joseph Missouri. Our group
was comprised of five probation officers, ten male
parolees, and eight resident offenders.
After introductions, one leader, Samuel, began his
portrayal of prison life within the walls. His language
was blunt, saucy and street-wise. He emphasized the
necessity for truthfulness, honesty, and respect in our
workshop. I was not clear about the dynamics at first,
but soon realized the focus of this event was targeted
to the ten parolees present. After the talk, we took a
graphic tour of the institution to places not open to
public access, including one of the dorms.
Reconciliation as Honesty with Self
More Conversation with Beth Heidler
by Fr. Keith Branson, c.pp.s., Publications Editor
Many of us know of religious communities where
many retired members live together. They may have
access to Confession regularly, even twice a year, and
generally don’t think they need it. We can be somewhat
taken aback by the attitude, for they sit in cliques at
meals, will not participate in activities their personal
unfavorites are at, will not share rides to personal errands
or activities, and generally demean those who are “other.”
It’s easy not understand why religious don’t see such
prejudice as a sin, like other such prejudices are.
In talking about the expectations of Confession, Beth
talked about many questions she never got from the
other side of the partition, especially such as:
“Have you made peace with this person?”
“Have you apologized to that person you’ve harmed?”
“What can you do to make the situation better?”
“How can you repair the pain of this situation?”
Karl Menninger once asked what happened to our
sense of sin? For Beth, Confession is about the courage
to be honest with yourself. It’s about “recognizing the
false self and looking to get ride of it...when you become
interested in living you true self you are closer to living
the image of God in us.” Her take on Teilhard de Chardin
is: “Our unwillingness to cooperate with God is the
meaning of sin.”
One of the great challenges she spoke of is that one can
go to two different confessors with the same sins and get
two very different responses. Another challenge for her
especially, like most women, was going to a male priest
to speak about intimate matters; women generally prefer
to speak with other women about very personal things in
their own lives. The priests she thought who were most
helpful in her experience were ones who were aware of
their own brokenness. Recognizing that in Confession
both penitent and priest have baggage, and we can’t get to
all of it in one session, is important.
For Beth, the important aspects of Confession are
insight, honesty, regret (sorrow), understanding it’s
continued on next page
The New Wine Press • Page 10 • July 2015
Inside the dorm, we saw eight people in cots in one
of the pods, four of them sound asleep. Someone in
the gathering resident crowd dubbed me as “Pops.”
While his tone sounded friendly and joking, I heard
him clearly enough. We got heavy moldy whiffs of the
lingering residue of nicotine and other clingy odors
from the present and others embedded from ages past
in that pod. Next, we were taken to one of the small
shower rooms. We could readily visualize the potential
for violence or physical attacks therein. Tragically,
an incident can occur within seconds before a rescue
would happen, perhaps a few minutes later. I’m sure our
parolees understood precisely why this site was on our
tour.
We returned to our original meeting space and
listened to the participants expressing their reactions
and impressions. Then more resident team members
shared stories of living inside the walls. We were served
a simple brown bag with the fixings for a cheese and
baloney sandwich and an orange, with beverages
available in several soda machines along the walls.
The second half of this intense program focused
on our ten parolees. Each man stood up in the circle,
aware we all had read a sketchy summary paragraph
describing his public record. The pointed questions
and comments from probation officers and resident
offenders made it profoundly clear how vulnerable
and unseasoned they were when interacting with this
intimidating, focused crowd. While some tried to be
evasive, make excuses, and deflect unsuccessfully, these
verbally skilled probation officers and offenders directly
challenged their every word, especially when they tried
to use double talk excuses for their crimes and addictive
behaviors. It was powerful, humbling and awesome to
observe this intense process. Now I understood how
those earlier talks, tours, and smells seemed to have
disposed them for the impact of their interviews.
As clergymen, this workshop had an impact on
Timothy and myself. At the closure, some of these
offenders and pr