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Rituals to not make spiritual reality happen.

Sorry for the delay, but needed to offer you an in-depth reply..
So you did not agree with the biblical ritual evidence I sent you. You do not think God IS, or can be, pleased with our "ritual" actions- even though as God spares those Ninevites from destruction – this does not seem worthy to you?
Ritual, and rythm, has always been a part of God’s creation.
And Rituals of Sacrifice? Abraham halving the animals for Sacrifice and so on? The bible is full of examples of pleasing God in this way.
In the annual Ash Wednesday Gospel reading, Christ is not saying
"IF" we pray, fast and give alms...
But rather clearly,"WHEN" we pray, fast and give alms... "do it this way". It's NOT optional for us in what Jesus tells us in that Gospel... God expects us to pray, fast and giv alms among other things… and that when we do these things that he promises WILL increase our Faith...
Our very lives are ritualistic. You can say that rituals don’t “save us” and we can agree on that…
But you cannot say it does not make our Faith increase- or enhance our “spiritually reality” insofar as God will not Look upon those things favorably.
Now as far as the necessity of confession goes then, in John's Gospel , we are told exactly what the purpose for seeking absolution is about

9+++ If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. +++

We confess our sins in order to be forgiven, as a means of purification, and again it does not seem as an optional request that we must DO something, born of our own Free Will.

Luke 18:9-14 He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”

You misunderstand this Gospel… back to rituals..it has nothing to do with not needing to fast or tithe. Those things are helpful, but they do not save us- I don’t know anyone who claims rituals save us. That's not what this parable is highlighting.
These verses are about humility and narcissism- against the boastful “look at me” self-assurance.
Nowhere does this parable say the tax collector didn’t tithe of fast either – since he was in the Temple praying, then we can assume he was most likely tithing and fasting as well.
Again though, the rituals are not important here because that’s not the message of the parable.
This parable warns of us of how our lack of humility, our lack of understanding God’s Mercy for us, obscures the penitential component for true repentance- keeping us from seeing the relationship God wants for us, and with us.
Contrite humility is required for us to approach God.

Actually though, I'm surprised you chose this particular parable to make your point... Look more closely at this parable… doesn’t the Pharisee remind you of a person who is so self-assured, so certain of his righteousness (salvation), that he can proclaim himself unabashedly to God in this condescending way, as that he is "so much better" than the sinner “doing” something in asking for mercy for himself?
The Pharisee seems so confident, so (falsely) proud... he has developed a mistaken ideal of his faith life based upon a false assurance he assumes?
And the tax collector asking God for mercy for whatever he did... doesn't he strike you as someone who is not so sure of his right relationship with God? A sinner who know that he MUST ask for Mercy to make right the wrong he seems to have committed?
Now the question comes… WHICH person in this parable would you choose to be? The one so self-confident? Or the one who knows he must do something to stay in a right relationship with God?

Confession is NOT a payment for sin.
Penance is not payment for sin, but rather is a Catholic construct to make people feel like they are doing something positive to procure salvation. We can’t. We can do nothing to add to the finished work of Christ on the cross.
If His sacrifice is adequate, then we can add nothing to it to complete it or enhance it.
If His sacrifice needs our involvement by works, then it wasn’t adequate in and of itself.

I hear this parroted all the time… “we can add nothing to the finished work”… except for we must DO some things- certain works that don't "add" to the Cross- but we must do anywyas...
St. Paul tells us we must confess our sins, other places in the bible requires we must repent of our sins- and Jesus said we must forgive others-
or our sins won’t be forgiven- and that no sin can enter heaven, and that it is better to enter eternity maimed or with one eye - than to live sinfully in our earthly life.
So if we don’t have to- or can’t- add anything to the cross…
Why do I have to confess, repent, forgive, and do these things the bible clearly tells us we MUST DO to in order to keep a right relationship with God…?

Either the “finished work on the Cross” is once for all and complete- or it's not...
Why then do we have to DO anything - which is definitely a work- when it comes to resolving sin? Don't call it adding then- but it is needed to complete, as it has been from the beginning.

Is there something about a guarantee of our inheritance that you do not understand? The Holy Spirit is our deposit, GUARANTEEING our inheritance, God’s words not ours.

I don’t think you are thinking this through..
You ask...."Is there something about a guarantee of our inheritance that you do not understand?

