Roman Curia Apostolic Penitentiary to host worldwide webinar on the Sacrament of Reconciliation

Bella Bailey

Multimedia Correspondent

The Roman Curia’s Apostolic Penitentiary is hosting a global webinar, October 23-24, celebrating the sacrament of reconciliation. The webinar will consist of presentations by Cardinals, members of the clergy and professors, providing a well-rounded commentary on the sacrament. There will be six presentations total including a time for testimonies. The topics include the biblical foundations of contrition, a clarification on guilt, regret, repentance and contrition, the steps of true repentance and the sacramental and pastoral dimensions of the sacrament of reconciliation.

The Apostolic Penitentiary is the first among the “organisms of justice,” within the Roman Curia. Specifically, it handles matters of indulgences, absolutions from censures, dispensations, commutations, sanctioning, pardons and other graces. It’s primary purpose “is to facilitate the faithful as much as possible on the path to reconciliation with God and the Church.” The late October webinar is in effort of this mission, and is not the first of its kind, with a similar webinar focused on the examination of conscience being hosted in late October of 2025.

A study conducted by the Pew Research Center released in 2025 found that 47% of United States Catholics never go to confession, while only 23% go at least once a year – despite confession being “a sacrament that’s part of our daily path to holiness,” said Jamie Schroeder, chancellor of the Diocese of Covington.

Often, it is a feeling of guilt or shame over the sins committed which will keep Catholics away from the confessional. But, Notre Dame Sister Marla Monahan, vicar for religious in the Diocese, said, “I realize now that God, one professor I had said, ‘God could care less about your sins. God cares about you,’ It means that God’s love and God’s mercy is greater than our guilt and our sin.”

Mrs. Schroeder said, “I’ve never been one to think that guilt was necessarily a bad thing. It’s when we let guilt keep us away from the mercy and love and forgiveness of God, that’s when it’s bad.”

Frequent use of the Sacrament of Reconciliation can help the faithful reconcile their own guilt, but also their own personal shortcomings. “I think as adults, we get older and we kind of feel like we have it all together, and it helps me to remember that I don’t have it all together and that I need God, or that I need someone stronger, more powerful, bigger, in my life and that I’m not perfect, that I stumble when I fall, and I need forgiveness,” said Mrs. Schroeder.

“I think it goes back to what Jesus told us is the greatest commandment, to love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength, and our neighbor as ourself” said Sister Monahan, “and this, the sacrament of reconciliation, can be a way for us to receive the help and support to be able to do that.”

Go to penitenzieria.va to learn more and register for the webinar on celebrating the sacrament of reconciliation.