In Australia, a proposed new law could require priests to turn over anyone who confesses child abuse to the police. And Australia’s not alone. In fact, it’s something of a trend.

The Irish Justice Minister introduced a bill earlier this year making it a criminal offense to fail to disclose information to police which would “assist in prosecuting a person who commits a serious offence against a child or vulnerable adult.” That includes priests being mandated to break the seal of the confessional.

Hey what a great idea following on Ireland’s decision to do the same. This is really going to knock out a lot of abuse since child molesters are known for going to confession. Plus now with the new law you know child abusers will really be seeking priests out for confession.

While we are at it let us get rid of lawyer-client confidentiality. Lawyers can plead guilty against the client’s wishes if they are aware of them committing a crime. Why should any relationship be protected if it covers up a crime?

It is certainly understandable a reaction such as this against child abuse, a crime so heinous. Yet as bad as child abuse is what about murder? Shouldn’t the priest or lawyer also be forced to give up any information they have if violating such confidentiality is a good in itself. How about client-doctor also whether medical or psychiatry if they come across information? The law seems very narrow in scope being directed only towards priests.

Besides the practicality of the whole thing seems more like an agenda than being directed towards any actual fruitful end. How would they know that the law was violated in the first place? Sting operations against priests with false confessions to see if they go to the police? Or arrested child molesters making an accusation that they admitted this in confession – something the priest could neither confirm or deny? That scenario has the earmarking of another movie in the vein of “I Confess” by Alfred Hitchcock.

St John of Nepomuk pray for us.

Via Creative Minority Report

In a story involving Brook Village Retirement Home in North Providence.

The complaining resident, Wanda Hughes told DePetro that she wrote a letter to the property management group because she finds the Rosary to be “an in your face ritual.” In the letter she threatens to bring the issue to the ACLU if it is not addressed.

Yeah what could be more in your face than a group of elderly people praying the Rosary in the community room.

Hughes said the community room is “suppose to be open” and the residents can pray in their rooms.

The very idea of people gathering together in a “Community Room” of all places.

This led to a ban that has since been lifted by the management.

[Source]

Msgr. Charles Pope replies to “Friendly Atheist” whose nom de plume is not exactly accurate and I am not referring to the atheist part. Really love the way the Monsignor takes up points in response in a clear and charitable manner. He points out logical fallacies and how words such as legitimacy don’t mean what this commenter thinks they mean.

It is also interesting how many atheists take up the side of liberal Catholics in this case the four Arlington Catechists who won’t take a fidelity oath. Really with the atheists point of view aren’t liberal/conservative/luke-warm/whatever-definition Catholics all just plain wrong for believing in God in the first place? Why take sides when all the players are wrong? Though as Friendly Atheist says “I’m loving this implosion from the sidelines.” The implosion he is referring to is 4 out of 5,000 cathechists not taking the loyalty oath. Not much of an implosion. Maybe it is a form of schadenfreude whenever there is some dispute within the Church with the Magisterium seen as the uber-theists and liberal Catholics seeming closer to the atheist position. Or maybe it is kind of like rooting for a football team you don’t really like because they are playing against a team you hate.

In related atheist comment box news, Mark Shea posts today:

So there’s some dude with the handle L.W. Dickel who has been trying to post here (unsuccessfully thanks to my sleek, leonine ban filter). He posts the same profanity-ridden blasphemous rant over and over again and, as is always the custom with these social inadepts, congratulates himself for being a Thinking Man. After the third or fourth try, I got curious googled his name to see if he was simply filled with hate for this blog or for theistic blogs in general. Turns out the dude is in comboxes everwhere, cutting and pasting the exact same blasphemous monomaniacal rant again and again.

Because Thinking Men cut and paste.

I got hit by the same commenter and while I am very loose in regards to allowing comments, this one was deleted for profanity. I have seen other commenter of this stripe who post the same thing on multiple blogs totally unrelated to the topic at hand. A form of atheist vain repetition like a Buddhist prayer wheel spinning out automatic prayers.

