The Time has Come to Ban Reconciliation Rooms

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This is great. This is totally how I see the world especially the streets at night.
 
phil19034 said:
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No one said you can’t do face to face. No one said you can’t sit in a chair and look the priest in the face.

What was said is “no more confessional rooms” where you and the priest are in the same room and use the same closed door.

The church in the United States does not allow priests to be alone with Children anymore. So technically, a confessional room with a closed door violates church rules in the US.
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That is a patently FALSE statement. The Church of United States has not issued any such ban.

Here’s a recent (2016) article about the Bishop of Montreal (in Canada) issuing such a ban (that you stated that the U.S. Church already has).

Please note what is stated in this 2016 article:
Catholic priests in Montreal will be banned from being alone with children to provide a “safety net” against allegations of abuse.

Archbishop Christian Lepine has issued a decree to implement the policy, which also covers lay workers and volunteers.
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The new policy is thought to be unprecedented in the Catholic church, although the Anglican church in Australia has had similar guidelines in place since 2004, said Andrew Chesnut, professor of religious studies at Virginia Commonwealth University.
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www.theguardian.com

Catholic priests in Montreal banned from being alone with children

New policy, which includes church workers and volunteers, intended as ‘safety net’ against allegations of sex abuse, but critics say move is ‘too little, too late’
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com

Again, this is about a new (2016) ban in the Archdiocese of Montreal.

Priests in the United States are still allowed (thanks be to God) to hear confessions from children alone in a confessional. There’s simply no such ban currently prohibiting this in the United States Catholic Church.
 
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PeterT said:
Priests in the United States are still allowed (thanks be to God) to hear confessions from children alone in a confessional. There’s simply no such ban currently prohibiting this in the United States Catholic Church.
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I NEVER said the Priests in the United States are not allowed to hear confessions from children alone in a confessional. And that was not what I meant to imply.

When I took the Church’s youth protection training program, they explicitly tell you that no one is to be alone with a child - one on one - behind closed doors or in a secluded area.

I said, the the dioceses in the United States have a rule that prohibits any child and adult from being alone in the same room without the door open and not being secluded (confession is currently excluded from that rule).

Because of our reconciliation rooms, confession would always break the general rule of not being alone one-on-one with children.

These new hybrid confessionals which are big enough for a chair, kneeler, air, light, wheelchair, etc with a sliding door to open for face to face confessions allow a parish to implement the concept of never being alone with anyone (child or adult) 100%.

God bless
 
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I go to confession at two different churches. Both have wooden clad glass doors. I never gave it any thought, but I throw it out now as a bone.

To the subject now. I don’t think alternate confessional arrangements would do much if anything to deter a predator. There might be, somewhere, a confessional design that offers a predator the type of convenience and secrecy he seeks, but from what I have seen from my travels out of town, most confessionals are not suited for such attacks.

I think this is just a “brainstorming” attempt to help in a horrible situation.
 
i prefer anonymous; but i’ve become so “used” to face-to-face confession over the years

Father Meneses said, in his EWTN radio broadcast just THIS WEEK, that less than 2% of catholics go confession AT ALL, much less regularly

face-to-face confession may be a part of the reason why; something is definitely wrong with this picture…
 
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Looks like the glass is frosted so people cannot actually see in.
 
I would rather go to confession out in the open at the altar rail rather than go into a confessional with windows. That just seems weird.
 
2towers said:
I go to confession at two different churches. Both have wooden clad glass doors. I never gave it any thought, but I throw it out now as a bone.

To the subject now. I don’t think alternate confessional arrangements would do much if anything to deter a predator. There might be, somewhere, a confessional design that offers a predator the type of convenience and secrecy he seeks, but from what I have seen from my travels out of town, most confessionals are not suited for such attacks.

I think this is just a “brainstorming” attempt to help in a horrible situation.
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True, but I think the alternative confessional arrangement does a lot to protect the priest from false accusations, esp ones where someone said “Father X did this to me in confession.” Since Father will not be able to defend himself during confession, such an alternative arrangement could be used to help debunk false accusations.
 
Oh well, mine has an altar rail. If the line for the confessional gets too long, sometimes a second priest will come out and hear confessions at the altar rail. But it can be done with or without an altar rail. The priest puts a chair near the altar rail or non-altar rail and the penitent kneels on the top step. Or it can be done in a pew.
 
phil19034 said:
Oh my goodness… the argument is NOT centered around all abuse takes place in reconciliation rooms.
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I was referring to the link in the original post. It seemed to me that the link was focused on abuse in reconciliation rooms. Even with doors closed it would not seem likely to me if there were people waiting outside for their turn. I don’t know if it does occur there or not. That is why I asked if there were any stats on it.
 
I’m not sure I understand what you mean here. How does it help to perpetuate myths about Confession and God’s mercy?

In what way? I just don’t follow you here.
 
For someone like myself, who has only ever confessed face-to-face because there’s no alternative where I live, your post strengthens me in the conviction that face-to-face is the right way to do it.

“Priests are ministers of the Lord, not emotional counsellors.” Exactly right. Your melodramatic rhetoric about “kneeling in awe of the Lord” with images and suitable theatrical props describes confession as an emotional experience, not as a sacrament. The conclusion I draw from your post #130 is that face-to-face is sacramental, whereas kneeling in a confessional is theatrical.
 
BartholomewB said:
For someone like myself, who has only ever confessed face-to-face because there’s no alternative where I live, your post strengthens me in the conviction that face-to-face is the right way to do it.

“Priests are ministers of the Lord, not emotional counsellors.” Exactly right. Your melodramatic rhetoric about “kneeling in awe of the Lord” with images and suitable theatrical props describes confession as an emotional experience, not as a sacrament. The conclusion I draw from your post #130 is that face-to-face is sacramental, whereas kneeling in a confessional is theatrical.
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I agree. There definitely seems to be too much fixation on aesthetics/posture and not enough on the sacrament.

This is not to say that aesthetics are totally unimportant, but taking things to extremes is rarely beneficial. It’s important to remember aesthetics and posture belong to the laws of men and should not be placed on equal footing with the commands of God.
 
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I personally prefer the old confessionals but also don’t want to see reconciliation rooms banned.
 
Centuries of Church tradition does not support refusing the participate in the sacraments because we don’t like the look of the building. Extremes are rarely beneficial.
 
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