LOUISIANA
The Advocate
BY JOE GYAN JR
JGYAN@THEADVOCATE.COM
July 07, 2014
The Diocese of Baton Rouge warned Monday the sanctity of the confessional is under attack by a recent Louisiana Supreme Court ruling the church says might force a priest to reveal in court what was privately told to him.
The case involves a young girl who claims she was sexually abused by a now-deceased church parishioner but that her confession to a local priest fell on deaf ears.
The decision resuscitates a 5-year-old lawsuit against the Roman Catholic Church of the Diocese of Baton Rouge, the Rev. Jeff Bayhi and others, and gave the girl, now an older teenager, the green light to testify and introduce evidence of “her own confession.”
At the same time, the state high court sent the case back to 19th Judicial District Court Judge Mike Caldwell, saying there is still a dispute “concerning whether the communications between the child and the priest were confessions per se and whether the priest obtained knowledge outside the confessional that would trigger his duty to report” sexual abuse allegations.
In a strongly worded two-page statement posted to its website, the Baton Rouge Diocese says the religious implications cannot be overstated.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.