I understand it just fine- the guarantee is there- but it is a conditional one. You are a bit confused on this. We agree- Inheritance, like a "free gift" never has to be worked for. Never, ever.
An Inheritance is a Birth Right most often.
That's why infant Baptism is amost proper process of conveying God's Grace of regeneration.
The infant does not have to "Do" anything to receive that Grace, no work is required - unlike the doing-making of any verbal acceptance through a ritual like “accepting Jesus into your heart” stuff to receive that Grace.
Free is Free. We don’t have to do -or say- anything.

So here’s where it breaks down for you…
You can lose a gift, forget about it on a shelf, sell it or even throw it away later on. Nothing about the “free” nature of that gift - given freely- assumes that gift has absolute assurance. Because of Free Will- we can choose how we hold that gift. The free-ness of God's justification pertains only to his will to give it- not ours to hold on to it.
To say since it was Free, will make it last unconditionally forever is just in error, so we will always disagree there.
You do howevere liken it to an “inheritance” which we agree is another apt analogy.
But wait a minute. Lets look at another Bible parable… one that specifically deals with the “guaranteed” Inheritance you claim I do not understand.
You know the one.
The one where the one son asks for his inheritance from his Father, and the Father gives it to him to do as he wishes… and the son blows his inheritance on booze and broads.
He comes back after realizing the value he squandered, and the Father rejoices, celebrates him - as he was once Dead having pissed away his inheritance- but NOW he is alive again.
Had he not come back to his father- would he have continued to live, assuming then that a guarantee of inheritance still existed? Did he have a real chance of losing his inheritance?
Or did the prodigal son of the parable then have to DO something to be able to go back home, into a right relationship with the Father?

Did God not give his creatures Free Will, by which we can choose - or - lose the inherited Graces God freely offers and gives to us in this Life?

All that verbiage and you ignore what GOD commanded against eating the blood and eating human flesh! Is the god of uyour religion so double minded that He would command something then command the opposite? And yoiu missed the letter the Apostles wrote, found in Acts 15. Murph, I fear for your immortal spirit!

Think, Murph! Is God pleased with blasphemous rituals? Defying a Command repeated by God is, well, blasphemy to make it the heart of a ritual honoring Him.

Free will?

No such thing outside of Christ.

Without Christ and the regeneration of the Holy Spirit, your will is chained to sin.

Lets look at another Bible parable…

Yeah; looking in the bible is something needed all right; as long as one has eyes that see and ears that hear.

John 6:25-40

²⁵When they found him on the other side of the lake, they asked him, “Rabbi, when did you get here?”

²⁶Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, you are looking for me, not because you saw the signs I performed but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. ²⁷Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For on him God the Father has placed his seal of approval.”

²⁸Then they asked him, “What must we do to do the works God requires?”

²⁹Jesus answered, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.”

³⁰So they asked him, “What sign then will you give that we may see it and believe you? What will you do? ³¹Our ancestors ate the manna in the wilderness; as it is written: ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’^[c]”

³²Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, it is not Moses who has given you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. ³³For the bread of God is the bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”

³⁴“Sir,” they said, “always give us this bread.”

³⁵Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. ³⁶But as I told you, you have seen me and still you do not believe. ³⁷All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. ³⁸For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. ³⁹And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all those he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. ⁴⁰For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.”

In the annual Ash Wednesday Gospel reading, Christ is not saying...

Too bad that GOD did not start this 'ritual' but man.

John W. Fenton writes that "by the end of the 10th century, it was customary in Western Europe (but not yet in Rome) for all the faithful to receive ashes on the first day of the Lenten fast. In 1091, this custom was then ordered by Pope Urban II at the council of Benevento to be extended to the church in Rome. Not long after that, the name of the day was referred to in the liturgical books as "Feria Quarta Cinerum" (i.e., Ash Wednesday)."^[96]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ash_Wednesday#Christian_use_of_ashes

That's why infant Baptism is amost proper process of conveying God's Grace of regeneration.
The infant does not have to "Do" anything to receive that Grace, no work is required - unlike the doing-making of any verbal acceptance through a ritual like “accepting Jesus into your heart” stuff to receive that Grace.

No work? I guess those babies jump into the water all by themselves.

...and a once baptized Catholic is Catholic ALWAYS; right?

And the tax collector asking God for mercy for whatever he did... doesn't he strike you as someone who is not so sure of his right relationship with God?

Nope. He sounds EXACTLY that he knows his condition...

"...have mercy on me; a SINNER."