“I had an affair with my sister's boyfriend.” “I hate my mother.” “I just had an abortion.” From personal revelations to venial sins to major commandment busting, the Internet is perhaps the biggest confession booth on the planet.
Twitter, Facebook and blogs can offer complete anonymity to anyone with a keyboard and a secret to share.
Entire websites and books have been devoted to divulging indiscretions, dalliances and harmless pranks.
One such site, PostSecret, invites anyone to submit secrets and then it shares them with the world: “I work at a Mexican restaurant & when wives are mean to me I put more beans in their husband’s burritos,” wrote one contributor.
“I work at a tollbooth. Sometimes people pay their toll and the toll for the next car too, but I just keep it,” wrote another.
“Now I’m starting to worry that ‘The One’ is just the best One I’ve found thus far...,” reveals a third.
Cathartic though it may be to spill all online, the Catholic Church says it can do better. “People can put their deepest, darkest secrets online. 
That’s fine, but they’re not receiving the full benefits of what a sacrament can be,” says Mark Adkinson, a spokesman for the diocese of London.
“They’re not getting their slates wiped clean. They’re not getting a fresh start.”
The diocese is launching a new campaign to get sinners back into confession booths. More than 120 churches in the diocese, which includes Elgin, Essex, Huron, Kent, Lambton, Middlesex, Norfolk, Oxford and Perth, will be open for confessions on March 3.
Adkinson said the idea for the confession blitz came from a diocese in Washington, which launched its own campaign called The Light Is On in 2007.
When that diocese began promoting the sacrament of reconciliation — in which a person confesses his or her sins to a priest, who then absolves them — it was immensely popular.
“People were coming back to confession who hadn’t been to confession for 20, 30 years,” said Adkinson, who was working in that diocese at the time.
The London diocese has printed 100,000 “how to” pamphlets to coach penitents on the confession process.
“Some people call it the forgotten sacrament,” Adkinson says. “This gives them a starting point rather than showing up to a church and saying, ‘I don’t really know what to do.’”
Rev. Bob Remark, who serves at Our Lady of the Atonement Church, said he hears about 10 to 15 confessions per hour when he’s in the booth.
“It’s an opportunity for freedom, for a fresh experience of God’s compassion and mercy and love,” he said.
“It really sets people free. It’s a wonderful gift.” Rita Couture, who was on her way to mass Thursday evening, said she goes to confession several times a year.
“I feel good when I go. I feel like I’ve been forgiven for anything I’ve done. It makes me feel like I can go on and do good,” she said.
All priests in the diocese will be ready to hear confessions on March 3.
Parishioners are encouraged to check with their churches for exact times.
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SIC: WS