Novus ordo heresy heats up in Austria

[Mornac]

• Tweet

Austrian priests in revolt over laws on celibacy and Mass

PATSY McGARRY, Religious Affairs Correspondent

Wed, Aug 31, 2011

AN ESTIMATED 400 Austrian Catholic priests, or almost 10 per cent of the 4,200 in the country, are reported to support an “Appeal to Disobedience” which calls for significant reform of guidelines on celibacy, marriage and other areas of church authority.

The initiative was launched on Trinity Sunday, June 19th, and priests behind it said that “Roman refusal to take up long-needed reforms and the inaction of the bishops not only permits but demands that we follow our conscience and act independently”.

On their website www.pfarrer-initiative.at, they called for the abolition of celibacy; for married clergy to be allowed; for shared Communion with remarried people and other Christians. They have also called for reform of the liturgy and introduction of the term “Priestless Eucharistic Celebration” for a liturgy of the Word with distribution of Communion.

“This is how the Sunday Mass obligation is fulfilled when priests are in short supply,” they said.

The initiative is led by Archbishop of Vienna Cardinal Christoph Schönborn’s former vicar general, Msgr Helmut Schüller.

The cardinal has expressed shock at the initiative and reminded priests that they had freely promised obedience to their bishop at ordination.

He said, “the one who gives up the principle of obedience dissolves unity”, but that he would meet with the priest leaders of the appeal to point out its “inconsistencies,” such as “priestless Eucharist”.

The meeting has yet to take place.

He also suggested that “those who truly in conscience believe that they must disobey the hierarchy, and that ‘Rome’ is on the wrong track [and] gravely contradicts the will of God”, ought to “travel the way no more with the Roman Catholic Church”.

Meanwhile, the results of a poll in Austria by the Oekonsult institute, published this week, found that 71.7 per cent of those polled found the appeal “fair and adequate”, with 64.7 per cent saying they would sign a “call for insurbodination”.

According to 73.8 per cent, pressure from the initiative could help the Austrian Catholic Church argue a case with the Vatican that reforms were unavoidable.

This initiative by Austrian priests shares many aspirations with the newly formed Association of Catholic Priests in Ireland.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2011/0831/1224303239091.html

[Mornac]

Wednesday, Aug. 31, 2011
A Clergy Rebellion in Austria's Catholic Church

By Michael Frank / Süddeutsche Zeitung / Worldcrunch
 
This post is in partnership with Worldcrunch, a new global-news site that translates stories of note in foreign languages into English. The article below was originally published in Süddeutsche Zeitung.

VIENNA — There is open rebellion among the clergy of Austria's Catholic Church. One highly placed man of the cloth has even warned about the risk of a coming schism as significant numbers of priests are refusing obedience to the Pope and bishops for the first time in memory.

 The 300-plus supporters of the so-called Priests' Initiative have had enough of what they call the church's "delaying" tactics, and they are advocating pushing ahead with policies that openly defy current practices. These include letting nonordained people lead religious services and deliver sermons; making communion available to divorced people who have remarried; allowing women to become priests and to take on important positions in the hierarchy; and letting priests carry out pastoral functions even if, in defiance of church rules, they have a wife and family. (See photos of Pope Benedict XVI in Spain.)

 Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, Vienna's Archbishop and head of the Austrian Bishops' Conference, has threatened the rebels with excommunication. Incidentally, those involved in the initiative are not only low-profile members of the clergy. Indeed, it is being led by Helmut Schüller — who was for many years vicar general of the archdiocese of Vienna and director of Caritas — and the cathedral pastor in the Carinthian diocese of Gurk.

 The issues that supporters of the initiative want addressed may be revolutionary, but they are by no means new: they constitute basic questions that have been around for a long time but have never been addressed by church officials.

 The initiative's supporters are demanding that parishes openly expose all things forbidden by the church hierarchy, thus putting a stop to hypocrisy and allowing authenticity of belief and community life to emerge. The appeal for "more honesty" made to the world's youth by Pope Benedict XVI in Madrid last week left a sour taste in many mouths in Austria, where some say that honesty is a quality the church hierarchy has more of a tendency to punish than reward.

Open Pressure and Disobedience

 Particularly affected are some 700 members of an association called Priester ohne Amt (Priests Without a Job) who wish in vain to practice their ministry because they have a wife and children and stand by them. Priests who break ties with loved ones, on the other hand, are allowed to continue working. (See photos of President Obama's meeting with Pope Benedict XVI.)

