A federal judge sided with Catholic priests, blocking a Washington law that targeted the confidentiality of confession.

In Etienne v. Ferguson, the Archdiocese of Seattle and the dioceses of Spokane and Yakima argued that the new law violated ...

One supporter of the law, a member of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, or SNAP, called the court decision "a ...

Confession, the Catholic and Orthodox practice of listing one’s sins in the presence of a priest who then offers absolution and is sworn to secrecy under pain of eternal damnation, has long been a ...

The laws of the Catholic Church require priests to maintain the seal of confession or face excommunication. Washington’s law ...

The Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against the state of Washington over its recent law mandating that priests must violate the seal of confession if child abuse is learned about during the ...

The Confraternity of Catholic Clergy, representing over 500 Roman Catholic priests and deacons from the U.S., Australia, and the United Kingdom, has issued a statement defending the inviolability of ...

(The Conversation) — The Catholic Church treats information shared during confession as absolutely confidential – but that requirement can create legal dilemmas. (The Conversation) — The 1953 Alfred ...

Catholic bishops in Washington state are rejecting a new law that requires clergy to report child sexual abuse revealed during the sacrament of confession—setting up a constitutional clash between ...

The 1953 Alfred Hitchcock film “I Confess,” based on an earlier play, features a priest suspected of murder. He’s innocent, and has even heard the murderer’s confession – but cannot clear his own name ...