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Vatican Diary / Priests against Celibacy. Austria's Rerun

The Chiesa
March 20, 2012

http://chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1350199?eng=y


The first wave of disobedience among the clergy was a century ago. Rome reacted with a crackdown, and it all finished with a little schism. Cardinal Brandmüller is proposing that the same thing be done today, against the new rebels

by ***

VATICAN CITY, March 20, 2012 – "How a schism was born": this is the title of an article that appeared recently in "L'Osservatore Romano" with the byline of the Bavarian cardinal Walter Brandmüller (in the photo). An article with an historical slant, but with explicit references to current events.

An article that from the very beginning recalls the anti-Roman movement "Los von Rom" that emerged in Austria between the 19th and 20th century, which "was able to drive about a hundred thousand Austrian Catholics to separate from the Church."

This movement – the cardinal continues, coming up to the present – "was revived following Vatican Council II." But not only that. "Similar tendencies seem to be reemerging from time to time in our days as well, in some of the appeals for disobedience toward the pope and the bishops.."

The cardinal is clearly referring to what is happening in Vienna and the surrounding area with the "Pfarrer Initiative" organized in 2006 by Monsignor Helmut Schüller – until 1999 the vicar general of Cardinal Christoph Schšnborn in the Austrian capital, and the former president of the national branch of Caritas – that has among its defining objectives the abolition of celibacy and the reintegration into the exercise of the priesthood of "married" and cohabiting priests.

This movement is supported by more than 400 priests and deacons, and has launched an open "Call for disobedience" toward Rome, intended to be expanded beyond the Austrian borders, creating an international network. It has already been joined by fringes of the clergy in Germany, France, Slovakia, the United States, Australia. Last October, Schüller himself went to Ireland to make converts.

The initiative is being followed in the Vatican with a good deal of apprehension, so much so that it was the topic of a private meeting last January 23 between representatives of the Austrian bishops and the leaders of the most important Vatican dicasteries. The Austrian attendees at the meeting, which took place in the building of the Holy Office, were Cardinal Schönborn, Salzburg archbishop Alois Kothgasser, the bishops of Graz and Sankt Polten, Egon Kapellari and Klaus Küng. While for the Vatican there were, among others, the cardinal prefects of the congregations for the doctrine of the faith, William J. Levada, for bishops, Marc Ouellet, and for the clergy, Mauro Piacenza.

Cardinal Schönborn, together with other bishops, has firmly distanced himself from the "Pfarrer Initiative," criticizing both the form and the contents of the appeal. So far, however, he has not brought any canonical actions against it.

But let's get back to the article by Cardinal Brandmüller.

It further analyzes the schism that came to a head in Bohemia after the first world war, with the protest movement "Jednota." Which also had as its war horse "the abolition of the obligation of celibacy." And had as its leader Bohumil Zahradnik, "a priest and novelist who since 1908 had been living in an illegitimate marital relationship."

The schism led to the proclamation of a "Czechoslovakian Church" on January 8, 1920. But what interests the cardinal more is the analysis of how the Holy See led by Benedict XV reacted to that rebellion of the Bohemian clergy.

The main cause was identified in the "insufficient formation of the clergy in the preceding decades, from both the theological and spiritual point of view," which led to "a crisis that was shaking the Catholic faith to its foundations."

This was followed by the refusal, on the part of Rome, to placate the rebel priests with concessions. The Holy Office hit them "immediately" with excommunication, obtaining the full support of the bishops. And Benedict XV dispelled any illusion about a relaxation of the "sacrosanct and most beneficial" law of celibacy.

So in the end, the schism involved only a small fraction of Catholic Bohemians. The author of the article concludes: "this approach of the Holy See, not determined by political and pragmatic reflections, but only by the truth of the faith," showed itself to be "the only correct one" to follow.

Here ends the reflection by Brandmüller, who in "L'Osservatore Romano" is presented simply as "cardinal deacon of San Giuliano dei Fiamminghi" but is much more. An academic, he was for almost thirty years a professor of medieval and modern Church history at the University of Augsburg, and from 1998 to 2009 presided over the pontifical committee for historical sciences, which he joined in 1981, called to replace Hubert Jedin, the great historian of the Council of Trent who passed away the previous year.

Born in 1929, Brandmüller has always been greatly respected by fellow professor and fellow Bavarian Joseph Ratzinger, who after becoming Benedict XVI kept him on as head of the committee until he turned 80, and wanted to honor him with the office of cardinal at the consistory of November 20, 2010.

A great expert on the history of the councils, Brandmüller is not above academic controversy, as when with an article that appeared on July 13, 2007 in both "L'Osservatore Romano" and the newspaper of the Italian episcopal conference, "Avvenire," he made a radical critique of the work "Conciliorum Oecumenicorum Generaliumque Decreta" produced by the historiographical school of Bologna.

Nor is he above talking about today by referring to similarities with the past. As in the article in the Vatican newspaper of March 11, 2012, which is reproduced in its entirety below.

But as for the notion that in this case history can truly become "magistra vitae," and that Benedict XVI would like to repeat today – with regard to the "Pfarrer Initiative" and other movements of rebel priests – the steps taken by Benedict XVI almost a century ago, that is another story.




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