When a person gathers for the first confession in his life, he has many questions. Our ancestors first confessed after 7 years and therefore from childhood knew how to behave correctly. Nowadays, many are baptized, but they have never been to confession. We are often afraid not only of the first confession, but of the subsequent ones. In fact, one should not be afraid of confession, but of sin. How to confess and receive communion?
Remember that the Lord Jesus Christ himself stands next to you and the priest in a confession, accepting your confession. Therefore, what you are telling the priest, you are telling God himself. If your repentance is sincere, sins after confession are considered completely forgiven. As you know, Orthodox Christians believe that the soul after death must go through trials called tribulations, on which it gives demons an answer for all sins committed in life. Sins are recorded by a demon specially assigned to a person. So, if sins were confessed, then demons can no longer see them in their scrolls, according to the testimony of authoritative Orthodox sources. If you forget a sin, it is also cleansed by confession. However, if sin was deliberately concealed, then this increases the degree of sin - and all confession will be considered invalid. Therefore, mentally prepare in advance for what you have to say all, aggravating conscience, no matter how hard it may seem to you. If you forgot to say something serious in a confession, say so in the next confession.
How to prepare for a confession? If the confession is the first, then you should agree in advance with the priest about it, because it is usually long and it is better to plan a confession in advance. If you are afraid, try to choose the priest you like most for your first confession. Different priests communicate differently with parishioners, in order to better understand this or that priest, you need to be like Sunday services and listen to the sermon.
Confession as a sacrament is available only to the baptized. There are special books for those preparing for confession. They list sins for those who want to know how to confess properly. The names of many sins may be unfamiliar and incomprehensible to you. Not everyone can quickly figure out everything and learn a lot of information, so do not try to indicate absolutely all the sins from the book in your confession. Better just take a separate sheet of paper and write on it everything that conscience accuses you of. You at this stage do not need definitions of all sins, although over time you need to master church vocabulary. Take a sheet with you for confession, as people have long done. Then, in confession, you will not be afraid to negotiate and leave with the feeling of an unfinished business. After confession, many priests tear a sheet of sins, and this causes relief. This is not always done, but in some churches this practice occurs.
If you want to take communion, you need to know how to confess correctly, because confession is a kind of admission to the sacrament. During confession, you need to ask the priest for the blessing of the sacrament. If you kept the fast before the sacrament, read the necessary prayers, were in the service the day before, and the priest considers repentance sufficient, he will allow you to take communion. Usually they take communion in the morning on an empty stomach, after midnight it is impossible to eat and drink before the sacrament. If in the morning you recalled another sin, you have the opportunity to fully repent of the morning confession. Although the decision on the need for additional confession is made by each individual father, therefore, questions should be addressed directly to the clergyman who professes in the morning.
Some rules of conduct. Before confession, the priest reads special prayers with those who want to confess, they must at least be listened to while you still do not know them. Often there are several people in the queue for confession, when you become the next “on the way” to the priest, you need to put your hands on your chest, quietly say “Forgive me brothers and sisters” and bow to the people. When you come to the priest, you need to cross yourself, kiss the lying Gospel and the Cross, and in a low voice say that you repent before God that you did this and that. Do not argue, answer the questions of the priest and listen to his instruction. Then he will cover you with epitrache and read prayers, after which sins will be forgiven.
Do not be embarrassed, even the most experienced people in church life once did not know how to confess properly. Remember, in the eyes of God there are no morally neutral acts. And a person who feels intimacy with God will always find something to reproach himself with. This is quite normal and common to all believers. After the first confession, you will want to confess more and more in order to approach the “purity, sight of God.”