Church Discipline

[ERCougar]

This is a concept that I really struggle to understand. For someone who actively fights the church or falsely represents the church (or attacks the church or whatever...), I understand the purpose of excommunication. For those who have sinned out of weakness and not belligerence, I don't get it.

A few examples to make my point...
My sister has had a bad few years and wants to turn her life around. She doesn't believe everything about the church and has had some bad experiences with a few leaders (legitimately bad...not just taking offense at stupid things), but she sees the good in the church and wants to start living the gospel. But she's afraid she'll be excommunicated. I tell her that it probably wouldn't happen (although I don't really know), but the fear, combined with other bad experiences, keeps her back and she's sort of living the Gospel "independently".

Why do we have something in place that discourages people from coming back into the fold? Having had my own experiences in the repentance process, I never really understood the Bishop's role either. It almost seemed like he was trying to insert himself into something that was between me and God. That's nothing against him--I thought his intentions were good, I could sense his sincere concern for me, he was very nonjudgmental, and I'm sure he did a better job than I would have done. I just remember during my meetings with him just feeling really weird about the whole thing.

As a teenager, whenever I'd think about morality, it always boiled down to "what do I have to tell the bishop?", not "what is ok with God?" Then if things would go too far, I'd think, "well, I have to talk to the bishop anyway, might as well have some fun". Admittedly, a really screwed up way of looking at things, but had there not been so much emphasis on confession, I may have looked at things a little differently.

So what's the purpose of confession and church discipline? Any thoughts?