Why, "I look at porn", is not a confession!

The objective of confession is neither the revelation of sins committed nor to bring shame to the sinner.

Confession is to tell the truth about something.  In the context of our faith it is to tell the truth of not just what happened but the moral reality of the act, word or attitude.  Confession is to speak the truth and then take a firm stand on one side or the other, not simply to say there are two sides. 

To say “I look at porn” is not a confession.  It could be a simple statement of fact.  It could even be a boast.  It is not fundamentally different from saying, “I look at cars.”  It is only confession when there is a moral element involved.  It is not enough to say, “I look at porn and that is wrong.”  Confession needs three truth statements that are; admissions of the action, the evil of the action, and our personal guilt because we took said action.    Full confession might say, “I look at porn and looking at porn is evil and I am personally, morally guilty because I look at porn.” It is only confession if there is both the general moral element to the confession and a personal moral element.

In reaction to the Roman Catholic sacrament of confession the protestant and evangelical churches have down played confession.  We have reduced it to creedal statements of orthodox faith or of denominational loyalty or we have made it an ambiguous statement of the general condition of lostness.  Unwilling to get too personal or to insist on too much we dumb down confession to a level that is entirely acceptable to anyone.  A vague reality that we haven’t done very well at being good is enough.

When we confess we reinforce our commitment to one side or the other of a moral position.  Confession is both the verbalization of repentance and the reinforcement of repentance.   In confession we are taking on the moral stand and a commitment to the side opposed to evil.  Our words do not create the reality of the future, but they do reinforce and strengthen our resolve to the present loyalty.  Our words strengthen that inner part of us that formed the commitment those words reflect.

Let us digress into a football illustration.  Let’s suppose that you are a casual fan of a college football team, we will use Alabama to illustrate, but any team will do.  As a casual fan you begin to say “Roll Tide” to other Alabama fans.  You begin to respond to people in team tee shirts or who have decorations on their cars.  You buy a team tee shirt and put a window decal on your car.  You make a point to watch their games and cheer at their success.  You begin to sing, “Yea, Alabama”, and insert “Roll Tide Roll” in the appropriate places when you hear Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Sweet Home Alabama.  You watch videos of the post game victory and chant “Rammer Jammer”.  If you do this for long, you will move from being a casual fan to a more determined fan.

Confession works in much the same way.  An honest, repeated commitment to a side reinforces our loyalty to that side.  Confession is more than, “I didn’t do very well”.  It is, “I have by my choices taken sides against a Holy God; it was evil and I was evil for doing so.”  Repentance without real confession is all but impossible.  Our soft selling confession may explain why the church is in such a mess today.