“Forgive Me Father”: A Look at Trust Engagement Within Catholic Confession

Catholic confession is one of the most practiced and well-known religious acts in the world. Although Catholic confession has proven to be an important component in the lives of millions of people, little research has been conducted exploring trust engagement within Catholic confession or the variables that affect one’s willingness to confess. The purpose of this study was to examine Catholic confession and find whether variables such as perception of the sexual abuse within the Catholic Church, ability, benevolence, and integrity of the priest, Catholic Church, and pope, propensity to trust, trust, and intrinsic religiosity have a significant relation with one’s willingness to confess. This study was conducted through a series of anonymous questionnaires, including two measures that were created for the purpose of this study—the Sex Abuse Perception Measure and Willingness to Confess Measure. Linear regressions and correlations were used to analyze relation between variables. Results revealed that the perception one has of the sexual abuse within the Catholic Church is significantly related to the perceived ability, benevolence, and integrity for a priest, Catholic Church, and the pope. Additionally, ability and benevolence had a moderate positive relation with trust in a priest and the pope and benevolence and integrity had a moderate positive relation with trust in the Catholic Church. Surprisingly, there were no significant relations between propensity to trust and trust in the priest, Catholic Church, or the pope. Similarly, there were no significant relations between trust in the priest, Catholic Church, or the pope and one’s willingness to confess. Intrinsic religiosity did have a positive relation with willingness to confess. This study highlights that individual and organizational religious figures possibly have differing origins of trust (ability, benevolence, and integrity). This difference may be related to one’s perception of the sexual abuse that occurred within the Catholic Church.