My First Confession...

...and How It Went Horribly Wrong

When I was in second grade I made my first confession. My first official confession, to a priest, to be logged into the book of St. Peter for all eternity. It was my First Reconciliation, one of the seven sacraments. Not as celebrated as the First Communion. No big party when a second grader proclaims to the world he is a sinner. At the First Communion, I had to memorize a few easy steps. How to hold my hands, what to say when the priest hands me the tasteless white cracker (Don’t say thank you, don’t say thank you). For the First Reconciliation, there was much more anxiety.

Fairly simple in theory, my task was to go into a room where the priest would be waiting for me and tell him something I’ve done that is a sin. Confess. Only problem was what to confess, for I was a good kid, or so I believed. Sure, I was a little hyperactive, but this couldn’t be your average household “mom yelling at you” incident, this had to be a sin.

“What if you don’t have a sin?” another kid in CCD asked our teacher.

“Everyone has a sin.” This was non-negotiable. And so this curly-haired second grader learned that we are all basically sinners.

Okay, fine, I’m no angel, I thought. This is my chance to revel in my dark side. I thought about my life and all the bad things I’d done. I fought with my sister. Not a sin though, is it? I didn’t listen to my parents. Rookie sins, if I’ve ever heard them! Then I had the brilliant idea to commit a new sin so that I’d have something to confess. For a while, this was the perfect solution.

But as I looked through the Bible’s guide to sins, a.k.a. The Ten Commandments, a.k.a. So You Wanna Be a Sinner, I couldn’t find a good match. Murder? No. Adultery? Don’t know what that means, I’ll mark it as a maybe. Covet thy neighbor’s house? No, it smells weird. Covet thy neighbor’s wife? She’s too tall for me. Thy neighbor’s male or female servant? His ox or donkey? This is getting weird and not helpful.

Thou shall not steal. Stealing! Wait a minute, that’s a no-brainer. I wasn’t an experienced thief but I’d watched a lot of cartoons, I had a pretty good grasp of thievery. Maybe I could shoplift some candy. Of course, I’d risk getting busted, which would be a huge mess and I should probably keep the police out of my first confession if at all possible.

Then it hit me. Stealing candy?! I’ve already done that!

It was a delightful afternoon at a department store in a suburban New Jersey strip mall. The kind of place where people feel safe. Nothing bad happens here, this is a nice community. Just the kind of place a skinny little freckle-faced kid can commit the perfect crime.

My older sister Jennifer was leading me through the aisles as our parents shopped for whatever boring stuff parents shop for, when she broke off to look at something that caught her eye. A young criminal in sweatpants was now left alone in the candy aisle, with the opportunity to sin. I glanced down at all the candy. So much candy. One particular bag was ripped open and the individual candies were spilled out onto the shelf. There were little candies everywhere, even on the floor.

Now this would be a great opportunity to sample this particular candy, I thought. The store probably wants me to sample this candy. See what a kid like me thinks about it. If I like it, I’ll tell my friends. Win-win! I thought about what my parents would advise in this situation.

My mom, responsible for the gift of Catholicism, would be a hard no. My dad, on the other hand, would be pro-candy sampling. We were, after all, a family that used children’s silverware that was pilfered from United Airlines (airplanes used to give out metal forks and knives, this was the 80’s).

Mom and Dad were both morally upstanding folks, but Dad was more of the “but also, let’s see what we can get away with” variety. As my dad, now dressed in a red devil’s costume with a pitchfork and a tail, sat on my shoulder, I reached down for a piece of the spilled-out candy.

Only then I realized, I hadn’t thought about when I would sample this little piece of sugary goodness. Eat it here at the store and I’m under pressure to finish it quickly. There’s a risk of hand-fumbling and perhaps choking. Wait and eat it later, I risk someone interrogating me. My sister would be just the type to cause a big scene if she were to see the contraband candy. It has to be now.

And I got away with it. And I told no one.

This was the sin I was going in with. I needn't sin again just to tell the priest a good story, I stole some candy. It was the perfect sin.

The day came and all of us second-graders waited our turn in a big room. No one could even raise their head, all of us wondering what the other kids were going to say, holding onto our shame and guilt, as we had rehearsed. As is our Catholic birthright. She’s really good in school, there’s no way she’s got a good one. Now that kid, he’s definitely got some sins. How did he even choose? I wonder if anyone here has done murder. Or adultery. Probably a lot of coveting.

“Michael.” It was my turn to go into the room. I was nervous. The priest sat behind a desk. I sat in the hot seat. I told him that I had stolen some candy from a store. It dawned on me that he’d heard that one a million times. “Whattaya got kid? Whattawe doing here, a candy shoplift thing? Great, another one.” On top of the guilt from being a sinner, I felt guilty for being unoriginal.

He listened to my confession and implored further. “Was the bag of candy already open?” I was shocked. How did he know? Did God tip him off? Was he briefed on all the sins beforehand? Before I could answer he continued. “Because if it were an open bag, that wouldn’t be too bad.”

I was caught completely off-guard. I had prepared my sin, rehearsed my candy-stealing sinner role to perfection, and now it was being turned upside-down! I thought about how our CCD teacher drove the point home that we are all sinners and we all have something to confess. I thought about calling an audible and switching sins, but I had no back-up, so I doubled-down.

“Right, no, it wasn’t open. I opened it and then took the candy.”

During my holy sacrament of the First Reconciliation, I went into a room and told a lie to a priest. But I had to! The priest was trying to negate my sin! I was left without options and I improvised. I immediately worried about the repercussions.

Is God listening to me lie to his chosen guy-in-robes here in this little room in suburban New Jersey? Would the punishment for lying to a priest be way worse than it would have been for sampling candy from a ripped-open bag, a clear sin that apparently this holy man thinks is just perfectly fine?!

But my time in the room was over. I was prescribed a couple Hail Marys and it was onto the next little sinner.

My parents, always fair-minded people, left it up to me if I wanted to share my sin with them as well. Otherwise, it was between me and the priest and, more importantly, me and God. I decided to keep my First Reconciliation to myself. But in the aftermath of my confession that turned into a sin itself, I wondered where God came down on the whole thing. Ultimately, I decided that I was okay. Yes, I lied to the priest during my first confession, but I think I’m perfectly fine.