19.2-271.3 - Communications between ministers of religion and persons they counsel or advise. - Virginia Statutes

§ 19.2-271.3. Communications between ministers of religion and persons theycounsel or advise.

No regular minister, priest, rabbi or accredited practitioner over the age ofeighteen years, of any religious organization or denomination usuallyreferred to as a church, shall be required in giving testimony as a witnessin any criminal action to disclose any information communicated to him by theaccused in a confidential manner, properly entrusted to him in hisprofessional capacity and necessary to enable him to discharge the functionsof his office according to the usual course of his practice or discipline,where such person so communicating such information about himself or anotheris seeking spiritual counsel and advice relative to and growing out of theinformation so imparted.

(1985, c. 570.)