The Catholic Church has approved an iPhone app that helps guide worshippers through confession:

The Confession program has gone on sale through iTunes for £1.19 ($1.99).

Described as “the perfect aid for every penitent”, it offers users tips and guidelines to help them with the sacrament.

Now senior church officials in both the UK and US have given it their seal of approval, in what is thought to be a first.

The app takes users through the sacrament – in which Catholics admit their wrongdoings – and allows them to keep track of their sins.

It also allows them to examine their conscience based on personalised factors such as age, sex and marital status – but it is not intended to replace traditional confession entirely.

Instead, it encourages users to understand their actions and then visit their priest for absolution.

This is treated as a “news of the weird” sort of thing, but it sounds like a neat app. What kind of surprises me is that they’re charging for it. They being the developers, not the church. This strikes me as one of those things that you do for God or the Church or something.