 According to the initiative's founder Schüller, only openly disobedient priests and pressure from both priests and laity can force the hierarchy to budge. Although the problems have been out there for decades, he says, the church keeps putting off doing anything about them. Schönborn stated that the critics would have to "give some thought to their path in the church" or face unavoidable consequences. On the other hand, Anton Zulehner, a priest who is one of the most respected pastoral theologians in Austria, believes that this time the church is not going to get away with diversionary tactics.

 Twenty years ago, Austria, nominally at least, was 85% Catholic. Today, in the city of Vienna, Catholics account for less than half the population while rural parishes are melting away. Various scandals have rocked the Catholic Church in Austria, among them child-abuse charges against former Vienna Archbishop Hans-Hermann Groër and the nomination of a series of reactionary priests to the rank of bishop.

http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,2090629,00.html

[Mornac]

Austrian priests defy Catholic Church, face showdown

Aug 31 2011
By Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor

 PARIS (Reuters) - Dissident Austrian priests defying their Catholic Church with calls for married clergy, women priests and other reforms enjoy wide public support, according to a new poll on a dispute that could lead to their dismissal.

 Three-quarters of people polled in the traditionally Catholic country backed the priests' "Call to Disobedience," a manifesto that Vienna Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn compares to a football team refusing to play by the rules.

 The revolt, openly supported by 329 priests, threatens a split in the Austrian Church weeks before Pope Benedict's Sept 22-25 visit to neighbouring Germany. Benedict, 84, grew up in Bavarian villages close to the Austrian border.

 Rather than simply appealing for reforms, the dissidents declared they will break Church rules by giving communion to Protestants and remarried divorced Catholics or allowing lay people to preach and head parishes without a priest.

 Schoenborn has hinted they would be disciplined if they do not back down in the coming weeks. "This cannot go on," he told the Vienna daily Der Standard. "If someone has decided to go down the path of dissent, that has consequences."

 Dissident leader Rev Helmut Schueller, who as Vienna vicar general was Schoenborn's deputy from 1995 to 1999 and once led the Austrian chapter of the international Catholic charity Caritas, has said he has no intention of giving up.

 He says many priests are already quietly breaking the rules anyway, often with the knowledge of their bishops, and his campaign aims to force the hierarchy to agree to change. About 8 percent of Austrian priests have supported his movement.


 SOLID SUPPORT FOR SCHUELLER

 Reformist Austrian Catholics have repeatedly challenged the conservative policies of Benedict and his late predecessor Pope John Paul in recent decades, creating grass-roots protest movements and advocating changes the Vatican refuses to make.

 Paul Zulehner, a leading Catholic theologian, said the Church must act urgently if it wants to avoid a confrontation. "It could come to a crash, to a split," he told Austrian radio.

 The survey published this week by the Oekonsult polling group showed 76 percent of Austrians queried supported Schueller and his colleagues. Some 85 percent said the Church should not do anything to drive away its reform-minded members.

 While the poll was not limited to Catholics, 70 percent of the respondents said the Church and its leaders were "a very important moral authority" for them. Some 66 percent said they liked Schoenborn personally.

 Schueller is now a parish priest and university chaplain in Vienna. If he is dismissed, 97 percent of those polled said, a "very large wave" of people leaving the Church would follow.

 A record 87,000 Austrians left the Church in 2010, many in reaction to sexual abuse scandals there.

 In the past year, over 800 people have registered complaints of molestation by priests after the sexual abuse scandals rocking the Church in Ireland, Belgium and other European countries also broke out in Austria.

http://in.reuters.com/article/2011/08/31/idINIndia-59073320110831

[Mornac]

Cardinal Schönborn plans no disciplinary action against dissident priests

Catholic World News
September 06, 2011

Although about 400 Austrian priests have now joined in a call for open disobedience of Church authority, Vienna’s Cardinal Christoph Schönborn does not perceive a major crisis, a spokesman has reported.

"The situation is not as dramatic as the Austrian media make it seem," Michael Pruller, the archdiocesan spokesman, told the Catholic News Service. He said that Cardinal Schönborn hopes to persuade the dissident priests to cooperate in building up the Austrian Church.

In July, Cardinal Schönborn said that he was shocked by the open defiance expressed by the Priests’ Initiative, which has encouraged pastors to defy Church rules on issues ranging from homosexuality and female priests to the reception of Communion by divorced and remarried Catholics. But—contrary to several media reports—the cardinal has not threatened disciplinary action against the dissident priests. "There has been no discussion of sanctions, no ultimatum, no talk of punishment," Pruller said.

The archdiocese is not checking to see whether Vienna priests have followed through with their promise to ignore Church law, Pruller added. "We don't send spies to all the parishes to make sure all the rules are kept," he said.

