Catholic Bishops Sue Washington Over Law Forcing Priests to Break Confession Seal
The law does not exempt attorney-client privilege, spousal privilege, the sexual assault advocate privilege, and the domestic violence advocate privilege.
Catholic bishops of Washington have sued the state over the new law that would force priests to break the seal of confession regarding child abuse, claiming it violates the First Amendment and Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.
The lawsuit explained how the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Seattle and the Dioceses of Yakima and Spokane have gone beyond what is required by state law on reporting child abuse and neglect.
That’s not enough.
The new law adds clergy to those required to report child abuse. Members of the clergy include “any regularly licensed, accredited, or ordained minister, priest, rabbi, imam, elder, or similarly positioned religious or spiritual leader.”
Here’s the thing, though. My research showed that the other clergy members can report crimes.
So, yes, Washington targeted Catholics with the new law.
The new law goes into effect on July 27. The law, as it stands now, exempts reporting child abuse when discovered via “privileged communication.” That includes “attorney-client privilege, the spousal privilege, the sexual assault advocate privilege, the domestic violence advocate privilege, and until July 27, 2025, the priest-penitent privilege.”
Yup. Washington is only removing the priest-penitent privilege.
“Information obtained through privileged communication by any supervisor in an organization other than clergy—including, for example, any non clergy member of a religious non-profit or any member of a non-religious nonprofit—remains excluded from the reporting requirement,” wrote the bishops.
For example, the law exempts those not named in the law, such as an aunt or uncle, who can report child abuse, but the state does not require them to report it.
An AA sponsor does not have to testify about anything the person told them. A union member or union representative cannot “be forced to disclose any communication between the union member and his or her union representative made during the course of the representation.”
A peer supporter cannot be “forced to testify as to any communication made to the peer supporter by the peer support services recipient while receiving services.”
Catholic law: “Can. 983 §1. The sacramental seal is inviolable; therefore it is absolutely forbidden for a confessor to betray in any way a penitent in words or in any manner and for any reason.”
A priest cannot break the confessional seal. Never. Not for anything.
He can encourage people to go to the police. He cannot make that a condition for absolution.
The man who hears the confession “who directly violates the sacramental seal incurs a latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See; he who does so only indirectly is to be punished according to the gravity of the offence.”
The penalty is automatic.
“Putting clergy to the choice between temporal criminal punishment and eternal damnation, interfering with the internal governance and discipline of the Catholic Church, and targeting religion for the abrogation of all privileges, is a patent violation of both the Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, a violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, and a violation of Article I, Section 11 of the Washington Constitution,” argued the bishops.
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Comments
You see, to the atheists, there is nothing special about a religious belief because they don’t believe in any power bigger than themselves.
My husband is an atheist and he thinks Washington state is violating the 1st amendment right of the Church. He’s not a believer but he’s not antagonistic towards religion either.
I am an atheist. That is not the same as hating religion or those that practice it. I respect and honor both.
As an atheist, I find the idea of confessing my sins to another person–unless I want to–a bit odd. OTOH, my late wife was a psychologist. Talk therapy. She did a lot of good for people listening to their problems and counseling them.
I think this aspect of the job of a Catholic priest is a tough one. I couldn’t do it and honor the men that do. I know my wife had some tough times–she took on the problems of her clients as, sort of, her own. The priests must have that in spades.
The confession aspect of Catholicism is an essential part of the religion and has been around a lot longer than the State of Washington. Leave it be.
but teachers cant ( and dont want to in many cases) tell parents that the student wants to cut their body parts off
sounds like a fair trade-off
ffffff the left
Will they give the Church standing to sue? Because after all, “no one has actually suffered any damages… YET!”
I suspect that the chilling effect on prospective confessors (of any ilk) who fear that their confessions could be disclosed has created standing. First amendment claims concerning stifling free speech and religious practice have been entertained broadly by the courts.
You think that. I agree, wholeheartedly.
The problem is that the Court gets to decide.
All priests have standing, because they are all now presented with the choice of violating either God’s law or the state’s.
Even if the law made no exceptions for anyone, they’d still have standing to sue, it’s just that they’d lose. But since it does make exceptions for other people, and used to make one for them too, and it’s only that one exception that’s now been closed off, they have not only standing but a winning case.
Granting that this is aimed specifically at Roman Catholics; but can you imagine the uproar if a DA tried to force an Imam to report child abuse.
