Source Documents: Cathar Rites from the Lyons Ritual: General Confession, the Apparelhamentum

We have come before God and before you and before the ordinances of the Holy Church that we may receive pardon and penance for all our sins in thought, word and deed from our birth until now and we ask of God mercy and of you that you pray for us to the Holy Father of Mercy that He forgive us.

Let us worship God and declare all our sins and numerous offences in the sight of the Father, the Son and the honoured Holy Spirit, of the honoured Holy Gospels and the honoured Holy Apostles, by prayer and faith and by the salvation of all the upright and glorious Christians and blessed ancestors asleep and here present, for their sake we ask you, holy lord, to pardon all our sins.

Benedicte, Parcite Nobis.
- Amen.

For numerous are the sins by which we daily offend God, night and day, in thought, in word and deed, wittingly and unwittingly, and especially by the desires the evil spirits bring to us in the flesh which clothes us.
Benedicte, Parcite Nobis.
- Amen.

Whereas we are thaught by God`s Holy Word as well as by the Holy Apostles and the preaching of our spiritual brothers to reject all fleshly desire and all uncleanness and to do the will of God by doing good we, unworthy servants that we are, not only do not do the will of God as we should, but more often give way to desires of the flesh and the cares of the world, to such an extent that we wound our spirits.
Benedicte, Parcite Nobis.
-Amen.

We go with those who are of the world, mixing with them, talking and eating with them, and sinning in many things so that we wound our brothers and our sisters.
Benedicte, Parcite Nobis.
- Amen.

By our tongues we fall into idle words, vain talk, mockery and malice, detraction of our brothers and sisters whom we are not worthy to judge nor to condemn their faults. Among Christians we are sinners.
Benedicte, Parcite Nobis.
- Amen.

The penance which we received we have not observed as we ought to have done, neither the fasting nor the prayer. We have wasted our days and hours. While we are saying the Holy Prayer our senses are diverted to carnal desires and worldly cares, so that at this moment we hardly know what we can offer to the Father of the Just.
Benedicte, Parcite Nobis.
- Amen.