Cardinal Schönborn met in August with 4 priests of the Vienna archdiocese who are active leaders in the Priests’ Initiative, and plans to speak with them again at an unspecified future date. He has not met with the group’s national leadership. His spokesman said that a wider dialogue with the group should be conducted by the Austrian bishops’ conference.

 http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/1103529.htm

[Mornac]

Sep-6-2011
Austrian cardinal continues dialogue with priests calling for reforms

By Cindy Wooden
Catholic News Service

ROME (CNS) -- Cardinal Christoph Schonborn of Vienna is not playing "a game of chicken" with priests calling for reforms in church practice, but is interested in getting the priests to work with him to bring new life to Viennese parishes, his spokesman said.

"The situation is not as dramatic as the Austrian media make it seem," said Michael Pruller, archdiocesan spokesman.

"There has been no discussion of sanctions, no ultimatum, no talk of punishment," the spokesman told Catholic News Service in a telephone interview Sept. 6.

The leaders of the "Initiative of Parish Priests" launched a "Call to Disobedience" in late June, urging priests to join them in saying a public prayer at every Mass for church reform; giving Communion to everyone who approaches the altar in good faith, including divorced Catholics who have remarried without an annulment; allowing women to preach at Mass; and supporting the ordination of women and married men.

Cardinal Schonborn met Aug. 10 with the four Vienna archdiocesan priests who are on the presiding council of the initiative, and he plans to meet with them again in a few weeks, but no date has been set, Pruller said.

"We don't send spies to all the parishes to make sure all the rules are kept," he said, but he added that, if a priest is violating church law, the situation will be dealt with on a case-by-case basis.

According to news reports, the initiative's membership has grown from about 300 priests to about 400, and polls taken among Austrian Catholics showed overwhelming support for the changes the priests support.

"The polls are in line with polls from previous years," Pruller said. "It is a reminder that we have to do more to explain" the church's teaching on ordination, the sacraments, marriage and church structure.

In late June, in a written response to the priests' "Call to Disobedience," Cardinal Schonborn said he was shocked by the idea of urging priests to disobey church discipline, but he wanted to discuss with members of the initiative ways to meet the needs of Viennese Catholics. He also said that if the priests really believe they have a profound conflict of conscience in following church teaching, they may have to consider whether or not they want to continue as Catholic priests.

Many people read the cardinal's statement as an ultimatum.

But "this is nothing like that," Pruller said. "There will be an ongoing debate and there has to be an ongoing discussion of the underlying issues."

Meanwhile, the president of the Austrian conference of superiors of men's religious orders has called for a "church summit" to involve all Austrian church leaders -- not just Cardinal Schonborn -- in discussing ways to respond to the priests' initiative and consider possible reforms.

Pruller said Cardinal Schonborn met only with the priests in his archdiocese who were leaders of the initiative and that a wider discussion would be up to the bishops' conference, which meets in October.

For several years, he said, the cardinal and archdiocesan leaders have been promoting a reorganization and renewal of the church life in Vienna.

The cardinal's intent in meeting with members of the initiative "is more a game of convincing and winning them over, and not a game of chicken," Pruller said.

The cardinal is convinced that his plan for renewal and reform, aimed at helping each Catholic discover his or her mission as a member of the church, is "more likely to solve the problems in the long term," the spokesman said.

"People are leaving institutional religions -- even the Protestant churches that have married ministers and women," he said. "We have to deal with it -- not by asking what the church can do for me and do I have a right to have a Mass within walking distance of my home."

Too many Catholics have been satisfied with "a cozy parish" where they can attend Mass, but they do not seem to realize that no one new is entering the doors, he said.

In the Vienna Archdiocese, he said, many priests are pastor of three or four parishes at a time. They work with three or four parish councils, three or four sacramental preparation groups, three or four finance councils "and have no time for pastoral work."

"People need to recognize that everybody is called to pastor others, to serve," he said. "It's not that we are sheep and here just to say, 'baa, baa,' but we must be shepherds for one another, reaching out" and bringing people into the church's life.

"Changing the rules for priesthood won't change this," he said. "We have to address the real needs of people in the 21st century" and that probably will mean larger parishes where people are encouraged to form small groups, "which are more vibrant and better at supporting each other in the faith" and at reaching out to others.

http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/1103529.htm

[Mornac]

Vienna cardinal takes tough line on priest revolt

By Michael Shields
Sat Sep 17, 2011

VIENNA (Reuters) - The head of Vienna's Roman Catholic community ruled out sweeping changes demanded by dissident priests and said there could be "serious conflict" if they defied Church teaching on celibacy or give communion to remarried divorcees.

