El control de las conciencias: el sacramento de la confesión y los manuales de confesores y penitentes

The practice of auricular confession represented one of the most relevant instrument of the action of social disciplining exercised by Catholic Church during the Modern Age. Through the analysis of some confessors’ manuals of the XVI and XVII centuries, this article suggests a dual purpose: on the one hand to highlight the importance of those manuals for the education of clergy, on the other hand to provide an overview of the role that the confessors had in disciplining the social and individual behaviour of the faithful. Keywords: Confession, Confessors’ manuals, Social Discipline, Modern Age.