Catholic Bishops’ Leader to Discuss Confessional Seal Comments with France’s Interior Minister

Catholic News Agency ^ | 10/8/21 | Staff

[marshmallow]

The president of the French bishops’ conference has accepted a request to discuss his recent comments about the confessional seal with the country’s interior minister.

Archbishop Éric de Moulins-Beaufort will meet with Gérald Darmanin on Oct. 12 at the interior ministry’s headquarters in Paris, according to an Oct. 7 statement on the bishops’ conference website.

“Archbishop Eric de Moulins-Beaufort will be happy to discuss with the interior minister the meaning of the sacrament of confession for Catholics and the theological, spiritual, and canonical foundations of the seal of confession,” the statement said.

It explained that Darmanin, who is responsible for religious affairs, contacted the archbishop of Reims on Oct. 7, expressing his wish to arrange a meeting. Moulins-Beaufort accepted the request shortly after he received the message, it said.

Vatican News noted that the bishops’ conference statement described Darmanin’s request as an “invitation,” rather than a “summons,” as it has been widely described in media reports.

Darmanin was responding to comments that Moulins-Beaufort made in an Oct. 6 interview after the publication of a landmark report on abuse in the French Catholic Church.

In the interview with FranceInfo, the archbishop was pressed on whether the confessional seal took precedence over French laws.

“The seal of confession imposes itself on us and in this, it is stronger than the laws of the Republic,” he said.

France has a mandatory reporting law, with sanctions for failing to stop or report a crime.

French government spokesman Gabriel Attal said on Oct. 7: “Nothing takes precedence over the laws of the Republic in our country.”