Ireland stepped up its battle with the Roman Catholic Church over child abuse Sunday, with Justice Minister Alan Shatter vowing to pass a law requiring priests to report suspicions of child abuse, even if they learn about them in confession.
The Catholic Church regards information learned in confession as completely confidential. But under the law proposed by Shatter, priests could be prosecuted for failing to tell the police about crimes disclosed in the confession box.
Shatter said in a statement through a spokesman last week that priests’ failure to report what they learn in confession “has led sexual predators into believing that they have impunity and facilitated pedophiles preying on children and destroying their lives.”
The minister’s comment to a local radio station Sunday comes after the Vatican rejected Irish accusations that church leaders sought to cover up extensive abuse of young people by priests in Ireland…
Released July 13, the 421-page report into the handling of abuses in the diocese of Cloyne demolished claims by the Catholic Church in Ireland that policies it put in place in 1996 had enabled it to get a handle on the problem.
It also accused Bishop John Magee, who was responsible for policing abuse in his diocese, of not backing the policies himself and failing to take action against abusers.
Overdue.
I don’t know about Ireland but Common Law has never held that priest-penitent communication was privileged.
Ok, so how would it work?
Would it be just sex crimes on minors?
How about theft?
How about murder?
Or is this just for abuse of children by priests? (So wouldn’t it be the priests that is reporting on themselves?)
Also, aren’t confessions anonymous? The priest can’t see you, but they can hear you.
So do they file a report to the police and later they get called as a witness – to compare how the voice sounds?
In America lots of doctor patient communications are confidential, but in cases of child abuse,depending on the state, the doctor may be required to notify authorities.
Electronic medical records can be assumed to be read by preverts and sickos in Gov’t.
@#1 It is not so much a question of Common Law but about Church Law. Priest can indeed report whatever he hears at confession to state authorities but such action must result in his excommunication, in other words loss of his job and profession… State can’t interfere in that part or there is no separation of Church and State in worse possible manner.
Wow. When ever a party wants to get a bad law passed, they just play the child porn/abuse/molestation card. So in other words, to protect the children, he wants to remove something that has been in place for hundreds of years.
I also love how they manage to blur two very different items together. The coverup by the Catholic church of abuses by their own staff has NOTHING to do with civilians in confession. Yet, somehow this article makes it sound like the catholic church welcomes their fellow child molesters.
This whole thing stinks and I hope the Irish wake up and make this fail miserably.
I’ve actually never heard the term, “confession box” It’s called a confessional.
But I agree, overdue indeed.
In fact, police should be allowed to interview priests and ask if Roger Smith who they arrested confessed to the murder.
ALL CONFIDENTIALITY LAWS SHOULD BE REVOKED.
By definition, they interfere with finding/establishing the truth and like everything else they are in fact set up to protect a special interest more than the supposed citizen or relationship or stated interest involved.
These confidentiality laws all give comfort of one kind or another to people who are stressed. I say they did something wrong and DESERVE to be stressed. Actions = Consequences in the real world. Not Actions = Relief from Consequences thru action of Confidential services.
I enjoy watching the cop shows on tv. Look how many people freely and willingly tell the cops what they have done? Then look at how many keep talking after they get legal counsel. Is that really “good” or “evil?”
Its evil. If you do the crime: you should do the time. No intercession by lawyer, priest, or doctor, or spouse.
but the lawyer, priest, doctor, spouse all have an interest in having their status protected.
Society: very much formed by the laws/concepts that are applied. Many such laws go against the grain of basic human nature. No wonder we are a sad lot racing towards the bottom of the barrel.
Note: confidentiality to be separated from right to privacy. Privacy goes to what other people have no need to know. Doesn’t go to committing crimes but that line can be difficult to determine in many cases. Confidentiality laws make such determination illegal.
Silly Hoomans–we do it to ourselves.
In re “Overdue” comment: put your knee-jerk anti-Catholicism back into the box and actually think this thing through first:
1) Any Catholic Priest who discloses anything heard in the confessional will be stripped of his faculties and ‘loose his job,’ so to speak. No questions asked. That’s the way it has always been.
2) Comment #2 is on to something: it may be easy to be all gung-ho against child abusers, but this could only be a first step to more governmental encroachment into private matters.
