Fr John Hardon SJ First Confession story.

It was a bright Michigan spring day.  The girls were in their dresses buckled in their seats as the family headed down to Detroit to meet with Father Hardon.  When we reached the residence, Father was called in his office and notified that we had arrived.  We met him at Lansing Reilly Hall, which was then the residence for the Jesuits at the University of Detroit.  It was 1993.  Sarah was seven and preparing to receive her First Holy Communion.  Father Hardon would be hearing her First Confession today.  He cheerfully greeted us and asked how we all were.  After a few minutes of relaxed conversation, he invited us to stay in a large gathering room filled with aged furniture.  Area carpets covered part of the hardwood flooring.  Father walked with Sarah to another smaller conference room where he would hear her confession. 

We were thankful that the room was empty and large so that the younger three girls would have some freedom to move about and play.  However, after some length of time, I began to wonder what was happening.  Shouldn't they be done by now?  Mothers worry, especially if they are like me.  I paced back and forth and finally I peaked out the door to see if anyone was in the hallway.  There they were.  How I wished I had a camera.  There was not much light in the hall except way down at the end so that Father and Sarah were in shadow.  He was holding her hand, walking down to the chapel to say her penance with her.  Such a loving, gentle priest taking such tender care of the young girl.

When they returned, Father told the story of preparing for his First Confession.  “I was in first grade, and the nun had written twenty-one sins on the chalk board for us to consider in preparing for confession.  Of the whole class I had committed most of the twenty-one sins.” Concerned that we may have missed some sins in preparing Sarah, I asked, “Father, what were they?”  “Well,” he said with his dry sense of humor, “I don't remember.  At the time I had not yet learned to take notes