You have the same shameful abuse continuing that the catholics have hidden and allowed for all too long. It is indicative of a lack of a moral compass. The history of abuse within the catholic church in America (and probably other places as well ) is well known. It is a stain on the church that seems to just continue growing. The justifications given don’t wash. God will hold them all responsible
2. While the proven abuses are indeed shameful, just what do you imagine do those abuses by a very small cadre of evil priests have to do with the attempt of state judges to abolish, disable, destroy the confidential relationship between priest and penitent which is, I assure you, quite old and quite necessary?
3. If you imagine that the Catholic Church lacks a moral compass, in a free country like the USA, you are free to belong to any other church or none. What you are not free to do is to force the violation of the seal of the confessional, NO MATTER WHAT the circumstances.
\ 4. The seal of the confessional protects the penitent but it also protects the priest and it protects innocent third parties whose alleged transgressions are reported to the priest in the confessional and not always accurately: "Father, I raped Susie and Billy, Bob and Jeff helped" but Jeff was not there any more than the priest was there. The priest is not competent to testify as to who was or was not there. Such testimony should be precluded as rank hearsay, a principle that was NOT invented by the Catholic Church but, for our purposes, by essentially Protestant judicial authorities in the system of Anglo-American common law.
5. Again, If Louisiana judges are allowed by the judicial system to attempt to engage in this gross violation of civil liberties, today is a good day to die as Plains Indian warriors used to say before battle, including Little Big Horn where they anticipated Patton's view that the purpose of the exercise is not to die for your (principles or country) but to make the other poor dumb bastard die for his.
6. The judges can do no more than hold the priest in contempt of court and order him jailed until he complies but they are also NOT allowed to keep him in jail when it is obvious that the coercion is not working and will not work. See the similar defiance of judicial authority by Bernardine Dohrn (Bill Ayres' wife and the radical queen). The priest should be proud to be jailed for contempt under such circumstances and should make a public statement affirming that he has absolute contempt for any judges or courts involved in violating the law to try to break the seal of the confessional.
7. The Vatican should take note of all this and, if the priest is otherwise qualified, consecrate him as a bishop, naming him as one while jailed, if possible. When the late Auxiliary Bishop of the New York Archdiocese Austin Vaughan was jailed in New York for entering an abortion mill and helping to stop the killing there, he served his sentence as though it was a reward. Upon release from prison, he made NYC headlines by arranging a press interview at the gates of the jail and telling them: "MARIO CUOMO IS GOING STRAIGHT TO HELL!"
Today is a good day to die: VIVA CRISTO REY!