“Seldom does history offer an example of a practice undertaken for so long by so many that collapsed so quickly,” writes James O’Toole of confession. “The question is why.” For I Have Sinned is his eloquent, thoroughly researched answer.
From the beginning of the twentieth century into the 1950s, regular confession was what O’Toole, a distinguished historian who taught for many years at Boston College, calls a “defining characteristic” of American Catholic religious life. If Sunday was for Communion, Saturday was for confession, and most Catholics were reluctant to take Communion if they had not gone to confession.
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