Getting ready for his first confession

Tomorrow Marky will have his first confession, also known as reconciliation or penance. This whole experience is so surreal for me- it's a right of passage. A coming into the fullness of our faith- coming into the "age of reason" where God will hold him accountable for his actions. I've been preparing him for this for some time. We've focused on hating sin and on what perfect contrition for sin is (as in I'm sad because it's offended my perfect and loving God, not because I got caught).

I've been using this amazing book written in 1926 and it has been a learning experience for me. The priest who wrote the book takes sin so seriously. He reminds the children that St. Louis's mother, the Queen of France, told him daily "My child, you know how much I love you. I love you so much that I would willingly give up my life for you. Yet as much as I love you I would sooner see you fall dead now at my feet than to have you commit one mortal sin." Do you think we take sin that seriously now days?

He talks about all kinds of suffering- physical pain, illness, enemies after you, and he says

"I am going to beg of you to think about sin, so that you will always remember that it is the worst thing that can happen to you. Every day of your lives you will be asked to do something that God forbids. The devil will ask you, and what is called the world will ask you, and sometimes you will desire of your own selves, to commit sin. This means that every day of your life you must fight against this great danger, ... You must therefore prepare for this fight every day. If you begin now to stand up against sin you will grow braver and braver, so that in the end sin will be more afraid of you than you will be afraid of sin.
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When you start in to stop hating sin you begin to love it. ... Your worst enemy can not begin to hurt you as much as sin. ... Sin will never spare you. Sin will never have mercy upon you. Sin will never be satisfied until it makes you its slave.
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The chief grace of the Sacrament of Penance is being made clean in your souls, in your thoughts, in your words, in your actions; the great grace, the special grace of Confession, is being pardoned your sins, is being made holy, is being made just. Sin makes the soul ugly. Sin soils, sin spots the soul. The grace of the Sacrament...will whiten your souls and take away all your spots.

It is the thought that in your first Confession God is going to dress your souls in the beautiful robe of His grace. Beg of Him to help you to keep that robe as beautiful as it is when He puts it on you when you make your first confession, to keep it beautiful always, so that when you lie down in death there will not be a stain upon it, there will not be a rent in it, but it will still be a garment rich and lovely enough to pass through the doors of heaven with and to be glad among the angels forever and ever.

Marky has been amazing during this preparation and taken it very seriously. I have explained to him that Jesus longs to have us confess our sins and lay our burden down. One priest says when he heard his first confession as a young priest he could almost hear the chains hit the floor. God's mercy is infinite and new every morning and tomorrow my son is going to experience it in a special, sacramental way first hand. What a grace this is to me as a mother! My heart is overflowing with joy and gratitude. Thank you, Lord, for Your mercy to my child.