https://www.policyforum.net/religious-freedom-confessional-royal-commission/ The APPS Policy Forum a public policy website devoted to Asia and the Pacific. Thu, 28 Sep 2017 22:32:30 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.1.7 https://www.policyforum.net/religious-freedom-confessional-royal-commission/#comment-9916 Thu, 28 Sep 2017 22:32:30 +0000 https://www.policyforum.net/?p=20335#comment-9916 I think any violent crime against anyone should be disclosed, whether against children or adults. Sexual or not.

]]> https://www.policyforum.net/religious-freedom-confessional-royal-commission/#comment-9913 Thu, 28 Sep 2017 12:37:01 +0000 https://www.policyforum.net/?p=20335#comment-9913 The suggestion is to ‘make disclosure of criminal offences to authorities one of the conditions of absolution, part of “penance”’. I think this is bad idea as it leaves disclosure to the discretion of the perpetrator, leaving vulnerable and abused children at risk. The author already recognized that: “Even the most ardent supporters of religious freedom acknowledge religious freedom has limits. We must, for example, restrict religious rites which involve ritualistic human sacrifice.” Why give religious institutions a free pass on this one when the young and vulnerable are at risk and the Catholic Church has an utterly deplorable history of allowing this abuse?

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