To an outside observer it can appear that Catholic priests forgive sins whenever someone goes to confession.
The priest will even say, "I absolve you from your sins" during the sacrament.
However, its important to remember that it is Jesus who forgives our sins, not the priest.
Jesus working through the Church
Bl. Isaac of Stella provides a beautiful reflection on this spiritual truth in a sermon that is used in the Office of Readings:
The prerogative of receiving the confession of sin and the power to forgive sin are two things that belong properly to God alone. We must confess our sins to him and look to him for forgiveness. Since only he has the power to forgive sins, it is to him that we must make our confession.
While it is true that God alone forgives our sins, God also instituted a Church and made her his instrument of reconciliation:
So all that belonged to the bride was shared in by the bridegroom, and he who had done no wrong and on whose lips was found no deceit could say: Have pity on me, Lord, for I am weak. Thus, sharing as he did in the bride's weakness, the bridegroom made his own her cries of distress, and gave his bride all that was his. Therefore, she too has the prerogative of receiving the confession of sin and the power to forgive sin, which is the reason for the command: Go, show yourself to the priest.
Jesus established a Church and it is through that Church that he forgives our sins. The Church itself does not have the power to forgive, but only God, working through the Church:
The Church is incapable of forgiving any sin without Christ...Do not destroy the whole Christ by separating head from body, for Christ is not complete without the Church, nor is the Church complete without Christ. The whole and complete Christ is head and body. This is why he said: No one has ever ascended into heaven except the Son of Man whose home is in heaven. He is the only man who can forgive sin.
Confession is a beautiful sacrament of encounter, one where we experience God's forgiveness of sins through a priest.
