Act of Contrition

Catholic theology distinguishes contrition, sorrow for sin arising from love of God, from attrition, sorrow arising from fear of punishment, and the Council of Trent taught that contrition, joined to confession and the purpose of amendment, belongs to the sacrament of penance. The Act of Contrition is the prayer in which that sorrow is spoken. Its classic English form, O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended Thee, and I detest all my sins, goes on to name both motives honestly, dread of the loss of heaven and the pains of hell, and above all the offence against God, who is all good and deserving of all my love, before closing in the firm resolve, with the help of God's grace, to sin no more and to avoid the near occasions of sin.

The formula is a catechism distillation of Tridentine doctrine, teaching the theology of repentance to everyone who memorizes it, and that has always been its double office, prayer and instruction at once. Children preparing for first confession learn it as a matter of course, and its phrases, heartily sorry, near occasions of sin, have entered the common speech of Catholic cultures, small fossils of the catechism carried by generations who recited the act kneeling in the dark of the confessional.

The Act of Contrition is best understood as a genre. No single wording is canonical, and the church has approved many forms, from the terse Latin Deus meus, ex toto corde paenitet me omnium meorum peccatorum to vernacular versions that vary by country and by generation. The revised Rite of Penance issued after the Second Vatican Council makes the plurality official, printing a selection of prayers of the penitent among which the traditional act stands beside newly composed forms and biblical texts, including the tax collector's plea, O God, be merciful to me, a sinner, so that a penitent may express contrition in scripture's own words.

The prayer's uses reach beyond the confessional. Catholic practice commends an act of contrition in night prayer, after an examination of conscience, so that no day closes with sorrow unspoken, and in danger of death the act carries particular weight, since perfect contrition, sorrow from love of God with the intention of confessing, is held to reconcile even when no priest can be reached. Chaplains and prayer books of every war have therefore carried it, and teaching the dying to make an act of contrition has been part of Catholic deathbed ministry for centuries, the genre's humblest and most serious employment.