THE Catholic Church will fight any efforts to break the traditional
Catholic seal of the confession box, the head of its child-protection
agency predicted.
Ian Elliott, the CEO of the National
Board for Safeguarding Children in the Catholic Church, said he welcomed
the tough new legislative package announced by Justice Minister Alan Shatter
in the wake of the publication of the Cloyne Report.
But Mr Elliott
said he saw no justification for breaking the confessional seal, which
is known as sacredotal privilege.
And he insisted that compelling
priests to reveal secrets confided in confession by abusers or victims
would "antagonise" relationships between church and State.
"The sacrament of penance (confession) is one of the main sacraments in the Catholic Church," he said.
The former head of the Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children
said it may not be in the best interests of victims to break their
confidence if they reveal in confession that they have been abused.
"Sacredotal
privilege is recognised in many legal systems," said Mr Elliott. "To
break it would antagonise relationships. In any event, it is unnecessary
as there are other ways to ensure compliance."
Legal experts warned that the new mandatory-reporting law could create
difficulties for the Catholic confessional seal and rite of penance.
They also claimed that it could undermine the lawyer-client
relationship.
The failure to report cases of child sexual abuse to
the gardai was "the central difficulty" identified in the Cloyne
Report, which also highlighted the failure to pass on to the authorities
soft and hard information about known or suspected abusers.
Minister for Children Frances Fitzgerald will launched the revised Children First national guidelines, which will be placed on a statutory basis.
Failure to comply with aspects of Children First will also give rise to a range of civil and criminal sanctions.
Geoffrey
Shannon, the Government's child-protection adviser said: "Monitoring
implementation of the Children First guidelines will be key to ensuring
that they are uniformly and consistently adhered to."