penance Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. noun remorse for your past conduct
    repentance; penitence.
  2. noun a Catholic sacrament; repentance and confession and atonement and absolution
  3. noun voluntary self-punishment in order to atone for some wrongdoing
    self-mortification; self-abasement.

WordNet

Pen"ance noun
Etymology
OF. penance, peneance, L. paenitentia repentance. See Penitence.
Definitions
  1. Repentance. Obs. Wyclif (Luke xv. 7).
  2. Pain; sorrow; suffering. Obs. "Joy or penance he feeleth none." Chaucer.
  3. (Eccl.) A means of repairing a sin committed, and obtaining pardon for it, consisting partly in the performance of expiatory rites, partly in voluntary submission to a punishment corresponding to the transgression. Penance is the fourth of seven sacraments in the Roman Catholic Church. Schaff-Herzog Encyc.
    And bitter penance, with an iron whip. Spenser.
    Quoth he, "The man hath penance done, And penance more will do." Coleridge.
Pen"ance transitive verb
Wordforms
imperfect & past participle Penanced
Definitions
  1. To impose penance; to punish. "Some penanced lady elf." Keats.

Webster 1913