Posted on 11/15/2014 1:56:37 PM PST by NYer
VATICAN CITY — The secrecy of a confession is maintained so seriously and completely by the Catholic Church that a priest would be excommunicated for revealing the contents of a confession when ordered to testify by a court or even after the penitent dies, Vatican officials said.
“No confessor can be dispensed from it, even if he would want to reveal the contents of a confession in order to prevent a serious and imminent evil,” said Msgr. Krzysztof Nykiel, regent of the Apostolic Penitentiary, a Vatican court dealing with matters of conscience.
The penitentiary sponsored a conference at the Vatican Nov. 12-13 on “the confessional seal and pastoral privacy.”
According to the Vatican newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, conference participants heard that since the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 spelled out the penalties in church law for violating the secret of the confessional, “the discipline of the church in this matter has remained substantially the same,” with the exception of additional protections.
One of those additions, the newspaper said, was a 1988 church law explicitly stating that using an “electronic apparatus” to record, broadcast or otherwise share the contents of a confession also is an excommunicable offense.
Cardinal Mauro Piacenza, head of the Apostolic Penitentiary, told conference participants it is important “to remove any suspicion” that the church’s commitment to the confessional seal “is designed to cover intrigues, plots or mysteries as people sometimes naively believe or, more easily, are led to believe.”
The seal, he said, is intended to protect the most intimate part of the human person, “that is, to safeguard the presence of God within each man.” The effect of the secret, he said, is that it also protects a person’s reputation and right to privacy.
The confessional seal, Msgr. Nykiel said, “is binding not only on the confessor, but also on the interpreter, if present, and anyone who in any way, even casually, comes to know of the sins confessed.”
The church, he said, takes the seal so seriously that it forbids, on the pain of excommunication, a priest from testifying in court about what he heard in the confessional, “even if the penitent requests” he testify.
Not even the death of the penitent can absolve the confessor from the obligation to maintain the secret, Msgr. Nykiel said.
She was LESS revered than John the Baptist, any of the apostles, any of the martyrs, and any of the other saints?
That’s your explanation for the absence of any relics or even claims of relics?
You’re serious?
It’s clear that your peculiar, backwoods religious ideology takes precedence over even the views of St. Matthew and St. Luke.
This from someone who ACCEPTS doctrine from absence of proof?
Kitty is happy!
Surely she left a shoe or SOMETHING behind!
I get HE was assumed as well!
What vague VIEWS do you have in mind?
Actually there are some (at least alleged) relics of St Joeseph. http://forallthesaints.info/relics_1.htm
If I may though, I think taking a step back in your conversation may be useful.
Are you (Elsie) saying that there is no evidence that Mary was venerated in the early church?
Feel free to reply with a joke (I kind of like some of your jokes) but if you’d like to discuss this issue seriously I think it may be helpful to examine that question above more.
The fact that both Matthew and Luke begin their gospels with an infancy narrative in which Mary is the primary actor. She is addressed by the angel Gabriel as “full of grace.” Read the Magnificat to get a taste of the Church’s belief about the importance of Mary. Elizabeth says: “Who am I, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?”
If Mary was a sinner, tell me where in the gospel are we told anything about her sinfulness, or how or when she repented of her sin.
Show me scripture that says Mary wasn’t a sinner!
The Bible doesn’t say “For all have sinned (except momma Mary) and fall short of the Glory of God” Romans 3:23 (the presumptive Catholic version.
It does say “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God!” Romans 3 :23 KJV (or just about any other version including Douay Reims) That includes Mary.
The biggest mistake I think people make about Mary is that they think Mary have been must be sinless or else somehow her sinfulness would rub off on Christ as he was in her womb waiting to be delivered. Christ himself put the lie to notions such as that when he said...”It is not what goes into a man but what comes out of him that corrupts him”. Mary was a sinner but she was a virgin who submitted in faith to God’s will. Her faith saved her as did the Christ that was birthed from her womb. In her salutation to Elizabeth...she refers to “the Lord my savior”. If she wasn’t a sinner, then what has God saved from, but from her sins.
bump
A lot of old testament prophets fell into disfavor with God after they had done their part in HIS plan.
I think you are trying to be supportively sarcastic?...(scratches head :} )
It was true, what I wrote. I read a lot about it from a Catholic book too. :p
Mary was saved by Jesus. She was preserved from Original Sin from the moment of her conception. She did not need to be a sinner in order to need a savior. Her sinlessness does not imply that she needed no savior. The opposite is true.
The Fathers of the Church teach that Mary’s sinlessness is evidenced in the fact that her body obeyed her will in conceiving the Son of God in her womb. She heard the word of God from the angel, and consented to conceive the Word in her womb. Being the New Eve, without sin, she enjoyed a freedom and a mind-body integrity lacking in those weakened by Original Sin.
There is no reason to suppose that, in his preaching about what corrupts a man (what comes from outside vs. what comes from within), Jesus intended to settle any question concerning the sinlessness of Mary. To exploit the words of Jesus in that way is to twist and misuse Scripture—in a manner that is all too common.
When St. Paul says that “all have sinned” he is referring to all who need to repent of sins. Why would he bother to carve out an exception for Mary if he was not discussing Mary and not addressing Mary?
Is there any evidence that Paul foresaw that this particular verse would be exploited 1500 years later to “prove” that Mary was a sinner?
What basis is there for holding that each individual verse of Scripture may be used to prove points that its author was not discussing, and can be leitimately used to prove points, without reference to its context, without reference to its author’s immediate purpose, and without reference to its audience?
Show me that from scripture that Mary was saved from sin from her conception....scripture and verse...I want to see it...not just some ancient beard scratching musings from some old church patriarch 200 years after Christianity got started!
Step back to #162.
As you can see; I did NOT say that.
Please reply to MY statements; not what Art wishes I had said.
some?
only SOME?!?!?!?
I have suffered more than a flesh wound at your hand...
The TIME I pour into each and every response; crafted to wittily to counter the absurdity of 'some' people's comments; is WAY more than the time I spend carefully building a theological strawman - using a bit of evidence from here, a snippet or two of Scripture from thither and yon: a letter or three from church fathers and an assumption or four from children in Portugal.
If Mary was NOT a sinner, tell me where in the Bible; that you Catholics compiled; is ANY evidence of that at ALL!
Oh; indeed!
It's true that your 'church' believes such a thing. It can be evidenced in most ALL of it's later writings!
Elizabeth says: “Who am I, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?”
Elsie says: “Who am I, that my Lord should DIE for me?”
Elizabeth says: “Who am I, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?”
Huh?
Are you saying that ELIZABETH is the CHURCH?
(Red herring alert!)
This is MY interstate ramp.
He should move to the other one!
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