Vienna Cardinal Christoph Schoenborn said he would not lead his diocese into a schism with leaders in the Vatican by letting priests flout Church rules after a group of priests issued a "Call to Disobedience" manifesto to try to press reform.

In weekend interviews with Austrian radio and television, Schoenborn backed celibacy for priests, limiting ordination to men and preserving marriage as a life-long commitment.

"If in our diocese here I would step out of line with the community of the Catholic Church then I would lead our diocese into a schism. I am not ready for this and I think no Austrian bishop is ready for this," he said on Saturday.

Late on Friday, he again warned dissident priests that they faced consequences if they stuck to their revolt.

"If it comes to actions that clearly contradict Catholic teaching on faith then it can lead to serious conflict," he said, adding it was not too late to reach common ground in a second round of talks due later this year.

"All possibilities are open. I am counting on dialogue and cooperation," he said.

Dissidents led by parish priest Helmut Schueller have issued the manifesto and say they hope the campaign will persuade Schoenborn to push reforms with Pope Benedict and the Vatican.

The dissidents, who have broad public backing in opinion polls, say they will break Church rules by giving communion to Protestants and remarried divorced Catholics or by allowing lay people to preach and head parishes without a priest.

They oppose the current drive to group several parishes together because of a shortage of priests.

"We are now really going to step on the gas," Hans-Peter Hurka, head of the Catholic reform group "We are the Church," told newspaper Der Standard this week, announcing plans to have hundreds of demonstrators march on bishops' offices.

"It is like in Egypt. There will be a revolution of Church people in Austria. We will make St. Stephen's Square (before the cathedral in Vienna) into Tahrir Square," another activist, Anton Achleitner, said, referring to the square where Egyptians staged protests that ended the 30-year rule of Hosni Mubarak.

The dispute has come to a head just before Pope Benedict's September 22-25 visit to neighbouring Germany. Benedict, 84, grew up in Bavarian villages close to the Austrian border.

Catholic reform groups in Germany have made similar demands, and a prominent retired Irish bishop, Edward Daly, called on Tuesday for an end to compulsory celibacy for priests, saying it was pushing new recruits away.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2011/09/17/uk-austria-church-idUKTRE78G1F220110917

[Mornac]

Austria's rebel Catholics issue ultimatum on celibacy rule

Nov 5, 2011

Vienna - Several reformist Catholic groups in Austria announced Saturday that ordinary believers would start holding masses without priests in defiance of church rules, unless women and married men were allowed to join the clergy.

The groups, including the lay organization We Are Church, enjoy broad backing among the population and have spawned similar movements in other European countries in recent years.

By joining forces, the five groups tightened pressure on Austria's bishops, who are meeting next week to mull similar demands that have been voiced by more than 300 priests.

In a statement, the groups criticized church rules that forbid married and female clergy, even though a third of parishes are without a priest.

We Are Church Chairman Hans Peter Hurka told dpa that the reformists would not wait much longer.

'Actually, what we said has come into effect as of now,' he said.

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/europe/news/article_1673436.php/Austria-s-rebel-Catholics-issue-ultimatum-on-celibacy-rule

[ivanm]

It is not unusual for people to meet for worship without the guidance of a pastor, at least in the Protestant sects it isn't.  I think that a review of history will show that this was often the case with the early Christians too.

Out in the rural areas of the country it isn't financially possible to hire a preacher in a lot of cases so the congregations either merges with a larger one or meet without an ordained minister.  Even the small Catholic congregations south of town have had to shut down some of  the churches and even share a priest in some other cases.
Some of the Protestant sects use either lay leaders or seminary students, but they at least get together for worship.  Isn't that what it is really all about?

The issue in the piece Mornac has posted was different in that the people were meeting without a priest in order to protest certain other church policies, but it was also mentioned that meeting without a preist was against policy.  That is rather legalistic IMO, and I think the people need to break away and set up their own religious order.

 When a church gets between a believer and his Lord then that is not cricket, and the church needs to butt out and get lost. I think the traditionalist crowd likes to cut off its nose to spite its face. Principles are fine, but the name of the game is to survive, so more flexibility may be appropriate.

Would the trads rather be attending a mosque? Isn't that the most pertinent issue n the greater scheme of things?  A dead church can help no one, not even the priests.

[Mornac]

Austrian bishops issue warning to progressive Catholics

Nov 11, 2011

Vienna - Austria's Catholic bishops issued a stern message on Friday to increasingly vocal groups calling for the appointment of female and married priests.

Five progressive clergy and lay groups said last week that they would start holding masses without priests in defiance of church law, if the church did not address the lack of clergy by relaxing its admission criteria.

