Did the early Church really believe confession was made directly to God alone—or is there biblical and historical evidence for confession through the Church’s ministers? In this episode, Trent responds to objections raised in his exchange with Ruslan and Gavin Ortlund and unpacks the Catholic case for sacramental confession.
Response to Redeemed Zoomer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QUS4zikocRM
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Trent Horn (00:00):
Hey everyone. In today’s episode, I’m going to share with you a short excerpt of my recent conversation with Gavin Ortland at Rusalin Katie’s Blessed God conference where we talked about a lot of subjects, but in this clip we talk about the sacrament of confession. And I’ll unpack in today’s episode, the evidence that backs up what I said in that exchange. So let’s roll the footage. Seeing salvation as a process I think makes sense of how we view many of these instances and help people make the Catholic you make more sense.
Ruslan (00:26):
We would agree with that. We would say sanctification is that you’re saved, you’re being saved, you will be saved. Two quick things. Work out your salvation for fear and trembling. The very next verse says, “For it is God working in you and giving you the power to obey him.” So we
Trent Horn (00:41):
Say the only power you have as a human being is to get yourself to hell. The only way you can get to heaven is through God. That was back to the anthropology thing of like by your nature. But that we have receiving grace. But even as Christians, we are capable of doing that. As Jesus says in John 15, “Those who do not abide in me shall be gathered up and burned.” So we would say, yeah, in being obedient to God to go to heaven, you cannot do that of your own power. It’s only by cooperating with God’s grace. So you can’t get to heaven on your own. You can certainly get to hell on your own.
Ruslan (01:12):
Yeah. And so I think the pushback we would have is then you have to confess in this way to a priest. Sure. And that’s the part. Never get into the details. And it’s one of them. Yeah. That’s one of them. And so if I’m looking at one John, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all righteousness. If we claim we have not sinned, we may come out to be a liar and his word is not in us. That verse specifically would, I would say, strongly imply that we’re confessing our sins to Jesus there.
Trent Horn (01:45):
No, because the verb confessed, and I have a whole article on this. You can look up online Trent Horn one John one: nine, where I talk about the use of Amalagao and examalagao, the word confess, with only one exception in the New Testament. It refers to making confession. So read verses eight and 10, it talks about confessing or speaking to who? It
Ruslan (02:04):
Doesn’t say anything about presbyteries or priests in here. No,
Trent Horn (02:07):
No, but it talks about not to God. It’s talking about if we confess our faith or confess things.
Ruslan (02:11):
If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in this.
Trent Horn (02:15):
So it’s talking to other people.
Ruslan (02:17):
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and jury. Sure. Catholics
Trent Horn (02:22):
Believe that the priest doesn’t forgive us God does, but he works through the priest just like he works through the minister of baptism.
Ruslan (02:28):
Okay. If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us.
Trent Horn (02:34):
Correct. So I would say that verses eight and 10 are referring to making claims or confessions to other people. And verse nine would fit into that format of confessing sins to other people.
Ruslan (02:46):
Okay.
Trent Horn (02:47):
And as I said in today’s episode, I want to share with you a little more of the evidence that backs up what I said in that exchange. But if you’d like to help us attend events like this and engage and host similar Catholic kinds of conferences like our recent Council of Trent Conference that we hosted right here in Dallas, then please support us for as little as $5 a month at trenthornpodcast.com where you get access to all kinds of premium content. Once again, that’s trrenthornpodcast.com. All right, so let’s take a look at one John one: nine and unpack the data I referenced in our exchange. The verse says, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” So many people assume that the word confess here refers to a confession made directly to God.
(03:31):
When in John’s letter, it’s actually used to refer to the confession we make to other human beings. In one John 2:23, he says, “No one who denies the Son has the Father. He who confesses the Son has the Father also.” So John is referring to the confession we make to other people. First John one: nine is also bracketed by verses that refer to what we say to other people. Verse eight says, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.” Then we have verse nine. “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” Then notice verse 10. “If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in us.” There’s no reason to think verse nine only refers to what we privately say to God and not what we say to other people as we see in verses eight and 10.
(04:25):
The Greek word Amalagao that is translated confess in this verse means I confess, profess, acknowledge, or praise. It’s used 26 times in the New Testament and each time it is used with only one exception, it refers to a person publicly declaring something to another human being. And in John’s writings, it always is used to describe confessing something to another human being. This understanding of confession in the first letter of John isn’t new. The 19th century Protestant New Testament scholar, Brooke Wescott, who helped create the Greek New Testament scholars still use today, said that the phrase confess our sins means, “Not only acknowledge them, but acknowledge them openly in the face of men.” Hans Joseph Klouk, a prolific New Testament scholar, likewise held that one John one: nine referred to some kind of public or liturgical confession of sin. The Johane New Testament scholar, David Rensburger, writes in his recent commentary on John’s letters that “Confession of sin was generally public as seen in Mark one: five, Acts 19:18, James 5:16 and in the Didique, and that may well be the case here.