3) And yes, confessions are usually anonymous, unless the person confessing chooses to reveal his/her identity. And why in the h*ll would someone confessing something so heinous reveal himself when he doesn’t have to, particularly with an awareness of this proposed law? Which leads to the next point:
4) This is a sounds-great-on-paper kind of law, but how in the h*ll could it possibly be enforced? Assuming child abusers would even feel guilty enough to confess this, how in the world can one ‘police’ the confessional and ensure that the law is being followed? What about the anonymity issue? What’s next, microphones and cameras with facial recognition software in to confessional with a line directly to police headquarters?
5) The priest pedophilia problem is largely (also) a homosexuality problem: Priests (male by definition) abusing (mostly) young boys (males). Why does this homosexuality-pedophilia connection rarely get mentioned?
Knee-jerk anti-Catholicism is so 16th century.
#9–alt==if its all so anonymous then the law will have no effect. You should be for the law then unless you are a kneejerk apologist.
Catholic Priests aren’t well known homo-pedophiles??? HAW, HAW===where you been?
Keeping secrets for criminals. What could go wrong?
@Alt: Private matters? What private matters? You, the first party, are telling a third party what you did/wanted to do/allowed to happen to a second party. Where’s the privacy in that? Two people knew, and you have added to it. How about imposing a little self-privacy?
The best way to keep a secret is to shut the hell up.
oh yeah, more see something say something bullshit. its once again illegal to not rat somebody out. fucking government. enjoy your police state. I think the expression, is nothing sacred anymore actually is rather meaningful here.
# 4
There are many churches and most of them value the prosecution of criminals, so do not automatically excommunicate when priests reveal what they heard in confession.
Confessions are anonymous? Wouldn’t the priest recognize who it is in the confessional?
The Irish weather may kill children from time to time – freezes, floods, winds etc., otherwise known as acts of God.
Banning weather, weather forecasters and God will save many children.
It seems rather obvious that a few of the commenters here who are all for this law are more or less completely ignorant about how things actually work in the world of the Catholic church.
If you haven’t set foot inside a church of any kind in recent memory — let alone a Catholic church — then may I suggest you zip your lip and not make a fool of yourself by revealing just how little you know. Just because YOU think it is so doesn’t make it so.
Such blatantly uninformed comments aren’t worth point-for-point responses, as that would be as futile as replying to a troll.
#16–alt==BWHAHAHAHAHA. Pathetic. The OVERRIDING issue is not what happens inside the Catholic Church. Its what is happening in society.
All you have evidenced is an inability to support your position. Or, I could be more positive and say you have supported your position as well as the Church has supported the position that God created the Universe.
Yeah, just about the same. Its true because I say its true, and if you disagree, then you aren’t a true believer and there is nothing more to be said. Please give me 10%.
Dope.
I CHALLENGE YOU to actually respond to any point made against you. As so many are defective and irrelevant, should be an easy task. Or do you want to take the confessional?
Double Dope. ((Worst alliterative insult I can come up with on short notice other than Conforming Catholic!! Ha, ha.))
@MikeN #14:
Catholicism 101: The confessional is set up so that there is a wall with a screen separating the priest and the person giving the confession; they can talk to each other but not see each other. And it’s not exactly the practice to talk in a loud voice that would make one easy recognizable by voice, but rather in hushed tones that are just loud enough to be audible.
So unless someone has a very distinctive way of talking / voice that is well known to the priest hearing the confession, yes, it is anonymous, and would be rather difficult to prove otherwise in court.
There is a (gruesome) scene in “In Bruge” that briefly illustrates this (good film).
alt–not that you are responding to me but that is a good start. Relevant only if your position is that priests NEVER know who they are dealing with? or that hushed confessions NEVER have any worthwhile details that could help solve a crime?
But again===the relevant issue here is not what happens inside the church but rather what happens outside the church: ie===society.
Widen your horizons. Is that possible?
# 5 Yankinwaoz
Given that priests must confess to each other or a higher ranking church official, this law would theoretically snare the child molesting/raping priests or the priest who heard the confession and sat on it.
The Catholic Church has been dragging it’s feet for over a decade now on the issue of harboring and sheltering the child molesters in its priesthood that it did all over the planet for Decades. I have no sympathy for their original protection for such predators in the Lord’s Name and even less for their continued obstruction after it was found out.
So I guess this means no more priests confessing to each other then.
