ACI Prensa Staff, Nov 16, 2023 / 18:50 pm
A group of Catholic leaders from Costa Rica — including Daniel Blanco, auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of San José — recently participated in a webinar titled “Sacramental Secret: A canonical, legal, and preventive approach” in order to lay out the position of the Church regarding a bill that seeks to eliminate the seal of confession.
On Sept. 11, lawmaker Antonio Ortega of the Frente Amplio (Broad Front) political party, supported by legislators from several parties, introduced a bill that by amending a series of articles of the Criminal Procedure Code and the Civil Code would allow lifting the seal of confession when sexual crimes against minors are involved.
In response, the Costa Rican Bishops’ Conference expressed its opposition to the bill, pointing out that according to canon 983 of the Code of Canon Law, the sacramental seal “is inviolable,” which prevents the confessor from revealing the penitent’s confession.
In the webinar organized by the Catholic University of Costa Rica on Oct. 31, Blanco, a specialist in canon law, referred to a document published by the apostolic penitentiary in 2019 on the importance of the inviolability of the sacramental seal.