Subotai Bahadur
but Catholics have a history:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_Church_sexual_abuse_cases
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/religion/nearly-1-700-priests-clergy-accused-sex-abuse-are-unsupervised-n1062396
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/09/new-orleans-catholic-church-abuse-takeaways
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22809048/
https://www.npr.org/2021/10/05/1043302348/france-catholic-church-sexual-abuse-report-children
Questions of sexual abuse by clergy are entirely irrelevant to the topic of clergy reporting sexual abuse confessions of their parishioners to police.
The abusive clerics are a small minority but it is very relevant b/c in some of those cases the offending cleric was moved to another parish to repeat the offenses after the Church had knowledge that the cleric was a threat to children. That’s exactly what we are discussing; whether those with knowledge of criminal actions will be compelled to report them to LEO. IMO applying the same basic framework as Attorneys operate under is the better option; require reporting when someone says they will commit future criminal acts but keep admission of past criminal acts exempt.
No. That is not what we are discussing. You’re talking about what an organization learns about in the course of business. It is not subject to the seal of confession and already must be reported.
irishgladiator63 In part that is exactly what we are talking about. The priests who abused kids confessed those sins to other priests or their “confessor,”
Basically the Roman Catholic Church is putting their “rules” ahead of and contrary to the Word of God.
Irishgladiator63,
No that’s exactly what I am proposing an equivalence between the conversation of a criminal child predator disclosing his intent to commit FUTURE acts and his attorney and his clergy.
His confession of PAST criminal child predation would remain between him and his clergy just as it would between him and his attorney.
FWIW the Catholic Church is an organization and had knowledge specific of predatory clergy but in some instances recycled them to another parish and they harmed additional children in part due to the refusal of the organization to take action either external with LEO or internally by reassignment to non public duties.
Oh please. Now do the teachers in government schools. Otherwise shut up
Very fair point and applying the reporting requirements to everyone equally is exactly what we should be doing with limited and narrow exceptions for Attorneys, clergy, psychologists for admissions of past acts but no exceptions for admissions of intent to commit future acts.
Wouldn’t be an uproar… more of a short, wet, messy gurgle.
No way in Hades they will infringe on anything to do with Islam. The Muslims fight back.
Ask Salman Rushdie.
I have a problem with all the privileges. I’m trying to come up with a middle ground. Perhaps reporting should be required at the level that a potential crime might have occurred but not details. Testimony would not be required. The state would have to build a case without it.
I realize this gets pretty tricky when attorney-client is involved.
It gets pretty tricky in most of the cases. The “middle ground” is treacherous, to say the least.
Church law prohibits even indirect reporting by priests. So, sideways glances, hand signals, and reports “without details” are also forbidden. Priests cannot reveal anything in any way that’s reported to them in confidence when absolution is sought by a parishioner.
I understand but I watched the priest pedophilia case occur in real time in Boston and it was abysmal. A lot of people were hurt by it and of course higher level church officials were complicit in the coverup. That shouldn’t happen.
There have also been reports in the past of abuse by certain ultra religious Jews in NY. There was some protection happening there too.
Apples and oranges. What you’re referring to is an organizational cover up of something the organization knew through its normal course of business. None of that falls under the seal of confession.
What Washington wants is for priests to inform some random guy going into a confessional and asking for forgiveness of his sins. And child abuse is a very, very broad term. Not just sexual abuse.
Thank you. You said it better than did I.
I know, somewhat, a couple Catholic priests. Good men, have dedicated their lives to helping others. They were/are extremely distressed by the child abuse situation. It goes against their very reason for living their lives.
Look, nothing stops a priest from counseling a parishioner that he needs to seek help (or even report himself) for his crimes. But it forbids the priest from being the one who outs him.
Yeah, right. That is the definition of the slippery slope. And we know how that ends.
In case you aren’t following, Seattle/antifa attacked Christians at a rally in Seattle.
City of Seattle blamed the Christians for being bigoted.
This is Washington.
Please bus all your criminals there immediately and let that city burn.
Okay, lawyers please help me out here.
My understanding is that the default is that people are not legally required to report known or suspected criminal behavior. There are exceptions to that default for certain categories and crimes (medical personnel and bullet wounds, school personnel and child abuse, etc.). There are exceptions to that exception (privileged relationships as listed in the article, etc.). And now Washington state wants an exception to the exceptions to the exceptions?
LOL – that’s a good way to put it.
Not quite. The general rule is that no one is required to report a crime. There is a list of exceptions to that rule, and Washington has now added one more item to that list.