(05:31):
The use of the plural sins rather than sin as in one eight is a reminder that not just an abstract confession of sinfulness, but the acknowledgement of specific acts is in mind. Father Raymond Brown, who was a moderate in the field of biblical studies, reached the same conclusion in his anchor Bible commentary in verse John. After listing the public confession of sins in the Old Testament to which John is alluding, like Leviticus five, Proverbs 28, Syrac four and Daniel 9:20, he writes this. “All the parallels and background given thus far suggests that the Yohan expression refers to a public confession rather than a private confession by the individual to God. The catechism says that even though some elements of the sacrament of confession have changed over time, it’s always maintained a certain fundamental structure. Specifically, the sacrament includes the sinner expressing repentance for his sins and God working through the ministers of the church, healing the sinner and reestablishing him in ecclesial communion with the body of Christ.
(06:31):
In Renzberger’s commentary on John’s letters that I cited earlier, he mentions the didace of first century catechism in the context of the public confession of sins. It gave believers the following instruction. “In your gatherings, confess your transgressions and do not come for prayer with a guilty conscience.” Scholars tend to date one John as being written in the late ’90s and the didicais having been written at the same time or even earlier. It makes sense therefore to connect John’s instruction to confess your sins with the context of confession to another person in the early church as described in the dideke. I will add here, as I did in a previous reply to Redeem Zoomer, that it’s become something of a myth that private confession to a priest only arose in the Middle Ages. The Ecumenical Council of Trent taught that the following statement is false. The manner of confessing secretly to a priest alone is a human invention.
(07:24):
When a lot of sources talk about confession in the early church being public, there’s a bit of an ambiguity in discussing this because they may be confusing public acts of penance or public displays of sorrow for sin with public confessions of sins. So for example, the Didique says, “In the church, you shall acknowledge your transgressions.” But that doesn’t necessarily mean a person had to confess his sins out loud to every person in the church. I mean, I go to church for confession, but I don’t confess to everybody at the church. I confess to a priest in private. And the evidence shows that private confession existed long before the seventh century. St. Augustine talks about not wanting to publicly disclose a person as a grave sinner, for example, by turning them away from communion, but this wouldn’t be necessary if confession of sins was already done in a public way, and so everybody already knew each other’s sins.
(08:19):
That’s why Hubbard in his thesis on this issue says the following. “There appears to be no evidence whatsoever in Augustine’s writings to indicate that an individual’s sins were read out in public. In the third century, Saint Cyprien of Carthage gave this advice. He wrote,” Let each one confesses sin. I beseech you, brethren. While he who is sinned is still in this world, while his confession can be admitted, while the satisfaction and remission affected through the priest is pleasing with the Lord. “In the second century, Irnes described women who were taken in by the heretic Marcius, saying some of them,” Make a public confession of their sins, but others of them are ashamed to do this and in a tacit kind of way, despairing of attaining to the life of God. “But Irneus doesn’t say anything about confessing to the entire congregation as opposed to publicly revealing sins to a priest rather than privately confessing them in prayer at the church.
(09:13):
The only place where confession of sins is mentioned in scripture is James 5:16, which says,” Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed. “In the context, James is referring to the elders, the presbyteroy, from which we get the English word priest, those who anoint the sick also. James says in verse 15,” The prayer of faith will save the sick man and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. “Notice this is joined with the conjunction therefore or in Greek Un. This places the confession of sins to one another in the context of seeking out the church’s presbyters or the church’s priests who anoint people with oil that results in the forgiveness of sins. And as I noted in my dialogue with Russ Lon and Gavin, the New Testament never tells us to confess our sins to Christ.
(10:05):
Instead, it tells us to confess our sins to other people, which was the norm in the early church. In the fourth century, Saint Ambrose connected the authority of the priesthood in remitting sins at baptism with the authority of priests to remit sins in the confessional. He said,” The office of the priest is a gift of the Holy Spirit, and his right it is specially to forgive and to retain sins. “And I note this connects to John 2023, where Jesus tells the apostles they have the authority to forgive and retain sins. Ambrose continues,” Why do you baptize if sins cannot be remitted by man? If baptism is certainly the remission of all sins, what difference does it make whether priests claim that this power is given to them in penance or at the baptismal font? He calls each blessed both him whose sins are remitted by the baptismal font and him whose sin is covered by good works.
(10:57):
For more on this subject, I recommend the resources@catholic.com and my book, The Case for Catholicism, published with Ignatius Press. Thank you all so much for watching, and I hope you have a very blessed day.