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 Casuistry and Clericalism: A Reply to A Defense of Casuistry    Casuistry doesn’t have to be rigid. By Cathleen Kaveny, Commonweal January 24, 2023 The objection to casuistry by Pope Francis is about much more than rigidity, it is about the moral elitism that underlies both casuistry and its frequent companion, clericalism.  Caveny rightly locates the elaborate development of casuistry to the sacramental practice of confession. Unfortunately, she glosses over the huge change in the practice of confession from that of public penance and reconciliation for serious sinners in the first millennium to private confession of all sins for all Catholics in the second millennium. Let us take a close look at the two paragraphs of Canon 21 of the Forth Lateran Council (1215) which she mentions briefly.   The first paragraph was obviously intended to universalize and regularize the practice of private confession which had developed in the preceding centuries. All ...