BishopAccountability.org
	Confessors Cannot Report Pedophile Priests, Vatican Official Notes Catholic Culture March 18, 2010 http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=5775 VATICAN CITY -- If a priest admits to abuse of children during a sacramental confession, the confessor cannot report that abuse to legal authorities, a Vatican official has reminded readers of the Vatican newspaper. In an interview with L'Osservatore Romano, Bishop Gianfranco Girotti, an official of the Apostolic Penitentiary, emphasized that the seal of confession is absolute. The confessor can take no action based on the penitent's revelations, nor reveal the sins that have been confessed to anyone. "The only possible outcome of confession is absolution," the bishop said. The confessional seal has not often been an issue in the sex-abuse scandals that have come to the fore in public discussions. The criticism of Catholic bishops for mishandling abusive priests has centered on cases in which the revelations of abuse came outside the confessional-- either through complaints from victims or through admissions made by priests in administrative interviews.
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