The Power of the Keys

The gate of heaven, always open to mankind since the day of Ascension, is closed upon that individual man who is burdened bythe guilt of mortal sin and the debt of eternal punishment due to it. Whatever takes away these two things from that man’s soul, opens the gate of heaven to him. Now, what opens a gate is fittingly called a key. The power to remove sin, both as to guilt and debt of eternal punishment, is bestowed by Christ on his Church and on the priest of his Church;this power, especially exercised in the sacrament of penance, isfiguratively called “the power of the keys.”

The “keys” are the power of binding and loosing given to the Church by our Lord; more specifically, the”keys” are the power given to priests to forgive sins.

Now, there are two keys, and they are distinguished from each other by their respective acts: the one is the key of judging whether sins are to be forgiven or retained; the other is the key of absolving from sin. When these two keys are used (when the penitent is judged worthy and is absolved from his sins) the gate of heaven is opened to the penitent.