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The right to privacy may sometimes be exaggerated, and it can certainly be abused. But that doesnt mean it is not real. Freedom from the constant, prying eyes of other people is essential to the development and maintenance of a sense of selfhood. If we do not recognize the claim other people have to be free of our scrutiny, then we treat them as objects for study, manipulation, and destructionnot as human beings equal in dignity to ourselves.

The sting distorts the relationship between the Catholics who fund and run it and the priests who fall within its ambitwhich was potentially all priests. The moral danger to the self-appointed members of the purity committee is substantial. How does it affect their own relationship to the Church to see its priests as guilty of sexual sin until proven innocent? How does it affect their relationship with Christ to see themselves not as fellow sinners in need of redemption (even if ones own sins are of a different sort), but as self-appointed police officers and judges?

There is also a moral danger to the priests, and to those who might wish to become priests. Will the fact that they live their lives in a context of pervasive suspicion and scrutiny, including electronic scrutiny, crush their spirits and erode their freedom in Christ? How will such priests interact with parishioners? Will they see them as fellow sinners in need of redemption, or as potential spies? How will they structure their lives? Will this lead them to avoid some sins (especially sexual ones) more than others (say, gluttony and waste)? Will an anxious obsession with not being suspected of committing sexual sin make them more likely to ignore sins of omission in their lives, including the duty to reach out to those at the margins?

The bishops need to act decisively. If they do not, their priests will become weapons and targets in the competing Panopticons of the culture wars. After all, if they put their minds to it, progressives can track and embarrass priests as easily as conservatives.

The bishops first task is to distinguish morally legitimate from morally illegitimate ways of obtaining compromising information. Stumbling upon a priest on Grindr is different from de-anonymizing data. Their second task will be deciding how to handle illegitimately obtained information, Here, in my view, is where the Church might helpfully borrow from the state. The Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures. It recognizes that unreasonable searches affect everyonenot just the guilty. But without enforcement, such a prohibition is no more than a paper tiger. Consequently, the provision is interpreted as preventing the government from introducing evidence obtained directly or indirectly from such a search into a criminal trial. The government is thereby dis-incentivized from conducting searches without a warrant, except in certain extreme circumstances. The bishops should adopt similar disincentives for lay sleuths. They should strongly condemn any violation of priestly privacy, and they should declare that they will not allow priests whose activities were discovered in an unethical manner to be targeted or punished. The only exception, in my view, should be activities involving minors.

Some might say that this approach goes too easy on priests who break their promises of celibacy. I disagreejust as I disagree with those who say the Fourth Amendment goes too easy on those who commit crimes. The point of the Fourth Amendment is not to say that committing crimes is okay. It is to say that in using its considerable power to chase criminals, the government must observe reasonable limits. If that is what members of a state bound together by earthy ties owe one another, consider how much stronger the obligations are among members of the body of Christ.

The rest is here:
Do Priests Have a Right to Privacy? - Commonweal