I’m a lapsed Catholic and I did not learn about this. What exactly happens? If you go in the confession booth, does the priest say, “I’m sorry, you have to take this matter up with the pope or a superconfessor?”
Well, basically, even just going into a confessional isn’t something one should do. My point was so man pope or otherwise has the power to forgive or absolve sin. Jesus does himself, hence the death on the cross and all the rest of it.
Jesus’ death on the cross was perfect and complete, there is nothing else you can do except accept his gift of salvation.
It’s the return of medieval Dispensation’ where the suffering of souls in limbo could be abated by a cash payment.
Also could be used to forgive moral sins that are supposedly unforgivable
Sounds like the pope just created the vatican’s very own Federal Court of Appeals.
As he explained it, and I understand it, this is about the difference between something just being a sin and it being a 'crime' as far as the Catholic Church is concerned. Sins are forgiven by God and in the Sacrament of Penance, the Priest merely acts as an intermediary for the forgiveness of sin - but the sacrament also involves reconciliation with the Church, and that part of it is done by the Priest.
These very serious offences involve a violation of Church law to such an extent that a normal Priest is not considered qualified to decide whether the person has reconciled with the Church. The sin is forgiven - that's between the person and God - but whether the person is reconciled with the Church requires an expert to question and satisfy themselves that the person understands the Church law in question.
If a person confesses one of these special class of sins to a 'normal' priest, the sin is forgiven as any sin is forgiven by God - but the Priest should refer the person to a higher authority to resolve the question of whether they are following Church law.
The breach of Church law is less important than the sin, but may be more complex to resolve. God forgives simply because a person sincerely repents and there is nothing complex about that. But the Church is not as perfect as God.
I hope I've done justice to what I was told. It seemed to make sense to me at lunch.
In the case of abortion, a confessor must go to his bishop and get permission to absolve. Many American bishops have already given their priests permission to absolve one abortion, but in the case of multiple abortions, he is consulted.
In the other instances, breaking the Seal is extremely rare, I have only heard of one case; attempting to kill the Pope, not too common; profanation of the Blessed Sacrament, yes, it does happen.
To answer your question, if one of the above is confessed to a priest, the person would be put in contact with the appropriate Confessor.