Admitting to something you did wrong or that you're guilty of; also, in religion, telling your sins to a priest or to God.
From Latin 'confiteri' (literally 'to speak together with'), composed of 'con-' (with) and 'fateri' (to speak or acknowledge). The word moved from general admission into religious practice, especially in Christianity where confessing sins became a formal sacrament.
Confession as a religious practice became more formalized after the medieval period, and it actually changed how people thought about guilt and forgiveness—before that, different cultures had completely different ways of addressing wrongdoing, sometimes without any verbal confession at all.
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