National Catholic Register News
At a press conference Thursday, Bishop Bätzing said that abuse victims should receive compensation in recognition of their suffering “without great bureaucratic effort."
The 57-page text advocated “reciprocal Eucharistic hospitality” between Catholics and Protestants, based on previous ecumenical agreements on the Eucharist and ministry.
Father Langendörfer, who has held the position since 1996, indicated on Wednesday that he had accepted his re-election on a temporary basis, fueling speculation that the bishops had failed to agree on a suitable candidate to replace him.
As secretary of the German bishops’ conference, the Jesuit priest has shaped the direction of the German Church for the past quarter century and has been a leading figure behind its controversial current ‘synodal path.’
The proposal was voted down in an August meeting of the executive committee of the German Episcopal Conference.
Jesuit Father Hans Langendörfer speaks to the Register about the Church tax, the German bishops’ controversial guidelines on Amoris Laetitia, and the general secularization of the German Church.
Other bishops disagree. Cardinal Gerhard Müller stresses that Amoris Laetitia ‘be interpreted in light of whole doctrine of the Church.’
NEWS ANALYSIS: Bishop Stefan Oster of Passau called the appeal from the Central Committee of the German Catholics ‘incomprehensible.’
Automatic dismissal of those in such circumstance is now ‘out of the question,’ according to the president of the Central Committee of German Catholics.
The Vatican’s prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith reminded his fellow countryman that ‘the president of an episcopal conference is nothing more than a technical moderator, and he does not have any particular magisterial authority.’
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