LOUISIANA
Philly.com
MELINDA DESLATTE, ASSOCIATED PRESS
POSTED: Friday, July 11, 2014
BATON ROUGE, La. – Catholics are decrying a recent Louisiana Supreme Court decision that reaches into the most sanctified of church places, the confessional booth.
The ruling revives a lawsuit that contends a priest should have reported allegations of sexual abuse disclosed to him during private confessions and opens the door for a judge to call the priest to testify about what he was told. The lawsuit was filed by parents of a teen who says she told the priest about being kissed and touched by an adult church parishioner.
If the priest was called to testify, Catholic groups say, it could leave him choosing between prison and excommunication.
“Confession is one of the most sacred rites in the Church. The Sacrament is based on a belief that the seal of the confessional is absolute and inviolable. A priest is never permitted to disclose the contents of any Confession,” Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, said in a statement this week blasting the ruling.
Catholic groups and a national organization that tracks church sex-abuse cases said Thursday they weren’t aware of any other cases in which a priest has been compelled to discuss what’s said during a confessional. The local Catholic diocese said that the ruling violates constitutional separations between church and state and it would seek U.S. Supreme Court intervention.
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