What do I do with knowledge of a friend's child's sin?

[StevenFrancis]

I can’t find the answer to this in Scripture or the Catechism of the Catholic Church. I’m praying on it, and if not satisfied here, I’m going to talk to my priest. I probably will anyway, but in the meantime, my wife has a friend. It’s not a close friend, but a fellow parishoner in our church. Her friend’s daughter talked to our daughter the other day and confided in her that she and her boyfriend have been intimate several times and plan on being so again on a regular basis. She is about 14 and so is the boy. They are both Catholic and attend church on Sundays. Anyway, she told our daughter; our daughter, who does not keep moral secrets from us, told us.

Now, we know we must tell the mom. I can glean that much from the CCC and prayer. I’m just not clear on whether we talk directly to the mom, or talk to the girl and give her some sort of small grace period of time to tell her mom on her own, or whether our daughter should tell this girl to tell her mom, or that she or her parents (my wife and I) will. Or if my wife, daughter, and I should all go see the priest and let him deal with it. Looking for suggestions.

 

[Michelle_Arnold]

I agree with you that the girl’s mother should be told of her daughter’s activities. But the title of your question indicates that you believe this is a matter of reporting sin. What the girl and her boyfriend are doing is indeed grave matter, but you should not be voicing to the girl’s mother that the girl is “sinning.” To do so could unnecessarily inflame the discussion and could cause the mother to become defensive rather than concerned. All that your wife needs to do is to report that the girl said to your daughter that she and her boyfriend have been engaging in sexual relations and plan to continue doing so. It is up to the mother to help her daughter understand the gravity of the actions and the need to reconcile with God and the Church.

As for how to tell the mother, I recommend that your wife – not you, since this concerns someone who is primarily her friend, not yours – talk to the mother privately, and suggest to her that, if possible, the mother not let on to her daughter how she found out about the girl’s behavior. Not only will this protect your daughter from being thought of as a “snitch” by her friend (and any other peers to whom your daughter’s friend might complain), but it will also be to the mother’s benefit that her daughter not know how she found out. A child who doesn’t know her parent’s sources of information cannot cut off the flow of information to those sources and thereby hinder her parent’s ability to know what’s going on in the child’s life.