Moral Theology / A Complete Course Based on St. Thomas Aquinas and the Best Modern Authorities

by John A. McHugh; Charles J. Callan

(c) The entrusted secret obliges _per se_ under grave sin; for there is a duty of commutative and of legal justice to keep it, on account of the rights of contract and of the common good that are involved. The violator of an entrusted secret injures private good by disregard for contract, and he injures public good by weakening confidence in officials or professional persons to whom others must go for advice or assistance. Violation of a committed secret may be only a venial sin on account of the lightness of the matter. Thus, some think it is not a serious injustice to reveal a secret to one very discreet person, if the person whose secret is made known is not very much opposed to this and no other damage will result (see 2065).

2415. Comparison of Secrets as Regards Binding Force.—(a) The promised secret obliges less than the natural or the entrusted, as was said in the previous paragraph. (b) The natural secret obliges less _per se_ than the entrusted secret, for the safeguarding of the latter is agreed to in an onerous contract, while no engagement is made to keep the former. (c) Some entrusted secrets are more sacred than others. Thus, a secret confided from necessity is more binding than one confided without necessity; a secret one has sworn to keep is more obligatory than a secret one has given one’s word of honor to keep; a professional secret is more imperious than a private secret; a state secret is far more important than any secret of private individuals. The most inviolable of all secrets is that of the confessional, because its violation is always a sacrilege.

2416. Cases Wherein It Is Not Necessary to Keep a Secret.—(a) If there has been no obligation from the time the secret was learned, it is not necessary to keep it. Thus, if a merely promised secret was accepted under compulsion and revelation will be advantageous and not harmful, it does not seem necessary to keep the secret.

(b) If the obligation of the secret has ceased, it is not necessary to be silent. Examples are cases in which secrecy was promised only for a certain space of time, or in which a matter formerly secret has become public, or in which the owner of the secret wishes it to be divulged, or in which he has not kept faith with the possessor of the secret, provided of course that in these cases no injury or unnecessary harm is done by making known the secret. Similarly, if the recipient of the secret cannot keep it without grave harm (e.g., death) to himself, he is not bound by it, unless charity (see 1165, 1236) or justice calls for the contrary. Commutative justice would demand silence (though many make exception for a most grave reason, regarding a promise to the contrary as prodigal) if there had been an express contract to guard the secret at all risks; legal justice would demand it, if the safety of the republic were involved.

2417. Cases Wherein It Is Not Lawful to Keep a Secret.—(a) If a secret cannot be kept without greater harm to the common good, it may not be kept, for legal justice requires that private good be subordinated to public safety. The violation of secrets is a harm to the public good and a greater harm than ordinary evils against the community (such as the escape of a guilty person); but it is a less harm than serious evils against the people (such as menace to public health, sedition, or treason). The possessor of a natural or promised secret must make it known at the command of lawful authority, as in court; but the superior has no right to question about entrusted secrets of a necessary kind, and this is usually recognized by positive law in the protection extended to professional communications.

(b) If a secret cannot be kept without greater harm to the private good of the owner of the secret, distinction is made between a non-entrusted and an entrusted secret. In the former case the secret may not be kept, for charity bids one to help a neighbor escape a greater evil, and the owner of the secret would be unreasonable if he were opposed to its revelation (see 501 sqq.). In the latter case, some are of the opinion that the secret should be kept, if it is professional (since the public good then takes precedence over the private good of the owner of the secret), but this is denied by others. Example: Titus knows that Balbus is about to marry with a secret impediment that will nullify the marriage, but he cannot persuade Balbus to disclose this impediment to the pastor.

(c) If a secret cannot be kept without greater harm to the private good of a third party (i.e., one other than the owner of the secret), distinction is made between cases, according as injury is or is not done by the owner of the secret to the third party. If no injury is done the third party, the secret should be kept (e.g., if one knows in confidence that Sempronius has made an invention which will supersede an invention made by Claudius, one is not at liberty to make this known to the latter, for Sempronius has done no injury to Claudius). If, however, injury is done the third party by the owner of the secret when the secret is kept, one should not keep the secret; for charity requires that one help an innocent person to escape from harm, even if this has to be done at the expense of harm to the guilty cause of the harm. Examples: If one knows as a secret that A, B and C have conspired to murder D tomorrow night, and one cannot otherwise prevent the murder, one should if possible break the secret, at least by sending warning to D that his life is in danger tomorrow night. If a doctor knows that a man who is about to contract marriage is syphilitic and pretends that he is sound, and if the doctor cannot persuade this man to make the facts known to the intended wife, the doctor himself should give notice to the woman, according to some authorities, unless the laws of the country forbid such use of professional knowledge.

2418. What should the possessor of an entrusted secret do, if from the secret he knows that the one who entrusted it is guilty of a crime for which an innocent third person is about to be convicted and sentenced?

(a) If the guilty party is responsible for the plight of the innocent party (e.g., because he falsely accused him or threw suspicion on him), natural law would require the possessor of the secret to make known the true state of affairs; for the guilty party is then the unjust cause of damage and is bound to accuse himself (see 1763). Revelation of the true culprit would not be necessary, however, if there was some other way of saving the innocent person.

(b) If the guilty person is not responsible for the difficulty in which the innocent person finds himself, not having used any means to bring the latter into suspicion, some believe that the secret should be kept, since the guilty person has then the right to keep his secret and therefore has also the right that his confidants keep it (see 1968). But others, while granting that the guilty person is not obliged to accuse himself, deny that the confidant is not obliged to accuse him; for the right of the guilty that his secret be kept and the right of the innocent that he be not deprived of life or liberty are in conflict and unequal, and he who prefers the former right does an injury to the innocent person (see 288).