Roman Catholics: Confession to Counseling

Roman Catholics are confessing less but profiting from it more. In the past two years, U.S. parish priests admit, attendance at the confession box—once a Saturday ritual for legions of devout Catholics—has fallen noticeably. "I would say that confessions are at least a third less than they used to be," says Monsignor James A. Davin of St. Bernard Church in Mount Lebanon, Pa. At the same time, many renewal-minded Catholics are approaching the confessional in a more meaningful way—not as a mechanical means of cleansing their souls of sin but as a...