In the discussion following the post “Thoughts on Abortion”, questions were raised regarding “confession and repentance in the Roman Catholic Church.” I hope in this post to give a brief, general overview of the Catholic understanding of these issues, and to answer some of the questions raised in the discussions of the previous post.

To get an overview in the Church’s own language, I recommend reading the sections concerning grace and justification of the Catechism, paragraphs 1987 through 2029. I refer to these sections because understanding the Catholic conception of grace is necessary to understand the Catholic conception of sin.

Why does man need salvation?

Catholics believe man’s destiny is eternal life, to live in unity with God. This, in particular, is what distinguishes us from the animals, who share biological and sensible life with us, but do not have free will and rational, immortal souls. The nature of this life with God himself is participation in God’s own life – this is our definition of grace (CCC #1997). Read the rest of this entry »

[Ed. Note: This is valuable and welcome submission was contributed by one of our astute Catholic readers, who comments under the monicker "Bear". It helps set the record straight on some of the unintentional inaccuracies made in the previous entry, Thoughts on Abortion and provides some much needed explanation of the Roman Catholic Church's current teachings as well.]

I. TEACHING ON ABORTION

Firstly, Catholicism considers abortion to be evil because it is the direct, intentional killing of a human person. The Catechism states in paragraph 2270:

Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person-among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life.

It goes on to affirm from there that this has been the constant teaching of the Church from the beginning. Sources indicating this include the Bible itself, the Didache, and various non-canonical epistles and other writings from the early Church. Read the rest of this entry »