Audio recordings of the meetings over the next four months, obtained by The Associated Press, show how [Utah attorney and head of the church’s Risk Management Division] Rytting, despite expressing concern for what he called John [Goodrich]’s “significant sexual transgression,” would employ the risk management playbook that has helped the church keep child sexual abuse cases secret. In particular, the church would discourage [Bishop Michael] Miller from testifying, citing a law that exempts clergy from having to divulge information about child sex abuse that is gleaned in a confession. Without Miller’s testimony, prosecutors dropped the charges, telling Lorraine that her impending divorce and the years that had passed since Chelsea {Goodrich}'s alleged abuse might prejudice jurors.
So let’s say confession (which is not in the Christian bible in any way, shape, or form) didn’t exist previously and we were coming up with it now. You and I had decided that this was an important right for religious people. We tell the state that we no longer want our members to be bound by mandatory reporting laws because God forgives sinners and confessing your crimes to a religious member isn’t enabling crime anyway.
And at some point, someone would ask if we also meant no mandatory reporting for child sex abuse crimes and we’d be like hell yea man. This is our religious and this is religious freedom and it’s important.
And then we would be laughed out of the room and every other room on this planet. We would be personas non-grata, because seriously who the hell would argue for something like that?
Traditionalism doesn’t do anything for me, and the state having a muscular, aggressive response to mandatory reporting laws (of which I am also bound as a sports coach for middle schoolers) is A-OK with me.