Reconciling Community: The Rite of Penance

To disclose the underlying mystery of the Church in relation to Christ and sinners, James Dallen traces the complex development of ecclesial repentance from the Church's first centuries to the present time. He shows that the Church has always worked with sinful members, assisting them to live out the implications of their baptismal conversion and recognizing them as members of its assemblies. It is in this history, the tradition that survives from those who have gone before marked by the sign of faith, that the Church must find the way to exercise the ministry of reconciliation today and in the future.

Father Dallen writes about the concrete ways in which the Roman Catholic Church has dealt with sinners in its midst, assisting them to live out the implications of their baptismal conversion and recognizing them once more as members of its assemblies. He studies the underlying mystery of the Church in relation to Christ and the sinner through the forms this sacrament has taken in the past to help illustrate how the Church can exercise the ministry of reconciliation both now and in the future.