So how exactly are Washington state officials going to enforce this law. If someone confesses child abuse and/or neglect to a Priest who exactly is going to know if the Priest doesn’t inform secular authorities about that confession. Unless the guilty party reveals that they confessed to a priest exactly two people will ever know. The Priest and the Penitent. Nobody else. So it seems to me that while this law egregiously intrudes on the Priest/ relationship it’s hardly an enforceable law.
What I worry more about is that people will “set-up” the priest with fake confessions of child abuse/neglect to see what those priests will do. That’s certainly something isn’t beyond these sanctimonious a-holes. But time will tell.
The problem will occur 1) when the supposed penitent re-offends, or 2) when they pre-confess.
The pre-confession shouldn’t be a problem for the priest, because I do not think telling a priest what sins you are about to commit is actually covered by the seal of the confessional (and has other problems with doctrine, like helping the defenseless and rendering unto Caesar).
And, of course, the situation you describe WILL happen because the culprit will spill the beans to someone who will then throw that out because “He could have been stopped!” The emotional taint of prior Roman Catholic scandals is what drives and supports this bill. Lots of hate held toward the Roman church due to that stuff.
Interesting the teachers seem to be SO much worse, but they aren’t targeted in this bill. It’s because the teachers are the priests of Progressivism in many ways. And we can’t allow THAT church to be touched.
Anything heard in the confessional is strictly confidential. If it weren’t (even if only by church law), this would discourage people from talking to priests even in the confessional for fear that what they say might be reported to authorities. This is how this state law affects not only priests but also all parishioners – the law will have a “chilling effect” on their rights to practice their religion.
Yeah, I think you make a good point on the distinction between a confession which is about past actions and telling the Priest (or anyone else) you will commit future crimes. IMO if someone is actually repentant then a part of the acknowledgment is that prior act is ‘bad’ sinful/illegal and must not be repeated. I can see where Clergy can provide absolution but also need to report to LEO their belief an individual will commit future acts.
Complicated issues. Especially the framing, Mary views it as singling out the Catholic Church for special negative treatment but one could make the opposite argument that by granting an exemption to only the Catholic Church the State is providing special privileges in favor of Catholic Church. I think the better dividing line for clergy should be the same as for attorneys; centered on potential future acts.
The church is in the “business” of saving souls, not solving or preventing crimes.
Very trite. We can all play that game, let’s go ahead and allow exemptions to the criminal code for any/all actions to other groups as well. Polygamy as an example is accepted in many religions. Can’t limit exceptions to only ‘religions’ through. So the Manson Family is totes ok and every other cult. Will y’all stand shoulder to shoulder to ensure that everyone with a particular philosophical view will be able to implement by gaining an exemption?
For that matter the Catholic Church had some pretty stern views on apostates, heretics and pagans. If they should decide to return to those more vigorous views on ‘saving souls’ is that ok as well? After all the Church argued they were saving and purifying or at least offering an opportunity.
If you reject the compromise I formulated of keeping PAST deeds/crimes within the confessional but requiring notice on future crimes (the same way an Attorney operates) then .. What comes next is on y’all To make.it real simple…if Joe says I did X yesterday I am reluctantly agreeing to respect the confessional but if Joe say I am going to.do X in the future then IMO there’s a duty to report. If the Catholic Church wants to stand on their beliefs and refuse lawful temporal dictates they need to accept the consequences without quibbling.
Chief, that’s not how it works. Catholic law requires priests to keep secret everything they hear in confession, even plans to commit future crimes. Requiring them to report would simply force them to become criminals, since of course whenever God’s law conflicts with that of the state one must obey God and not the state. But it is odious to American tradition to put someone in the position of having to choose between prison and Hell. It’s constitutional, so long as there are no other exceptions to the law, but it’s odious.
In this case, however, the law does make other exceptions, so there’s no excuse for not making one for Catholic confessions. Or the state could simply not add clergy to the list of mandatory reporters, which is itself a list of exceptions to the general rule that no one has a duty to report a crime.
Milhouse,
I am not endorsing the WA statute I am proposing something different. You are mostly making my argument for me. Equality is exactly what I am proposing. That clergy be treated like Attorneys or Psychological professionals:
1. Past crimes are not reportable
2. Threats of future crimes would be reportable
Seems a reasonable standard. Of course a member of the clergy would have the option to obey temporal laws or their spiritual laws …just like everyone else…but also like everyone else there’s potential consequences if they do so.
I don’t see how we.can have a statute for mandatory reporting and offer exemptions based on a philosophical belief system.
The privilege would be to anyone whose religious beliefs forbid reporting. That happens to be only Catholic priests.
