ROME – In his first major liturgy for Holy Week, Pope Francis offered an extended reflection on the spiritual underpinnings of so-called “Catholic guilt”, a by now almost notorious concept associated by many (especially critics of Catholicism) with an almost compulsive need to feel overly guilty for any perceived offense.
He addressed the ancient tradition in Christianity called “compunction”, meaning a sense of remorse and repentance for one’s sins that for centuries has been a source of reflection by the Catholic Church’s most celebrated minds, many of whom are saints.
