Confession Quotes

Maturity is when you're able to say, 'It's not just them. It's me.

~ Criss Jami

Telling the truth may cause a few seconds of pain, but there's no medicine that can manage the pain of keeping lies.

~ R.m. Ford

If you do what is bad, Lay upon your knees and call upon HIM, and he will guide you in the right way.

~ Margaret Slade

As we Christians strive to be more influenced by God’s kingdom than by this world, we’re reminded we will sometimes slip, but ‘if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness’ (1 John 1:9).

~ Van Harden

It is a bad indication when, in any period, men will so exalt their confessions that they force the Scriptures to a secondary importance, illustrated in one era, when as Tulloch remarks: 'Scripture as a witness, disappeared behind the Augsburg Confession ...No decrees of councils; no ordinances of synods; no standard of doctrines; no creed or confession, is to be urged as authority in forming the opinions of men. They may be valuable for some purposes, but not for this; they may be referred to as interesting parts of history, but not to form the faith of Christians; they may be used in the church to express its belief, not to form it.

~ L.s. Chafer

I too was pinched off from a piece of clay, I too modeled by omnipotence and flankedby things too wonderful for me

~ Bryana Johnson

I know I’m not an easy She-dragon to. . not fear.” “I’m not afraid of you, Ghleanna. I’ve never been afraid of you. To be quite honest. . I think you’re amazing. I always have. Since the first time you ignored me.

~ G.a. Aiken

The last confession he heard was from a young hysterical girl who seemed to him to be making up a chain of small sins so that she could imagine herself full of remorse.

~ Morley Callaghan

On the way home from church, I felt like I was walking on clouds, as pure as an angel. I wished a car would run me down at that very instant, so I could die and go straight to heaven before I had a chance to sin again.

~ Alice Bag

Without confession, there is no remission of sins.

~ Lailah Gifty Akita

Confession breaks the power of canceled sin. It also heals the broken heart.

~ Mark Batterson

[H]er retaliation only made the sin the greater because she could not find words to confess.

~ Thomm Quackenbush

What's wrong with the world?It's easy to probe the ills of the nation, the Church, and the planet and come up with a grave diagnosis... But it takes all the strength we can muster to stand at Mass and honestly say, 'I have greatly sinned, in my thoughts and in my words, in what I have done and what I have failed to do...Sin is not out there; it's deep inside you and me... What's wrong with the world? I am, because I sin, and my sins well up from the darkness in my own heart.

~ Scott Hahn

Love can’t cover over the sins we cover up…If you want God and others to cover over your sin, stop covering it up.

~ Mark Buchanan

The moment of confession is not merely when one hears another pronounce the words: God forgives you, or 'in God's name I absolve you.' Rather it is that point at which the sinner unfeignedly experiences himself as truly judged and pardoned by God.

~ Thomas C. Oden

One trains the eye of confession most closely on what is hurting. If sin is present it will be aching. Confession begins where the raw anguish of conscience is rubbing against the primordial awareness of God's holiness.

~ Thomas C. Oden

The confessor can nullify the exquisitely seasonable moment of confession by talking instead of listening. When he sees pedagogy and advice as more important than simple listening, he diverts the stream of confession.

~ Thomas C. Oden

Protestants at one time were confident that their free form of confession was a vast improvement upon Catholic private confession to a priest because it is voluntary, demystified, and not routinized. But amid the acids of modernity it has volunteered itself right out of existence. Demystification has dwindled into desacralization. The escape from routinization has become a convenient cover for the demise of repentance. The postmodern pastor is trying to learn anew to listen to the deeper range of feelings of others, without forgetfulness of the Word of God.

~ Thomas C. Oden

To confess your sins to God is not to tell God anything God doesn't already know. Until you confess them, however, they are the abyss between you. When you confess them, they become the Golden Gate Bridge.

~ Frederick Buechner

Since it is likely that, being men, they would sin every day, St. Paul consoles his hearers by saying ‘renew yourselves’ from day to day. This is what we do with houses: we keep constantly repairing them as they wear old. You should do the same thing to yourself. Have you sinned today? Have you made your soul old? Do not despair, do not despond, but renew your soul by repentance, and tears, and Confession, and by doing good things. And never cease doing this.

~ John Chrysostom

Confession is a difficult Discipline for us because we all too often view the believing community as a fellowship of saints before we see it as a fellowship of sinners. We feel that everyone else has advanced so far into holiness that we are isolated and alone in our sin. We cannot bear to reveal our failures and shortcomings to others. We imagine that we are the only ones who have not stepped onto the high road to heaven. Therefore, we hide ourselves from one another and live in veiled lies and hypocrisy.But if we know that the people of God are first a fellowship of sinners, we are freed to hear the unconditional call of God's love and to confess our needs openly before our brothers and sisters. We know we are not alone in our sin. The fear and pride that cling to us like barnacles cling to others also. We are sinners together. In acts of mutual confession we release the power that heals. Our humanity is no longer denied, but transformed.

~ Richard J. Foster

The confession of evil works is the first beginning of good works.

