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Okay. I definitely get where everyone is coming from here. We all want to protect kids. I'm not sure this ruling is in the wrong though.

Here's why. We demonize pedophilia to the point that people would kill someone that is attracted to children. I'm making a specific point here to NOT include child molesters. That's a separate but very related issue. If we took the time to address the mental health issues that caused them to be attracted to children in the first place (eg, molested as children themselves, some other issue that therapy could address, etc), maybe we could stop them from going so far with their problem and actually save kids before they were abused.

Since they really don't have anyone to talk to ever, maybe a priest could curb their behavior and act as a counselor to stop further abuse of children. If left unaddressed, maybe the molester would continue with many more victims, and the priest could stop them at 1. But if they no longer felt they could talk to a priest, then they continue.

Basically, as a country we should be doing MUCH better to stop pedophiles from dealing with their issues alone and help prevent them from actually molesting children. Failing that (since we are failing that), why are we trying to take away the next level of therapy for them? It makes no sense to continue to push them into a lonely corner and expect them to do differently. If the priests' silence allows them to keep the molester from touching more kids, that's a much better outcome overall.

The fact they would protect abusers just to comply with their faith speaks volumes about their priorities. I mean it's no surprise when they already protect the predators within their ranks, so why not do the same with their followers?

Luigi Mangione’s religion requires that he sacrifice health care executives, but I don’t see any judges standing up for him.

Ig sexually abusing kids falls under religious freedoms now. What a shithole country

I mean, so if my religion says I can diddle kids and kill republicans, is that legal now?

It seems that protecting the children only works to weaken privacy and individual rights, not to actually protect children.

The legislation “places them in the position of either complying with the requirements of their faith or violating the law. The consequences for violating the law are serious and, as Plaintiffs assert, the implications of violating the Sacramental Seal are more serious still,” he wrote.

Attorney General Nick Brown’s office emphasized that the ruling only applies to “the Sacrament of Confession” and that, if clergy learn about abuse in any other setting, the injunction does not change that they will be mandated reporters. Brown did not provide any further comment.

Batshit insane first paragraph. The second is at least some small positive. I don't know that this being overturned actually makes any meaningful difference in practice though though- if people can't say they abused a child in confessional they won't. I guess you might catch some people in the transmission, who didn't learn about the change? That would be a positive. But I think long term people just wouldn't confess to sexual abuses in the confessional anymore

So they just need to classify Epstein as a religious leader?

A bit of a clickbait title (but only a bit) - the WA law moved to make priests required reporters, professions who are legally required by law to report child abuse. The injunction sought to exempt catholic priests from being required to report child abuse which was reported to them under the 'seal of the confessional' (the special super secret group chat that only exists between you, your priest and god) and after this injunction they are still required reporters in all other instances.

This is... at least a consistent ruling? For example religious leaders can't be held as accomplices if they don't report crimes that were told to them in a ritual setting (oversimplification) or be held liable if they don't forewarn about someone planning suicide or some other crime and then said person goes thru with it. Predictably canon law is rife with examples of breaking the seal of the confession to prevent a suicide, of course, but lets just ignore that.

The rationalization for this is twofold: First freedom of religion from civil regulation. Second and more credibly that it would be allowing unfair weight into criminal proceedings because of the perceived sanctity of the confession and the upstanding character of priests (lol). The argument goes that testimony brought of things revealed in confession is by it's nature hersay, but hersay that would be presented as being devout reporting of an unimpeachable confession, and that could unduly sway juries and in general get really messy so the law just doesn't want to deal with it.

I strongly disagree with this ruling, the catholics get enough special treatment what with not being prosecuted for raping all those children, that's just the background to the arguments being made about it.