“In confession, there takes place a breakthrough to community. Sin wants to be alone with people. It takes them away from the community…Sin that has been spoken and confessed has lost all of its power. It has been revealed and judged as sin. It can no longer tear apart the community. Now the community bears the sin of the individual believer, who is no longer alone with this evil, but has ‘cast off’ this sin by confessing it and handing it over to God. The sinner has been relieved of sin’s burden. Now the sinner stands in the community of sinners who live by the grace of God in the cross of Jesus Christ.” — Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together p. 109-110.