#8
“ALL CONFIDENTIALITY LAWS SHOULD BE REVOKED.”
I hope you’re just trolling. If not, would you extend it to removing protections against forced self-incrimination?
Just another form of confidentiality…
#22–chris==you normally post a bit brighter than that. Did you read past the caps? A distinction between privacy and confidentiality didn’t draw out a few distinctions and RELEVANT questions?
There is no such thing as forced self-incrimination.
I’d bet dollars to donuts what you will say “but” always open to other points of view and refreshing ideas:
I CHALLENGE YOU to name any legal circumstance comprising involuntary testimony against one’s self. Why testimony vs incrimination? Well, thats part of the bet.
Go. Show alterboy how its done.
Heh, heh.
In related issues:
Jonathan Haidt on the moral roots of liberals and conservatives.
http://ted.com/talks/jonathan_haidt_on_the_moral_mind.html
Also a link to David Brooks “The Social Animal”
http://ted.com/talks/lang/eng/david_brooks_the_social_animal.html
Both go to how we think without ever thinking about it. Lib v Con, Science v Religion, Moral v Immoral, Social vs Liebertardian==that sort of stuff. Stuff that is more important than anything else we might ever consider, and never do.
Both humorous. I know that pisses one side of the divide off. Heh, heh.
Yes, how do you know what you know and how do you change your mind? Open to new ideas?===or not at all? Why? What difference does it make.
Pedophiles running wild in our Churches. Its tradition and sacred. Why? Because I don’t want to think about it. Leave me alone.
Yea, verily.
#23 Let me rephrase: should you have the right to remain silent?
In #8 you say “If you do the crime: you should do the time. No intercession by lawyer, priest, or doctor, or spouse.”
If everybody should be compelled to give knowledge of others’ crimes how about the person themselves?
The Catholic church needs to drop its policy against married priests and simultaneously purge its clergy of the homosexual predators who have found refuge there… and their enablers.
Chris, don’t bother with bobbo. He’s a nutjob.
As for the answer, it’s simple. people who need help simply won’t get it.
Creeps like Bobbo will simply force everyone who are seeking help into hiding. Just the way creeps like it.
They can excommunicate all the Bishops and Cardinals in China for being approved by the state, but can’t confront a pedophile in Ireland?
#26–Chris==well your rephrase is a TOTALLY different question. The right to remain silent is the cornerstone of our freedom in the context of criminal law. That issue is not fairly raised at all by this thread.
Depending on the facts and circumstances, the issue of having to reveal what you know about other people is a more difficult mix of morality and law, privacy and confidentiality and so forth.
Current mandatory reporting laws===they all seem appropriate to me. Can you think of any that are wrong? and ER doc required to report gun shot wounds for instance? or a Shrink required to report a patient who has revealed his intent to commit a crime?
It is interesting to me on second thought why such reporting is mandatory. If you come to me and say you want to kill alfie, I have no duty to tell anyone. But if you go to a psychiatrist he is required to tell. Lawyers are required not to tell. I don’t know about priests. Spouses are not supposed to tell. I can make arguments from my value system why each case is the way it is but don’t know the actual legal or legislative history as to why the rules developed that way.
More dicey for non-lawyers is the cops knocking on my door and asking me if I know anything about you wanting to kill Alfie. Have I aided and abetted if I only say: “Sounds good to me” hiding the fact you said you wanted to do that?
Oh No–my goal in having people who do a crime not get comfort from lawyers and priests is that if they stay stressed, depressed, having questions, needing help but they get turned in by doing so, that is a good thing. They will more likely, more often turn themselves in rather than get what comfort they need from the very society they are preying on. The arguments in keeping such things secret never stand up in my mind. Like your argument==except I know that not a real argument, just your success at being completely vacuous. I get that, just the way creeps like it.
The truth. The first guiding principles in how societies/relationships should be formed/managed. Confidentiality corrupts that.
I can be challenged on this but I don’t think we should have a “duty” to come foreward with facts, but I think we have a duty to respond to cops who ask us. Certainly we have a duty not to lie about what we know. That kinda backs me into having to reveal what we know. Its a consequence of what the other rule would cause to happen rather than a value that get expressed directly by the rule itself.
Creepy huh? Having to think and stuff?
The priests that covered up the abuse are just as guilty as the abusers. Now that religions can contribute to political parties, they will never be brought to justice.