286 BuoniCattolici
this the man brought to the hermit. That was enough, the holy man said. It
was as if Jesus shed a single tear for the sinner, for the Lord said: ‘‘If anyone
drinks from the water I give him, that will be in him a fountain of water
welling up to eternal life.’’ The man burst into copious tears and was freed
of his sins.^89 When Anthony of Padua preached his last Lenten series in 1231 ,
those confessing were so many that all the friars and priests of Padua were
not enough to hear them.^90 When Nicola of Tolentino heard confessions,
he never imposed heavy penances; rather, he reassured the sinner that the
humiliation of confessing was enough.^91 This was not confession as spiritual
direction, catechetical formation, or admission to communion—this use of
the sacrament was devotional. It was for the sinner an act of penance and
mortification in itself. Francis of Assisi spoke for his age: when he used the
words ‘‘doing penance,’’ he usually meant ‘‘going to confession.’’^92
Modern confession conjures up images of a darkened box with an opaque
grill, the form instituted by the Council of Trent to prevent scandal by sepa-
rating the priest from the penitent. The box gave a sense of privacy to the
sacrament that it lacked in medieval Italy, when confession took place in
more exposed surroundings. One woman came to confess at the friars’
church in Milan and found Peter of Verona seated in the nave. She went
over, knelt at his feet, and made her confession.^93 Salimbene gave his peni-
tents a bit more privacy by hearing their sins behind the high altar, a com-
mon practice.^94 Synods commanded priests to hear a woman’s confession
out in the open, in a church or public space, unless she was gravely ill.
Ecclesiastical legislators were not happy with the dark corners in the
church—women’s confessions belonged in a well-lighted place.^95 Men’s con-
fessions might be heard anywhere. Like the woman who came to Peter of
Verona, the pious showed their humility by kneeling to recite their sins. Peter
the Chanter’s devotional book, in its Italian version, declared kneeling the
best expression of repentance. It castigated lazy kneeling practices, too, such
as leaning to one side and propping oneself up.^96 But even Armanno Pungi-
lupo, who had a reputation for holiness with his priest, did not always kneel.
Sometimes he stood while reciting his sins, but he always confessed with
tears and other signs of contrition.^97
- Milan, Biblioteca Ambrosiana,msN 43 Sup., fol. 55 v.
- See Roberto Rusconi, ‘‘I francescani e la confessione nel secoloxiii,’’Francescanesimo e vita religiosa
dei laici nel ’ 200 : Atti dell’viiiConvegno internazionale, Assisi, 16 – 18 ottobre 1980 (Assisi: Universita`di Perugia,
1981 ), 262 , commenting on the passage edited inVita prima di S. Antonio, o, ‘‘Assidua,’’ed. Vergilio Gamboso
(Padua: Messaggero, 1981 ), 13. 13 , pp. 344 – 46.
91 .Vita Altera [S. Nicolai Tolentinatis], 8 ,AS 43 (Sept.iii), 665. - Rusconi, ‘‘Francescani e la confessione,’’ 257.
93 .Vita S[ancti] Petri Martyris Ordinis Praedicatorum, 4. 28 ,p. 702 (text from ‘‘Miracula Berenguerii,’’
1310 s). - Salimbene,Cronica( 1250 ), 582 , Baird trans., 405 ; ibid. ( 1250 ), 592 – 93 , trans., 412.
- Novara Synodii( 1298 ), 1. 2. 1. 3 , pp. 180 – 84 ; Aquileia Constitutiones ( 1339 ), 18 ,p. 1123 ; Padua
Synod ( 1339 ), 9 ,p. 1136. - Peter the Chanter,De Oratione, 233 – 34.
- ‘‘Acta contra Armanum [Punzilupum],’’ 68 , 87 – 88.