Dear Maria:

Well, I will not give you "my" views, but the Church's view (besides I submit my view to the Church anyway).

If this priest your mention actually said that the Sacrament of Confession is not necessary is committing a grave sin and is risking his soul to hell. Such a comment is also heretical. I hope that you merely misunderstood him, or he misunderstood your question.

Nevertheless, the Church teaches that the Sacrament of Confession is ABSOLUTELY necessary whenever a Catholic commits a mortal sin.

It is true that after committing a mortal sin we may be forgiven before getting to confession when we make a sincere Act of Perfect Contrition, but that MUST be followed by Sacramental Confession at the earliest opportunity, unless we die first, and BEFORE we receive the Eucharist. If we die before making it to the Sacrament, then the Act of Perfect Contrition suffices to return us to a state of grace.

The reason that we must come to the Sacrament of Confession is not because God is too busy; that is nonsensical, God is God, He is not limited in time or space and thus cannot be "too busy".

When we commit mortal sin we are not just damaging our relationship with God, but are terminating that relationship. We lose the sanctifying grace that we were given at our Baptism. Our relationship with God is gone and our communion with the Church is wounded.

It is the economy of God that we come to Him through the Church in the first place, thus if we sever ourselves from that relationship by mortal sin, we need to come back to the Church to be reconciled to Him. It is His desire that we always come to Him through His Church. In addition, our sin is not just against God, but against the Church, and thus reconciliation is required not only with God, but with the Church.

Jesus specifically gave the power to forgive sins to the priests. He personally established the Sacrament of Confession. What God has established no man can put asunder and those who try risk their souls.

Here are a couple of excerpts from the Catechism:

1440 Sin is before all else an offense against God, a rupture of communion with him. At the same time it damages communion with the Church. For this reason conversion entails both God's forgiveness and reconciliation with the Church, which are expressed and accomplished liturgically by the sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation.

1446 Christ instituted the sacrament of Penance for all sinful members of his Church: above all for those who, since Baptism, have fallen into grave sin, and have thus lost their baptismal grace and wounded ecclesial communion. It is to them that the sacrament of Penance offers a new possibility to convert and to recover the grace of justification. The Fathers of the Church present this sacrament as "the second plank [of salvation] after the shipwreck which is the loss of grace."

God Bless,
Bro. Ignatius Mary