Though maybe the point of this post is to redirect my own constant atheist commenter to another blog as atheist link bait. Oh wait, did I write that publicly? Oh well, wishful thinking.

The Arlington Diocese, which includes nearly a half-million Catholics across northern and eastern Virginia, is one of a small but growing number that are starting to demand fidelity oaths. The oaths reflect a churchwide push in recent years to revive orthodoxy that has sharply divided Catholics.

Such oaths are not new for priests or nuns but extend now in some places to people like volunteer Sunday school teachers as well as workers at Catholic hospitals and parish offices.

…

The Arlington “profession of faith” asks teachers to commit to “believe everything” the bishops characterize as divinely revealed, and Arlington’s top doctrine official said it would include things like the bishops’ recent campaign against a White House mandate that most employers offer contraception coverage. Critics consider the mandate a violation of religious freedom.

Articles like this almost make me wish I was a journalist. Instead of actual research and getting quotes I could just write “critics say” followed by anything I wanted to make a point with – that done I could go home after a days work. Yes religious freedom now means you have the right to be a catechist even if you won’t swear to teach what the Church teaches.

So far, out of the diocese’s 5,000 Sunday and parochial school teachers, four are objecting to it and will not take the oath.

So what exactly is objectionable to them? The Profession of Faith simply starts with the Creed and then says:

With firm faith, I also believe everything contained in the Word of God, whether written or handed down in tradition, which the Church, either by solemn judgment or by the ordinary and universal Magisterium, sets forth to be believed as divinely inspired.

I also accept and hold each and everything definitively proposed by the Church regarding teaching on faith and morals.

Moreover, I adhere with religious submission of will and intellect to the teachings with either the Roman Pontiff or the College of Bishops enunciate whey the exercise their authentic Magisterium, even if they do not intend to proclaim theses teachings by a definitive act.

This section is pretty much a restatement of the levels of Church teaching from the Vatican II document Lumen Gentium section 25. Though an actual document from Vatican II doesn’t count since as much as ye ole spirit of Vatican II.

Now as far as these four women saying they can’t take the oath. Well if their conscience seriously objects to it, than that is what they should do. This is much better than those who would swear the oath and not fully mean it. Oath-taking has fallen on hard times across the spectrum from marriages to politicians swearing to defend the Constitution.

One of the women submitted a letter explaining why she won’t take the oath and I don’t think she really explained why she won’t. One of the reasons is that she says it is not even possible to “specify ALL the teachings proposed definitively.” I find this rather lame as if you can know most of them yet the one you might not knows directly is the one you would object to. As if the Church has hidden the definitive teachings making it impossible to know them all without looking at lots of fine print. She says it is “impossible to know” what she is assenting to. Yeah that shows a lot of faith and trust in the Church. Another reason has even less substance in that the “expression of teachings have not reached their fullest expression in the present.” Well if the Magisterium’s deepening understanding in the area of faith and morals makes it so that you can no longer accept the faith at that point, well then resign at that point.

She even goes on to write that “only a person who is willing to abandon her own reason and judgment, or who is wiling to go against the dictates of her own conscience, can agree to sign such a document.” Wow so of the 5,000 catechetical teachers who will sign this document they are all willing to abandon reason and their conscience. Talk about abandoning reason and pure vanity. Being guided by the Magisterium is not abandoning reason since we must fully engage our reason to come to a fuller understanding of Church teaching.

She also says that forcing this issue she will be depriving students of teachers. Well 4 out of 5,000 is not much depriving. Though the 5,000 figure seems awfully high to me. One thing for sure this policy is already working if it keeps teachers like her from poisoning others with such a skeptical view of the Magisterium and the ability to know what she teaches. She treats this oath like a contract with the Devil where you must make sure there are no loopholes that will back-stab you later.

Via Rorate Caeli