You can’t put a cop in the confessional’
(Photo by Nick Castelli on Unsplash)
By Kate Anderson
Daily Caller News Foundation
- Two bills in Delaware and Vermont are looking to remove the religious right of Catholic priests to withhold information given to them during a confession to protect children from abuse, but Catholic advocates argue that these bills will only harm the church.
- Lawmakers have argued that mandatory reporting must extend to everyone, including the Catholic church to fully protect children from abuse or neglect.
- “I haven’t seen any evidence that the seal of confession has impeded the prosecution of domestic abuse or child abuse, [and] as a mother of ten children, I am very serious when it comes to the safety of my children, so I do not want to downplay abuse …our church has had a terrible history of abuse,” Andrea Picciotti-Bayer, strategy consultant and media fellow at the IHE, mother of ten, and director of the Conscience Project, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
Two bills proposed by state elected officials would remove the Catholic Church’s right to the “seal of confession” protecting priests’ right to refuse to provide private information divulged during confessionals, and Catholic advocates warn it could be a slippery slope when it comes to protections for religious freedom.
Delaware HB 74 and Vermont Sen. Bill 16were introduced earlier this year by Democratic Rep. Eric Morrison and Democratic Sen. Richard Sears, respectively, to prevent child abuse, according to the bills’ texts. The legislation would amend state law to prohibit any clergy member from asserting the right to a privileged conversation during confessions if information about child abuse or neglect is revealed, but advocates warn it will not help prevent abuse and only deprive churches of their First Amendment rights.
“This is not the first time this has come up,” President of Catholic Action for Faith and Family Thomas McKenna told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “But what is at stake here is the real persecution of our Catholic faith because confession is not a therapy session…discussion or therapy group, because when a person comes to confession the priest is acting in the person of Christ. This would be a persecution of the Catholic church because a priest would go to jail before they would reveal someone’s sins.”