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Mark Scheiderer
GTW -
What court case are you talking about?
Mark
Mark:
The Church of Scientology is being sued by a parishoner for being abused while a part of the Sea Org. A side court case has resulted from this because they are wanting to bring confessional folders of people from CoS into the case. The court is being asked to rule on the "Priest/Penitant" Law that currently exists in California.
Many cults (Scientology, Lordship Salvation, Catholocism, etc.) have confession sessions where a parishoner must confess their sins to a church official. Some cults keep a record of everything that is said by the parishoner during the confessional, and some have accused cults of using these items later to retaliate against the person if they ever decide to leave the cult or tell anything that they experienced.
What happened to me in Lordship Salvation was very similar. I signed waivers (some were pretty lengthy contracts) not realizing what all I was signing. I do know the suicide/injury waiver was in there, but I'm not sure if Nouthetic Counselors are able to share the confessional information they collect during confession sessions. Usually a so-called independent "3rd party" is present during the session, notes are taken, and the two people badger a confession out of you for about an hour. That's how it was done to me anyway, and was part of the reason I had to undergo psychotherapy after leaving GCC.
During my time there it was normal for them to share things with other members, student life division, as well as church officials. It is part of the reason I stayed silent about what I experienced there, because I was threatened that they would share details about me (some of which they stretched the facts quite a bit) if I did not keep quiet.
However the courts rule in this "priest/penitent" priviledge case, even though it is resulting from the Scientology case, I believe it will still affect all other cults that use confessionals. If it can be proven that a priviledge exist and neither party can share information, or if only the parishoner can share info, we may see an outpouring of people coming forward with information about being abused while inside a cult, or if they rule neither party can share info, we may see very little negative info about cults in the future.
Either way, it will be interesting to see, and I hope it prompts more people hurt by any cult to come forward without fear. The link to the article about the court case on Tony Ortega's website can be found in my post toward the bottom of page 26 of this thread.