As legislators in Illinois and elsewhere seek to force Catholic clergy to report allegations of sexual abuse, they are finding the confession booth to be guarded by a thicket of legal, political and theological issues.
Last week, the Illinois Senate passed a proposal that would exempt clergy from the reporting requirement if they learn the information in the confessional or while acting as a spiritual adviser. Critics say the exemption is too broad and may render the law meaningless.
Across the country, legislatures are wrangling with the same issue, spurred largely by revelations that church officials in some dioceses hid sexual misconduct charges both from law enforcement and parishioners. And they are finding their efforts complicated by case law and religious law alike.
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Catholic leaders insist an exception must be made for confession, a holy sacrament whose secrecy the church protects.
“In a case of a person who has committed a sin that is a matter for the authorities, all I can do is encourage him to mend his life and encourage him to reform by turning himself in,” said Rev. Joseph Hren of the Dominican Priory in River Forest.
Barbara Blaine, founder of a victims support group, said that in some cases the priest who hears about abuse in confession is the only person who can protect the child. She criticized the clergy exemption for being crafted vaguely.
“The way it is worded now, a member of the clergy could argue that they are always acting as spiritual advisers,” she said.
Cardinal Francis George applauded the Senate proposal, saying lawmakers used language that was inclusive of all religions while leaving room to protect the confidentiality of confession.
George disagreed with the assertion that the proposal leaves too much room for interpretation.
“There are a lot of contexts when a priest is not acting as a spiritual adviser to you–a priest in the classroom and things like that,” he said. “It depends on how that person comes to you. People know whether they want to invoke that context or not. It’s not so much on the priest but on the part of the person who comes to him.”
Catholics believe Jesus Christ gave the power to forgive sins through confession, also known as the rite of reconciliation. The religion traditionally says that a person who is truly sorry and outwardly shows contrition can be forgiven.
But it is also believed that a person cannot forgive his own sins. Christ is said to have conferred that power to his apostles and to their successors, the bishops, and to priests.
Excommunication
William Wagner, a professor of law at Catholic University of America in Washington, said breaking the confidentiality of confession is a sin punishable by excommunication.
But priests generally feel obligated to work with sinners, suggesting they come clean to civil authorities as part of their penance. Wagner said that helps priests fulfill civil obligations without violating canon law.
For example, Wagner said that after World War II some priests told German war criminals that they had to turn themselves in to be absolved.
Rev. Susan Thistlethwaite, president of the Chicago Theological Seminary and a United Church of Christ pastor, said that in extreme cases such as sexual abuse, “mandatory reporting trumps clergy confidentiality.”
Years ago, she said a parishioner came to her and asked her to pray with him because he had been molesting a child. Thistlethwaite said she prayed with him, but she also turned him over to the police. The parishioner was upset with her, but she feels she did the right thing.
“I told him I will pray with you, and I will not abandon you,” Thistlethwaite said. “But I also said that I had a duty to make sure he could not continue to abuse.”
Rabbi Ira Youdovin, executive vice president of the Chicago Board of Rabbis, said he can understand the desire to protect the rite of reconciliation, but he would feel obligated to speak out if he were certain abuse had occurred.
“In general, I don’t think I could see a situation where if a rabbi found out that someone was molesting a child that he or she would not act to make sure that the child did not face further harm,” he said.
Laws on mandatory reporting vary widely across the country. Currently in Illinois, as in many other states, professionals such as doctors and psychologists are required to suspend the usual doctor-patient confidentiality and report suspected abuse to authorities in order to protect a child from further harm.
Other states have added the clergy to the list of mandatory reporters, although sometimes the law includes an exemption for confession or similar conversations. And some states have broadly stated laws requiring anyone who hears of child abuse to report it.
In only a few states are priests or other clergy legally bound to report abuse even when it’s learned during confession, a policy set over the objections of religious leaders.
Texas law `wouldn’t hold up’
A Senate Judiciary Committee staff member who worked on preparing the Illinois bill said lawmakers studied Texas’ stricter policy on mandatory reporting, which does not exempt confession, but they decided against following suit.
“If the Texas law was ever challenged, it wouldn’t hold up,” the staff member said.
An effort to overturn the confessional exemption recently failed in Connecticut, where clergy have been mandatory reporters of child abuse since 1971.
Rep. Michael Lawlor, chairman of the Connecticut House Judiciary Committee and a former state prosecutor, wanted state law to apply to all communications with clergy–including confessions heard by priests.
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“It is inconceivable that you would not take some action to prevent the harm no matter how you hear about it,” Lawlor said.
But in a state where the population is one-third Catholic, most of Lawlor’s colleagues disagreed, ultimately rewriting Connecticut law to extend the statute of limitations and toughen penalties for people convicted of child abuse.
During an earlier controversy over abusive priests, Illinois Rep. Rosemary Mulligan (D-Chicago) tried in 1993 to co-sponsor legislation calling for clergy to be mandatory reporters. That effort foundered, she said, because the Catholic lobby successfully argued that the faithful would fear going to confession.
Now that similar legislation is on the table, Mulligan fears the current proposal leaves too much room for interpretation of when someone is acting as a spiritual adviser. But Mulligan said she would probably support some sort of exemption for information gained through confession.
Sen. Dan Cronin (R-Elmhurst), a sponsor of the current Illinois bill, said the proposal refers to spiritual advisers in part to be inclusive of religions other than Catholicism. He also disputed criticism that the legislation is too broad.
“There are many instances when a person would speak to their clergy in a situation that is not spiritual confession but where they are looking for advice,” Cronin said.
If clergy were not given the exemption, Cronin said he feared the proposal would violate the U.S. Constitution.
“As a policymaker, you have to weigh the harm versus the good, and I think there is a great value of confession in the ministry,” Cronin said. “I think if we somehow invaded or limited the confession we could put an unfair burden on the ministry of the church.”