Bills currently under consideration in the Washington and Vermont legislatures would make all clergy in the state mandatory reporters of sexual abuse and would remove so-called clergy-penitent ...

Last week, I wrote a post about the seal of confession, and how a priest in Lousiana is being threatened with contempt of court and jail time if he refuses to disclose what a girl told him in ...

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Q: Recently I went to confession on Saturday afternoon before my parish's vigil Mass. The priest told me to say a rosary for ...

It’s a practice that is centuries old: confessing one’s sins to a trusted clergy member. But could the protection these confessions receive through clergy-penitent privilege be aiding admitted child ...

In the movies, the penitent enters a confession booth, kneels and whispers to a priest behind a lattice screen: “Forgive me, father, for I have sinned.” This drama was, for centuries, at the center of ...