{"id":626,"date":"2011-07-16T09:55:00","date_gmt":"2011-07-16T09:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/labmind\/2011\/07\/seal-of-confession-attacked-in-ireland.html"},"modified":"2011-07-16T09:55:00","modified_gmt":"2011-07-16T09:55:00","slug":"seal-of-confession-attacked-in-ireland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/labmind\/2011\/07\/seal-of-confession-attacked-in-ireland.html","title":{"rendered":"Seal of Confession Attacked in Ireland"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

One of the most sacred duties of a priest is to keep the seal of confession. The seal obliges a priest to keep complete silence about all things confessed and discussed during the sacrament of confession. Under no circumstances can a priest speak up, even if it\u2019s to defend himself or to prevent a crime or catastrophe. The seal also forbids the priest from changing behaviors due to what he learns in the confessional. A classic example: A kid confesses he has been drinking the sacramental wine in the sacristy weekly. The priest cannot start locking up the wine because he would be acting upon something he learned while hearing confessions.<\/p>\n

The seal maintains the integrity of the sacrament of confession. If penitents knew the priest could repeat what he hears, not many people would ask for forgiveness their sins, especially serious ones.<\/p>\n

The Church takes the seal of confession seriously. Canon law legislates that, \u201cA confessor who directly violates the seal of confession incurs an automatic excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See; if he does so only indirectly, he is to be punished in accord with the seriousness of the offense.\u201d This simply means that if a priest violates the seal, he is out. It\u2019s an automatic excommunication that only Rome can pardon. Depending on the gravity of the violation and whether<\/span> or not it became public scandal, the priest could be prevented from returning to active ministry.<\/p>\n

Having said all this, the media in Ireland for the last week has been reporting on a law proposed to legislators. The government wants to force priests to break the seal of confession when someone confesses pedophilia. Priests cannot do this. Even though it would be difficult to convict any priest of violating this secular law, some priests may struggle between following the law of the Church versus the law of the state. Actually, they must choose between the priesthood itself and the law of the state.<\/p>\n

Pray for Irish legislators. This has never happened before in history, not even under the worse persecution of the Church during the French Revolution and other under anti-church governments of the 19th<\/span> century.<\/p>\n

Click on this brief article below to learn a bit more about this proposed law.<\/p>\n

Government Proposal to Break Seal of Confession<\/a><\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
CNS story: Irish prime minister: Vatican has \u2018calculated, withering\u2019 abuse stance<\/a><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
***Please no anonymous comments. Thanks!***<\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the most sacred duties of a priest is to keep the seal of confession. The seal obliges a priest to keep complete silence about all things confessed and discussed during the sacrament of confession. Under no circumstances can a priest speak up, even if it\u2019s to defend himself or to prevent a crime […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2533,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-626","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nSeal of Confession Attacked in Ireland<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"One of the most sacred duties of a priest is to keep the seal of confession. 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