I  was a "baby priest" when one of those dear evening Confessions   touched my young heart with a compassion for God's hurting people like it   had never been melted before! It was the hour before the parish's evening   Mass. I was sitting in the Confessional and dear penitents were coming in   one after the other to find God's love in their broken lives. It was the old   style "Confessional booth" where the priest sat behind a closed door in a   compartment with a curtained window on each side of him. A curtained   entrance on each side of him allowed penitents to come in, kneel before the   screened window on their side, and seek God's forgiveness when the light came on letting them know that it was their turn. The window remained screened so that the anonimity of the penitent could be safeguarded. The penitent's curtained compartment was just large enough to allow a person to step in and kneel…
         "Father, there's a lady out there," a penitent said before beginning her own Confession. "She's so crippled up with arthritis that she can't get into the Confessional here. Is there any way that you could come out there to her?" I thanked the penitent for her compassionate request and asked her to remain where she was after her Confession. When I had finished with the penitent "on the other side," I told her, we would all come out together and she could lead me to the disabled penitent waiting outside.

          My guide led me to a woman sitting by herself in the last pew of the church. I could see, with my tiny bit of vision, how crippled up her arthritic body was. "Would you like to come into the sacristy, the priest's Mass preparation room," I asked, saying that it would give her the privacy she deserved. "No," she said. "Father, sit right here with me, please."

          "Are  you sure?" Iasked incredulously. "Wouldn't you prefer the privacy of the sacristy?" The church was already filling up with people coming for the evening's Mission Mass and talk. "No," she said persistently. "Sit right here. I've waited too long for this. Let's begin right here." She left me in tears as she explained that she had been away from the Sacrament of God's forgiving love for more than 70 years and then simply, humbly made a Confession of her whole life!

          As the penitent  finished her most beautiful, sincere, humble Confession and just glowed in the peace of God's forgiving love, I was moved to ask her, "You were away for 70 years. You very evidently learned to live without the Sacrament. What made you want to come back?" She answered my query as dearly as she had begged for God's forgiving love for all the sins of her life. "Oh, yes," she said, I was away all those years, since my teen years. I had gone to Confession with the other kids of our parish that Saturday. On getting home after Confession my mother had grilled me: did I tell the priest this? did I tell the priest that? Unsatisfied with my answers she had marched me back to the Church and on into the Confessional to do it over again! I never went back after that, Father. But," and she paused before continuing, "all these 70 years I knew where I could find God's peace if I could ever get the courage to come back! I'm so deeply grateful to my friend for bringing me here tonight!" … I was so ashamed as I sat there listening to her humble sharing and thinking of how I had actually wished the Church to do away with that Sacrament of God's loving peace.