Padre Pio was an Italian Capuchin friar who spent hours everyday in the confessional. People came to him from all over the world to go to confession to him. Well, I can't compare to him, after all, he was canonized as a saint, and he had the stigmata too! But I did spend hours today in the confessional hearing confessions and giving some spiritual guidance and then absolving the penitents from their sins. What other calling do you know that has the forgiveness of sins as one of the elements of a job description?
There is a red line difference between going to a counselor and going to confession. In counseling the same issues may be dealt with as in confession, but the emphasis is very different. In the Sacrament of Penance the penitent comes with an awareness of what he or she has done to make life problematical and asks for forgiveness for causing, or aggravating, the problems in life. And what the penitent looks for is not worldly wisdom or the benefit of sound science, but rather the penitent seeks absolution, a fresh start, a new way of living, and above all an encounter with the Lord Jesus Himself, through the ministry of the priest.
In the Sacrament of Penance the penitent is aware of having, at least to some degree, disturbed his or her relationship with the Lord Jesus. And the believer knows that there is nothing more important than that relationship. Or, to put this in the words of Pope Benedict in his new encyclical: "Life in its true sense is not something we have exclusively in or from ourselves: it is a relationship. And life in its totality is a relationship with Him who is the Source of Life. If we are in relation with Him who does not die, who is Life itself and Love itself, then we are in life. Then we live."
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