There is a long tradition in the USA of making religious exceptions to generally applicable laws, in order to avoid putting anyone in the position of having to decide whether to go to prison or to Hell.
The Supreme Court has held that so long as a law makes no other exceptions it is not required to make one for religious exercise, but it is permitted to do so and that is the traditional practice. However once a law makes other exceptions, it is required to make one for religious exercise as well.
Milhouse,
My point is that Mary and others view this as an attack upon Catholic Priests/Church precisely b/c they are (currently) the only recognized religion who does so, they are acknowledging the implicit bias but from an opposite tack. I would argue an exemption provides an unreasonable and unequal application based on what amounts to religious favoritism at least in practice if not in explicit intent then implicitly.
I also have a strong disagreement over distinctions between religion and conscious. IMO the minority of one person has just as much validity as a majority when discuss issues of belief/conscience. If an individual has a personal belief that mandates they do X or refrain from Y then why isn’t that just as valid as the freedom of conscious for the multiple adherents of a particular religion? For that matter what about a smaller group with shared beliefs aka cult? Every group has shared beliefs but more believers doesn’t grant more accuracy or validity.
Similar to the Aurora Colorado movie theater shooter. His psychiatrist went to the police not for his past acts, but because of what he was going to do.
BTW, the confessional in many cases is anonymous
I think you just hit on the solution. I am not Catholic–I consider myself a doubting atheist. If the priest doesn’t know the identity of the penitent, what is he supposed to do? Run around to the other side and arrest the person? Going to give priests a gun and a badge? Handcuffs?
Yahbut — the psychiatrist is legally a mandated reporter — he has to tell police about credible crimes being planned by his patients. This isn’t an ethical violation because the code of ethics is secularly-based and drafted by government.
The Church’s code of ethics is religiously-based, drafted by the Pope as revealed by God. Government making priests mandated reporters violates a religious precept.
A parishioner who tells a priest that he is about to commit more sins shouldn’t expect absolution. The priest will certainly tell him that his intentions indicate that he is not penitent, and no forgiveness can be granted. So whatever benefit he thought he was going to get by going to confession in the first place, he won’t be getting it.
Of course he can’t get absolution in advance. There’s no such thing. But what he tells the priest in confession is still sealed.
Not my point. I was expecting that any session in the confessional would include past sins (since everybody sins). It would be reasonable to withhold absolution for those past sins when a penitent also discloses plans for future ones, on the basis of him expressing a deliberate intention NOT to “go and sin no more.” However, not being a Catholic theologian, I can’t say for sure that this would be doctrinally sound… although I know that absolutions can be withheld for other classes of reasons.
That one is easy. They will expense law enforcement time, money, and personnel by sending in people to set up anybody that’s in the confessional. Say something to them, it doesn’t get reported, and they wrap out the priest involved. Creating a crime where none exists.
Yes, that’s another problem – the law is easily weaponized. This being Washington State, run by lunatics, the temptation to weaponize the law in this fashion is likely far too great for government officials to resist.
How will the priest get caught?
Answer: A sting operation
Are only priests exempt or all religious leaders prior to this law? Does the religious leader part also include those internet religious diplomas?
You mean like my ordination in the Church of Saint Valachi?
Prior to this law, clergy were not mandatory reporters, so they were covered by the general rule that no one has a duty to report crimes. This law makes them an exception to that rule, but that isn’t a problem for most religions. Catholic priests are the only people whom it requires to violate their religion.
At the end of the day our discussion here is meaningless. The Church doesn’t care what Internet posters think.
What will happen is this:
Faithful priests will not break the seal of confession, no matter the cost.
Faithless ones will break it and will no longer be either preists or Catholic.
And Washington State will join the long list of governments that have oppressed and jailed Catholics.
That’s certainly one way to describe it. An alternative viewpoint might state that placing all clergy in the same category of mandatory reporting is in keeping with the Constitution precisely b/c it doesn’t carve out a special exemption from the law for Catholic Priests thus reflecting the 1A and the 14A.
An equal application of the law across the board is hardly a specific attack upon the Catholic Church. No more so than the requirements to end polygamy for the Mormon Church. If the Catholic Church suddenly reverted to traditional practices of dealing with Apostates or Heretics would it be ok for an exemption of statutes preventing all the illegal actions they used to employ v Anglicans or Lutherans? How about the Cathars? At root it is the exact same argument ‘my Church requires me to do X or refrain from doing Y so I want an exemption based on religion’.
I have a question for the Catholics not being one myself. Could the priest put turning yourself in as a penance?