Defeat of California’s attempt to break seal of confession a victory for religious liberty.

Kathleen Domingo is Senior Director for the Office of Life, Justice and Peace and Director of Government Relations for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. She helped to organize the opposition to a California bill that would have required priests to break the sacramental seal of confession in certain cases.

“SB 360, authored by Senator Jerry Hill, sought to strengthen reporting requirements for child abuse, a goal we share. However, to achieve that goal, it removed the privacy protection for the sacrament of confession in instances of child abuse. Even after the bill was amended, priests and lay people, like me, who work at the same location as priests, would be denied the privacy protection in the sacrament” said  Kathleen Domingo

“I want to practice my religion the way that I want to, and I want you to be able to do the same.”

After months of legislative meetings and grassroots organizing of Catholics throughout California, we prepared a show of force for the Assembly Public Safety Committee hearing, that would have been held on July 9. We delivered 140,000 signed letters to Assembly members and sent close to 17,000 emails from parishioners in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles alone.”