CNA Staff, Dec 15, 2020 / 18:01 pm
The Supreme Court of India agreed Monday to consider a petition that the requirement of annual confession in the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church violates its members' privacy rights.
Three members of the Church, which is part of Oriental Orthodoxy, have petitioned the court after some of the Church's priests allegedly used information learned in the confessional for blackmailing and both sexual and monetary exploitation.
India's Supreme Court agreed to hear the case Dec. 14.
The petitioners called the Church's requirement of confession a "serious intrusion into the privacy of a person."
The Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church codified its constitution in 1934. That constitution requires that all Church members over 21 years go to Confession annually. It also requires that a confession register be kept in each parish.