LOUISIANA
The American Conservative
[with video]
By ROD DREHER • July 14, 2014
This might seem like inside baseball to some of you, but the above report from WBRZ, the ABC affiliate in Baton Rouge — if the video doesn’t embed, you can watch it here — is exactly the kind of thing that worries me so much about how this seal-of-the-confessional case is going to play out in the media and in popular culture. It’s a good thing that it is impossible under libel law to libel the dead, or the family of George Charlet Jr. might have a case against the station for that biased report on the abuse allegations at the heart of a controversy with potential national implications for religious liberty.
Background: Rebecca Mayeux, now 20, claims that when she was 14, she was subject to groping and other unwanted sexual attention from Charlet, a much older man who was a prominent businessman and beloved community figure. At least some of the harassment took place on the grounds of Our Lady of the Assumption Catholic Church, where both families attended. Mayeux says on three separate occasions, she told Father Jeff Bayhi in confession that Charlet was coming on to her sexually, and that he told her this was her own problem, that she should sweep it under the rug. Mayeux eventually told her parents, who went to the police. Charlet died of a heart attack during the criminal investigation, which was dropped upon his passing.
Now, Mayeux has filed a civil lawsuit against Charlet’s estate, his family’s business, Father Bayhi, and the Diocese of Baton Rouge. She wants Fr. Bayhi to testify that he heard her speak of this in confession, and what the content of the confessions were. He refuses even to acknowledge that the molestation conversations took place, because to do so would be to violate the seal of the confessional, the rock-solid obligation Catholic (and Orthodox) priests have to go to their deaths before revealing to anyone what they learned in confession. The Louisiana Supreme Court ruled that under state law, Bayhi could in principle be compelled to reveal those conversations (or go to jail for contempt of court), because the law only recognizes the priest-penitent privilege as protecting the penitent — who, in this case, releases the priest from that privilege. Under Catholic canon law, the obligation is binding on the priest, regardless of what the penitent later decides.
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.