Church in the World

Bishop sharply criticised over axing of diocesan council

Europe

THE BISHOP of Regensburg?s decision to abolish the diocesan council in his diocese has been deplored by a number of German bishops and sharply criticised by lay Catholics in Germany.

On 16 November Bishop Gerhard Ludwig M?ller announced that Regensburg?s diocesan council would be disbanded tomorrow, as it had ?a touch of the 1960s and 70s? and was no longer ?up to date?. The Church was not a democracy, the bishop emphasised, and could not be compared to a political organisation. ?In the Church, appointment and election are not in contrast to one another,? he said.

Bishop M?ller submitted his plans to the Vatican?s Congregation for the Clergy last April and in August, Cardinal Dar?o Castrill?n Hoyos, the congregation?s prefect, assured him that they were in complete accordance with canon law. He said the cardinal had also informed him that the special norms that applied to German diocesan councils deviated from universal church practice and that the Congregation for the Clergy had been trying to get them amended since 1983 when the new code of canon law had been published.

The president of the German bishops? conference, Archbishop of Mainz, deplored Bishop M?ller?s decision saying it was a ?genuine step backwards?.

Cardinal Karl Lehmann said on Monday that he did not think it a good thing if all appointments in a diocese were made by the bishop alone and no one ?from below? was elected. He added that the ?unrest in Regensburg is meanwhile spilling over into the other German dioceses. It would be a great pity if we were to drift apart too greatly.?

Cardinal Friedrich Wetter, Archbishop of Munich and president of the Bavarian bishops? conference, deplored the fact that Bishop M?ller had gone ahead with his plans alone, without informing his fellow bishops at the Bavarian bishops? conference meeting held just a week previously.

Hans Joachim Meyer, president of the Central Committee of German Catholics, Zentralkomitee deutscher Katholiken (ZdK) ? a powerful lay body consisting of 270 predominantly voluntary members representing Germany?s 28 million lay Catholics ? spoke of an ?open violation? of church law which was without precedent in Germany. The way in which Bishop M?ller had proceeded ?without plausible reasons or consulting any of the people concerned? was ?unacceptable?, Mr Meyer said.

Bishop M?ller?s announcement prompted the ZdK to ask a number of prominent Catholics to draw up a memorandum on the theological and legal foundations of lay councils in German dioceses. In the introduction to the five-page memorandum published earlier this month, the authors, including the prominent theologians Professors Peter H?hnermann and Peter Neuner, recalled that 40 years after the Second Vatican Council, lay councils are still ?a significant source of spiritual encouragement? for many German Catholics.

At their general assembly in Bonn on 18 November, the ZdK announced that Bishop M?ller had ?greatly harmed? the Catholic Church as a whole. His decision reflected an ?authoritarian vision of the Church, a paternalistic and autocratic concept of the bishop?s office and a deep mistrust of the Lay Apostolate?, they said.
Christa Pongratz-Lippitt, Vienna