"I ABSOLVE YOU OF SIN"

"1. To pronounce clear of guilt or blame. 2. To relieve of a requirement or an obligation. 3.aTo grant a remission of sin to. b. To pardon or remit (a sin)." (Amer. Heritage Dict.)

Two or three years ago, I thought I heard a Catholic priest, in a TV show [I forget which right now] use the titled phrase. I used it in an article and was told that a Catholic priest could not forgive sins therefore I must have heard wrong. Well, since I am nearly deaf and have to depend on a hearing aid, that might have been true.

But, Thursday night, February 22, I not only heard it again but read it on my "closed captions" monitor. This time I could not be mistaken. On the ER, show the old Catholic priest, on his death bed, said to the young doctor, (after the doctor had made a kind of confession) "I absolve you of sin." Now read the definition, given above, of the word "absolve."

I must concur with the scribes and Pharisees on this one. (Luke 5:21 "And the scribes and the Pharisees began to reason, saying, Who is this which speaketh blasphemies? Who can forgive sins, but God alone?" When man sins against his fellow man or against society in general or against his own body, we sin against God, and God is the offended one hence He is the only one who can pardon such.

But, say some, "the priest acted as only a mediator." Well, the Bible says,. "For there is one God, and one mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus" (quotation from the Catholic Douay Version 1943 [Catholic] of 1 Timothy 2:5) so that eliminates another mediator, whether Mary, saints, angels or statues.

Conclusion: A Catholic priest, nor Protestant "Rev," can neither forgive nor act as mediator for our sins.

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