#cf.confession

it is only on these terms that reconciliation is thinkable—guilt is universal and the whole world must shatter—and yet guilt remains singular, asymmetrical, and nontransferable. “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive others

The confessant "expects that the other will" will seal the deal by answering confession with confession, and it is this expectation that initially seems to dignify the transaction: it protects the confessor from debasement or degradation, at least in his own mind (§§666).

confession is an experiment with loss that stops short,...a simultaneous affirmation and denial in which we can detect a trace of disavowal

his/her unanswerable question is precisely the same as the abject lack/excess of sin that is constantly aimed at in the repetition of confession, but that must always remain unaccounted for by the discourse that attempts to annul it.

sin is deemed disgusting (abject) precisely because it is unspeakable

Caesar warns ‘how a confessor ought not to make enquiries about unknown sins’ lest he should tempt the confessee into further iniquity

It is ..in the practice of confession, that the discourse of the Hysteric comes fully into play, enacting the subject’s refusal to embody the master signifiers that define him as a split or lacking subject, as a sinner. - A-Discourse-for-the-Holy-Grail

The hysteric feels that his/her subjectivity is invaded, inhabited by a foreign body..-..the notion of sin as a foreign body, a bone in the throat preventing the full articulation