Holding mass without an ordained priest 'is an outright break with one of the central truths of our Catholic faith,' the bishops said in a statement. But they added that they would seek dialogue with the reformists. 

Among Austria's priests, 72 per cent share the view that disobedience to the Vactican is warranted on these issues, a poll by public broadcaster ORF found this week.

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/europe/news/article_1674692.php/Austrian-bishops-issue-warning-to-progressive-Catholics

[notoc]

March 2010: Vienna-based lawyer Georg Zanger wants to sue leading members of the Catholic Church on grounds of membership in a criminal organisation.

According to Austrian daily “Die Presse”, March 25th, Zanger says that if this abuse was covered up by Church officials, the entire Catholic Church could legally be qualified as a criminal organisation.

[Mornac]

Thanks for the input notoc, but that news is a bit old. The Novus ordo heresy in Austria only began in earnest as of late summer. Let's try to be a bit more current.

[ivanm]

Wednesday, Aug. 31, 2011
A Clergy Rebellion in Austria's Catholic Church

By Michael Frank / Süddeutsche Zeitung / Worldcrunch
 
This post is in partnership with Worldcrunch, a new global-news site that translates stories of note in foreign languages into English. The article below was originally published in Süddeutsche Zeitung.

VIENNA — There is open rebellion among the clergy of Austria's Catholic Church. One highly placed man of the cloth has even warned about the risk of a coming schism as significant numbers of priests are refusing obedience to the Pope and bishops for the first time in memory.

 The 300-plus supporters of the so-called Priests' Initiative have had enough of what they call the church's "delaying" tactics, and they are advocating pushing ahead with policies that openly defy current practices. These include letting nonordained people lead religious services and deliver sermons; making communion available to divorced people who have remarried; allowing women to become priests and to take on important positions in the hierarchy; and letting priests carry out pastoral functions even if, in defiance of church rules, they have a wife and family. (See photos of Pope Benedict XVI in Spain.)

 Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, Vienna's Archbishop and head of the Austrian Bishops' Conference, has threatened the rebels with excommunication. Incidentally, those involved in the initiative are not only low-profile members of the clergy. Indeed, it is being led by Helmut Schüller — who was for many years vicar general of the archdiocese of Vienna and director of Caritas — and the cathedral pastor in the Carinthian diocese of Gurk.

 The issues that supporters of the initiative want addressed may be revolutionary, but they are by no means new: they constitute basic questions that have been around for a long time but have never been addressed by church officials.

 The initiative's supporters are demanding that parishes openly expose all things forbidden by the church hierarchy, thus putting a stop to hypocrisy and allowing authenticity of belief and community life to emerge. The appeal for "more honesty" made to the world's youth by Pope Benedict XVI in Madrid last week left a sour taste in many mouths in Austria, where some say that honesty is a quality the church hierarchy has more of a tendency to punish than reward.

Open Pressure and Disobedience

 Particularly affected are some 700 members of an association called Priester ohne Amt (Priests Without a Job) who wish in vain to practice their ministry because they have a wife and children and stand by them. Priests who break ties with loved ones, on the other hand, are allowed to continue working. (See photos of President Obama's meeting with Pope Benedict XVI.)

 According to the initiative's founder Schüller, only openly disobedient priests and pressure from both priests and laity can force the hierarchy to budge. Although the problems have been out there for decades, he says, the church keeps putting off doing anything about them. Schönborn stated that the critics would have to "give some thought to their path in the church" or face unavoidable consequences. On the other hand, Anton Zulehner, a priest who is one of the most respected pastoral theologians in Austria, believes that this time the church is not going to get away with diversionary tactics.

 Twenty years ago, Austria, nominally at least, was 85% Catholic. Today, in the city of Vienna, Catholics account for less than half the population while rural parishes are melting away. Various scandals have rocked the Catholic Church in Austria, among them child-abuse charges against former Vienna Archbishop Hans-Hermann Groër and the nomination of a series of reactionary priests to the rank of bishop.

http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,2090629,00.html

The decrease in Catholic membership may be due to wrong headed Church policy.  Ever think of that? I cannot see that the infractions alluded to in thie article are sins in the eyes of Christ.  A lot of ancient Christians worshipped without the assistance of a priest, as an example of church dogma being what it is today.

[notoc]

Thanks for the input notoc, but that news is a bit old. The Novus ordo heresy in Austria only began in earnest as of late summer. Let's try to be a bit more current.

I realise you don't like 'old news', Mornac ... that's why I post it.

[Mornac]

That's fine. I just prefer more cutting edge stuff on my threads. Thanks all the same notoc. Stuff like that can never get enough public airing.

[notoc]

That's fine.

I know.