Posted on 07/15/2014 6:38:24 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Does anyone know for sure if this case is about civil damages against the diocese? I think she did testify in court, but how do you award damages or even charge the priest with something when his faith tells him he can’t even confirm he heard her confession? Like I said, if the law is indeed this way in LA and supposedly other states, why hasn’t this come up before?
FReegards
I hope they get money from the church. A ton of it.
If she was in a confessional with the priest, then it was a confession.
But it does seem that there was an "easy out" for the priest at the time....simply tell the girl to come and talk to him outside the confessional.
While I can't agree with the part about a twelve year old allowing a rape (no capacity to give consent), there is a more logical possibility.
Children this age are ego centric and will often take blame upon themselves for things that we, as adults, know are beyond their control. For instance, thinking that parents divorced because they were "bad" kids.
If the perp groomed the child as most perps do, he would have easily been able to reinforce that erroneous thought she might have about being at fault.
If that was the case, she may have come forward to confess her mistaken belief that she was at fault, in which case it would be the confessor's religious duty to help her understand the fallacy of her thinking while directing her to the resources to make the report.
If this was the scenario that unfolded, then I suppose the priest could have assisted her to make the report.
It is a civil case yes. Not a criminal one. As far as I understand there is no criminal case being investigated.
Whatever is said in the confessional is a confession. It does not have to be a personal confession of guilt in order to be confidential.
But after having heard the girl’s confession, the priest could have advised the girl to report the rape to the proper authorities without breaking his vow of silence.
After all, the priest is there to hear confessions but also to advice the penitent how to avoid a particular sin in the future.
“But after having heard the girl’s confession, the priest could have advised the girl to report the rape to the proper authorities without breaking his vow of silence.”
Yeah, if there was some sort of conference outside confession or something then the mandatory reporting law would supposedly kick in. But then I don’t understand why the lawsuit, unless he only told her after the first few confessions and then had some sort of conference. But if everything did happen in confession, how do we know that the priest didn’t advise her to do exactly that? I’m not saying he did, but wouldn’t it look exactly the same whether he did or not to us, depending on what the girl then decided to do?
Truly a mess, and I don’t understand why something like this is only happening now if the law has been this way since 1991.
Freegards
The authorities may have questioned the girl who it was who advised her to report the crime to them.
The priest’s name then came up.
Well, she is saying that the priest told her that she needed to keep the crime quiet, they are apparently suing the diocese over it. But the priest can’t even admit that he heard her confession at all much less what he told her, even if he wanted to (which I am not saying he does). The priest could be culpable as heck, he could be innocent. But either way it is all going to be the same, right? It’s not like he has the option of saying, ‘of course I will testify, I have nothing to hide,’ even if he really doesn’t have anything to hide he still can’t do anything different than if he is guilty.
Freegards
The first Amendment to the Federal Constitution says Congress shall make no law. As it is there is no congressional law in question here, so Technically and literally the 1st amendment to the Federal Constitution is ill-relevant on this issue.
What is relevant is the Louisiana Constitution which probably does have some rather point full things to say on the issue.
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