Like the Catholic Church shown during its first moments, scandal, sin and a complex history crowd the most recent episode of "Gossip Girl." Dressed to kill in ankle boots, a pencil skirt, black leather gloves and a lace hat that would make Carrie Bradshaw green with envy, Blair Waldorf decides to confess her sins.

"Within 20 minutes of breaking up with my boyfriend," she tells the priest, "I succumbed to inebriation, performed at a speak-easy and lost my virginity to a self-absorbed ass. And I'm not even Catholic."

Blair asks him to grant a birthday wish. She wants Nate back. But he tells her he's only a priest, not a genie. Chuck Bass has gotten himself way in over his head since hooking up with Blair. She officially uninvites him to her 17th birthday party, and the look on his face shows he's not okay with it. "Hell hath no fury like a Chuck Bass scorned," Gossip Girl herself declares.

Nate Archibold's creepy Stepford-wife of a mother starts to blame his father's situation on her son. Just like when he broke up with Blair, she says, his rash decisions have caused his father's legal woes. She shoves her heirloom ring in his face and suggests - nay demands -that he give it to Blair to patch things up, and consequently patch things up with his father's business deal.

At Blair's party, Chuck admits that his feelings for the birthday girl extend beyond a drunken hook-up. The two make a bet over Nate calling at midnight for his sort-of girlfriend's birthday. If he does, Chuck will leave her alone. If he doesn't, Blair must make a repeat of their tryst. How romantic.

Meanwhile, the prodigal Humphrey mom returns and the parents reconcile, but all we really want is for the camera to cut back to the party. (Does anyone really care about the parental drama?)

Serena and Vanessa deal with their tension by facing off in Guitar Hero. Serena realizes that Nate's gal pal heard about the Humphrey drama first and gets upset, Dan comforts her, they kiss, and we all feel warm and fuzzy inside.

Meanwhile, love-torn Nate finds Jenny Humphrey waiting outside the party, and the two go for a walk. The unlikely friends, however, find themselves subject to Gossip-Girl's wandering eye, and Blair finds out about the midnight stroll before it's even over. The final scene of the episode shows a newly sensitized Chuck giving Blair a diamond necklace for her birthday. And then Serena walks in on the two going at it.

"Gossip Girl" is becoming more convoluted with plot twists and uninteresting back-stories with each episode. The dialogue, though, is becoming wittier and the acting sharper. New York's elite has never looked more glamorous and sordid at the same time.

Episode recap by Sarah Lavery
Starpulse.com contributing writer