Title: Pontifical Secret
The pontifical secret or pontifical secrecy or papal secrecy is the code of confidentiality that, in accordance with the canon law of the Catholic Church as modified in 1983, applies in matters that require greater than ordinary confidentiality:[1]
Business of the Roman Curia at the service of the universal Church is officially covered by ordinary secrecy, the moral obligation of which is to be gauged in accordance with the instructions given by a superior or the nature and importance of the question. But some matters of major importance require a particular secrecy, called “pontifical secrecy”, and must be observed as a grave obligation.
— Instruction Secreta continereof February 1974, introduction[a]
Pontifical secrecy is the subject of the instruction Secreta continere of 4 February 1974 issued by the Secretariat of State. The text is published in Acta Apostolicae Sedis, 1974, pages 89–92.[2]
Its applicability in cases of accusations and trials involving abuse of minors or vulnerable personsand in cases of possession of child pornography by clerics was removed on 17 December 2019.[3][4] Its use in such cases had been condemned by German Cardinal Reinhard Marx at the Meeting on the Protection of Minors in the Church held in the Vatican from 21 to 24 February 2019.