I Won't Take Confession at All in Case a Pedophile Walks In, Says Father Chris Riley

By Tory Shepherd
News.com.au
November 14, 2012

www.news.com.au/news/i-wont-take-confession-at-all-in-case-a-pedophile-walks-in-says-father-chris-riley/story-e6frfkor-1226516624451

CHILD sex abuse is not a secret priests should keep, prominent Catholics say.

Sydney priest Father Chris Riley,  founder of Youth Off The Streets, says he refuses to take confessions because he could not listen to a child sex abuser without reporting them to police. 

Melbourne priest and radio host Father Bob Maguire says if a pedophile confessed his sins he'd tell him he would report him. And controversial NSW married priest Father Kevin Lee says he would convince an offender to seek outside help.

Australia's most powerful Catholic, Cardinal George Pell, is looking increasingly at odds with the Catholic community with his strident defence of the seal of Confession, which means that child sex abusers can confess their sins to a priest and not be reported to police.

Father Riley, who has worked with abused kids for 38 years, says it's time for the church to re-examine that idea, and says all priests would feel “really conflicted" and would want to report crimes including pedophilia, domestic violence and murder, but would have to “stick by the rules" that you can't disclose what's said in the confessional.

“I made a decision that I don't hear confession given the work that I do and I think working with kids who have been sexually assaulted… I've got to go and report that," he said.

“That's my position. I made a choice (because) as a mandatory reporter you'd report it to the cops, but in confession, you're not meant to disclose it."

Father Bob says he'd issue a disclaimer before even hearing confession.

“If it was me and a bloke sat down and said I want to go to confession I would say ‘go on, but if you're going to talk to me about… child abuse, it's no longer a confession. I'll have to talk to police'," the radio star and outspoken priest said.

“God knows where the Seal of Confession came from – it's got nothing to do with the Bible."

Father Bob, who calls himself a “pop-up priest" since he retired from his parish, said priests needed to get back in touch with the real world and be good citizens as well as members of the faith community.

He said some clerics were “emotionally teenagers", who remain “permanently undeveloped".

“These boys (clerics) with Visa cards flying around the universe… they're like corporate chiefs, that's when the disease sets in, that hubris and it befuddles their thinking," he said. 

Father Lee, a Catholic priest who rose to prominence earlier this year when he revealed he had secretly got married, spoke to Triple M about the burden of confession on a priest forced to hear about crimes.

“Some secrets you don't keep to yourself and pedophilia is one of them," he said.

“I found it a real burden … when someone says ‘oh, I've done this to a child and you're expected to keep that to yourself … we're not allowed to (approach the police) but of course the thought crosses your mind."

He said his approach was to persuade the person to talk to a counsellor who would then have to report them to police.

Opposition to the secrecy of confession is growing politically as well as within the church.

Liberal front-bencher and Catholic Christopher Pyne said priests should breach the seal of the confessional and report any crimes to police.

“If a priest hears in a confessional a crime, especially a crime against a minor, the priest has the responsibility in my view to report that to the appropriate authorities," he told ABC radio.

NSW Premier Barry O'Farrell also says he believes priests should have to reveal any abuse.

Meanwhile Attorney-General Nicola Roxon said the Royal Commission into child abuse will determine whether the confidentiality of the Catholic confessional should be broken.