~ Augustine Of Hippo

In confession occurs the breakthrough of the Cross. The root of all sin is pride, superbia. I want to be my own law, I have a right to my self, my hatred and my desires, my life and my death. The mind and flesh of man are set on fire by pride; for it is precisely in his wickedness that man wants to be as God. Confession in the presence of a brother is the profoundest kind of humiliation. It hurts, it cuts a man down, it is a dreadful blow to pride...In the deep mental and physical pain of humiliation before a brother - which means, before God - we experience the Cross of Jesus as our rescue and salvation. The old man dies, but it is God who has conquered him. Now we share in the resurrection of Christ and eternal life.

~ Dietrich Bonhoeffer

So what do you have to confess now?I don't know why I'm saying any of this, except that is the truth. I'm confessing that I don't know if I'm ready for this.What is 'this'?Being open. Being hurt. Liking. Not being liked. Seeing the flicker on. Seeing the flicker off. Leaping. Falling. Crashing.

~ David Levithan

Right words make all of us feel falsely important. Right action keeps all of us forever beginners.

~ Richard Rohr

The flame of testimony burns brightly when fed with the oil of grace.

~ H.a. Ironside

Confession is not all about telling your bad deeds to the public, but being proud of the bad things you have done so far.

~ Michael Bassey Johnson

I'm not always the best at expressing myself to you, so I'm taking advantage of the fact that I will be completely unresponsive when you read this, and therefore incapable of messing things up

~ Amy Plum

Even though I didn’t originally buy it for you, because like an idiot I avoided your feelings like the plague, I hadn’t noticed until now that it wasn’t the lucky price that had drawn me to it, but the colour of it.” I heaved a deep breath, preparing myself. I remembered the last time I had said something so cheesy, and how he had laughed but I continued anyway, before my shyness could take over.“Hurry up, before you start regretting.” The taxi man had said. And I did.I looked him square in the eyes, blushing so furiously I was sure even my dark skin wouldn’t hide it. He met my gaze, somewhat shyly, which was a rare sight. “So I’ve decided to give this necklace to you as a symbol for what I realised today. The colour is green, like your… uh, like your eyes… and your eyes are my kryptonite.” I mumbled, looking at him into the eyes right until the end, until his face turned completely red and his jaw dropping so low I was sure it almost hit the counter, his eyes sparkling, wide with shock.

~ Anja Owona Okoa

Lucien?”“Yes, Alice?”Her heart was pounding, but she willed herself to muster the courage to reach out to him— unpredictable, dangerous as he was. “I think it’s real.

~ Gaelen Foley

I can't bring myself to trust you. But even if you were to betray me, and even if you were to become my enemy... would it be okay for me to love? Could you... let me love you?

~ Ryohgo Narita

—And you completely blow me away and rip my world up and everything else, and then you go back to ignoring me.” “I blew you away?” I squeak out before I can stop myself. He stares at me steadily. “You blew everything away.

~ Lauren Oliver

With all my soul I wished to be good, but I was young, passionate and alone, completely alone when I sought goodness. Every time I tried to express my most sincere desire, which was to be morally good, I met with contempt and ridicule, but as soon as I yielded to low passions I was praised and encouraged.

~ Leo Tolstoy

Confession is an act of violence against the unoffending.

~ Tom Stoppard

You said just now, Don't be so ashamed of yourself, because that's the root of your trouble––with those words, you seem to have reached right into my innermost soul. What I mean is, when I visit people, I always feel that I'm really the lowest of the low, that everybody takes me for a buffoon, so I say to myself, why shouldn't I act the fool, I'm not afraid of what any of you might think, because every single one of you is even worse than me. That's why I'm a buffoon, I'm a buffoon born of shame, great starets, of shame. It's anxiety pure and simple that makes me so unruly.

~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky

And sometimes when I tilt my head,in that deep sleep, I realize I forgot to tell youwhat happened at work, in the thick of,all other rubbish daily stuff.And then I hate to believe, it’s more than5 hours to hit the snooze, and now suddenly the night seems longer- than any lazy afternoon.I want to talk to you now, before I forgetHow I have imagined you will react, word by word,And act by act. But I kind of manage dozing off in a few minutes,And I clearly forget it morning,This entire instance.But tonight- when you are asleep, and I amWide awake like a snake, I don’t say I forgot anyBuzz to discuss, but I have this insane gushOf words of tell you I how much I have loved you through.Precisely none of this should be forgotten,So I decide to write this poem and tell you,I am so much in my moment of truth.

~ Jasleen Kaur Gumber

The legal profession is notorious for complicating the simples of things.

~ Sarah M. Eden

If there was anything I learned from John the Baptist, it was that the sooner you confess a mistake, the quicker you can get on to making new and better mistakes.

~ Christopher Moore

Christ became our Brother in order to help us. Through him our brother has become Christ for us in the power and authority of the commission Christ has given him. Our brother stands before us the sign of the truth and the grace of God. He has been given to us to help us. He hears the confession of our sins in Christ's stead and he forgives our sins in Christ's name. He keeps the secret of our confession as God keeps it. When I go to my brother to confess, I am going to God.

~ Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Arturo Bandini was pretty sure that he wouldn't go to hell when he died. The way to hell was the committing of mortal sin. He had committed many, he believed, but the confessional had saved him. He always got to confession on time — that is, before he died. And he knocked on wood whenever he thought of it — he always would get there on time — before he died. So Arturo was pretty sure he wouldn't go to hell when he died. For two reasons. The confessional, and the fact that he was a fast runner.

~ John Fante