AUSTRALIA
Central Western Daily
By LOUISE EDDY
Nov. 19, 2012
PRIESTS would likely go to jail rather than break the confessional seal, says Bathurst Catholic Bishop Michael McKenna.
A royal commission into child sexual abuse, announced last week, will have the power to compel priests to answer questions about what they have been told in the confessional.
But Bishop McKenna said priests had gone to jail in the past for refusing to betray the confessional seal, though he hoped it did not come to this in Australia.
“If a priest cannot give this assurance to people who approach him for the sacrament, he cannot hear confessions,” he said.
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