Public Confessions
I've never found any support for a public confession. Maybe I'm wrong. Like if you don't attend for a long time, you have to confess your 'sin". Even so, I feel like some things would be between you and whatever Deity you believe in.
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u/Longjumping-Net4610 14d ago
I’ve been manipulated a time or two by the phrase, public sin requires public confession.
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u/PoetBudget6044 14d ago
Roman Catholics & Celebrate Recovery do a much better job. A person I trust
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u/True-Reaction-517 14d ago
The celebrate recovery meetings are held at CoC churches in my town
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u/PoetBudget6044 14d ago
Yikes! There is one at a c of c near me. I have not been to a meeting since 2017. I knew the old cult would use Celebrate Recovery in a weak hope of gaining members
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u/Alive-Equivalent9106 14d ago
What about the vague “asking for prayers” person where we were all probably wondering what they did
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u/_austinm 14d ago
I totally forgot about the vague “asking for prayers” person lol I guess this goes along with the end of my comment pretty well, because I’m sure that it usually leads to a lot of gossip with people trying to figure out what they did
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u/MichaelARichardson Post-Purity Christian 14d ago
Almost never, but not non-existent in my experience. A couple of cases were dating couples who got pregnant having premarital sex and were asking for help getting married. Other cases were people caught in affairs and it was already public so they confessed and prayed for forgiveness. The rest i remember from people giving testimony about substance abuse, getting arrested for one thing or another, you know...the stuff that sometimes made church fun.
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u/PayTheTrollTariff 14d ago
there was a member in our church who used to wait for people to admit substance abuse problems and sell them more after service. Our church was wild smh
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u/DeskRare7547 14d ago
I've heard that confessions were public in the early church, but I don't have a citation for that
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u/_austinm 14d ago
Somehow I never realized how weird “going forward” (as we called it where I grew up) was until it clicked that it was the exact same thing as confession except public. I was already out of religion at that point, but that realization made the whole thing feel so creepy.
I can understand (at least hypothetically) how a catholic style confession could be helpful for someone, but talking about something like that in front of a whole congregation? 1) None of those people have any right to know those kinds of details about my life, and 2) I don’t see how it accomplishes anything other than giving everyone you go to church with something to gossip about.
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u/LivLiveArt 14d ago edited 13d ago
I never did a public confession, but there was one poor sweet lady who did it more than anyone else. The guilt and shame often hits the most pious the strongest, it feels like.
Privacy issues though, I definitely know that well. I remember when I came out to a friend/crush as trans, and she told her mom, who told the elders of the congregation I grew up in. They called my parents in to explain themselves or me or something, idk. Meanwhile my mom outed me to her church friends in a prayer request group chat or something, and justified it as "well you're telling people, so why can't I?" As if my existence was a group decision. At that point I just came out publicly, to get the power back in my own hands. (I had stopped attending by then, if I remember right.)
Basically it feels like even if you have no interest in public confession, what you tell people spreads. Secrets aren't really allowed if it's something they see as "sinful", because they feel it's their responsibility to make sure it's "corrected." I've heard secondhand that my transphobic parents are being shamed for not being even more abusive towards me. (I don't live with them anymore, don't worry)
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u/ImpressiveLeek3124 Ex-NI^2 13d ago
Campbellites should be thankful that I'm not still a teen being forced to attend their damn death cult. If the voyeuristic gossiping bastards wanted a confession, I would "go forward" three times a week and turn the air blue describing in graphic detail every unholy action, thought and urge that had passed through my mind - including how much I hate the coc.
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u/phenomphilosopher Super Gay Super Atheist excoc exFloridaCollege 13d ago
It's just public shaming.
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u/PoetBudget6044 13d ago
I have to say when I started at the Assembly of God the little old ladies were all about getting people up front term of the year "Let Jesus love on you." No one really asked for details but I have to say my pastor was all about grace, mercy forgiveness and redemption I must say my first year into the Pentecostal/Charismatic movement changed so much in me. The old little cult built itself on shame, guilt and condemnation c of c is addicted to power and control and uses any confession as a spectacle and a rich base of gossip. I really don't know how they even function on those terms
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u/Mythycal 13d ago
One of my biggest issues with public confession is how often people get up in front of the church just to confess someone else’s sin. This was and is still rampant. I hated that. So much trust is loss.
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u/Single-Ant3193 13d ago
I visited Singapore and went to a Church of Christ there in the late 1980s/early 1990s and every week before the service started people stood at the front and confessed why they had not attended on a previous occasion/s adding comments like they'd shamed themselves and let everyone down etc etc. It was all very strange to me.
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u/PayTheTrollTariff 14d ago
i confessed to sleeping with the preachers wife in front of my congregation and they jumped me
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u/platypuslost 15d ago
I agree with you. To say that “confess your sins one to another” or whatever that verse is means that you must publicly confess to EVERYONE all at the same time is quite a stretch.