Sunday is a good day to talk about coming clean.

Owning up to our mistakes is core to many religious faiths.  Judaism sets aside a day each year, Yom Kippur, for it.  Catholics are expected to go to confession at least once a year.

This idea that “confession is good for the soul” extends far beyond religious practice.  The saying “our secrets keep us sick,” is foundational to psychotherapy and dealing with addiction.  Owning and atoning are among the twelve steps along the path to recovery.

We see it at work.  Accountability–the expectation that employees take responsibility for their actions–is part of every corporate values statement I’ve ever seen.

Yet, like so many core values in life, its actual application often gets messy and is rationalized.  Coming clean and accountability may sound admirable and virtuous on Sundays, but it’s quite another matter when one is staring down a wave of massive lawsuits and relentless negative press that could destroy companies, eliminate jobs, and ruin careers. 

Boards, CEOs, lawyers, HR people and insurance companies exist to mitigate risk when things go wrong.  Marketers and communications people vigorously protect a company’s hard-earned brand and reputation.  Executives can’t be blamed for defending themselves and their companies from harm, especially when coming clean might result in consequences that far outweigh the offense or negatively impact the innocent.

Yet at the same time we’ve seen the devastating impact of corporate irresponsibility.  Tobacco companies ignored and hid the dangers of smoking for years at the expense of countless lives and untold billions of dollars in avoidable health care expenses.  Today social media companies and smart phone manufacturers refuse to acknowledge the profound mental health crisis their products have triggered among young people.

Admittedly, those are easy examples.  The world is not often so black and white.  This is tough stuff.  I don’t pretend to have the answers nor to be offering perspective from the moral high ground.  Far from it. 

Coming clean has been challenging for humans from the dawn of time.  Read the Genesis story about eating the forbidden apple: Adam blamed Eve; Eve blamed the snake.  You don’t have to be a religious person to appreciate the point, our first instinct as humans often is to point the finger somewhere else.

But there is a reason only sociopaths are immune from the pull of conscience.  The religious among us will say this instinct is hard-wired into our souls by our creator.  Believe what you will, but religious or not, there’s no doubt that taking accountability for our actions resonates deeply in the human spirit.

What does it mean for our workplaces and careers?  In the end, it’s up to each of us to decide.  Something worth contemplating on a Sunday.