Nevertheless, the fact that the Archbishop of Munich, Cardinal Reinhard Marx, allowed the incriminating report to be published and publicly admitted that these were the ‘worst months’ of his life, must be acknowledged with respect. It shows that some theologically conservative bishops are beginning to understand how serious the situation within the church is. The Archbishop of Munich and the Bavarian bishops have drafted a joint prayer for forgiveness and pledged to do more in terms of prevention and to work more closely with the public prosecution authorities. At the end of 2010, Archbishop Marx once again spoke out in favour ‘of a policy of openness, of looking more closely, and of transparency’. He considered the crisis and its aftermath to be far from over.
But Christian Weisner, the speaker of the reform movement We are Church, argues that to overcome the deep crisis of credibility it will be necessary to tackle the underlying problems, namely, the abuses of power, the inhibitions in dealing with sexuality, the lack of equality between men and women, celibacy … The bishops should not cherish the hope that the cases of abuse will be quickly forgotten: ‘The memory of these abuse cases is not going to go away.’ It is not enough to get these cases of abuse under control within the organization. Surely, all of the bishops need to recognize how serious the situation is.
To paraphrase the beginning of the famous poem of Heinrich Heine: ‘Thinking of Germany’s Church at night/puts all thoughts of sleep to flight.’ In 2010, despite two heavily promoted and expensive campaigns launched that year – the Year of Vocations and the Year of Priests – only 150 candidates responded from all over Germany. This is the lowest number ever reported. And how many of them will change their minds before they are ordained? Moreover, how many priests will die in the meantime? In view of the upside-down population pyramid of the Catholic clergy, it looks as though the celibate priesthood may die out in the foreseeable future.
But this is just another symptom of the dramatic loss of confidence the Catholic Church is facing. According to a study by the Allensbach Institute published in July 2010:
… the percentage of the general population that believes the Church to be capable of offering orientation on questions of morality has dropped from 35 per cent in 2005 to 23 per cent; between March and June 2010 alone it decreased from 29 per cent to 23 per cent. At the same time, the belief that the Church offers answers in the search for meaning has also declined. In 2005, around 50 per cent of the population still believed that; by March 2010 the figure was only 45 per cent, in June it was down to 38 per cent. (Frankfurter Allgemeine, 23 June 2010)
The latter figure is especially alarming because it concerns the Church’s core mission, and figures such as these should galvanize the church leadership into taking immediate action.
However, at the Second Ecumenical Church Congress in Munich (May 2010) the bishops never even mentioned any of the numerous reform movements. Since then, numerous articles, comments, letters to newspapers and personal discussions have shown them the extent to which unrest, resentment, frustration and anger have spread among the church laity and clergy alike. And so there have been indications of a slow change of opinion within the German Bishops’ Conference, and, if I am not mistaken, within other bishops’ conferences as well. On the eve of the autumn plenary meeting of the German Bishops’ Conference in Fulda in October 2010, the Bishop of Fulda, Heinz Josef Algermissen, who was hosting the conference, spoke of a ‘bottleneck situation’. He indicated that many questions were ripe for discussion, from sexual morality to celibacy. Such topics can no longer be kept under wraps. In truth, apart from the virtually incomprehensible official catechism, it is the increasing backlog of reforms, halted for many decades and culminating in the cover-up of widespread sexual abuse, which constitute the main reason for the current wave of people leaving the Church.
Bishops Refusing to Enter into a Dialogue
Still, the massive opposition to dialogue on the part of the ultra-Roman wing of the worldwide episcopate should not be underestimated. Again I call attention to the situation in Germany as typical of that elsewhere.
In Cologne, the largest archbishopric, currently headed by the conservative Cardinal Joachim Meisner, only nine priests were ordained in 2009, and only four in 2010. The 221 parishes will soon be downsized to 180. The situation is the same in the Essen diocese under Bishop Franz-Josef Overbeck, another member of the conservative wing; there, only two new priests were ordained in 2009 and only one in 2010. He has amalgamated some 272 parishes (with roughly 350 church buildings still in ecclesiastic use) into 43 mega-parishes (information provided in 2010 by the art historian Dr Christel Darmstadt from the grassroots campaign ‘Save Bochum’s Churches’). Clearly, as role models for future priests, such conservative prelates alienate more than they attract.
The diocese of Limburg offers an especially alarming example of the damage being done by the narrow-minded, conservative prelates appointed under John Paul II and especially under Benedict XVI. There, in 2007, the widely admired, open-minded Bishop Franz Kamphaus was replaced by Franz-Peter Tebartz-van Elst, a protégé of Cardinal Meisner. Fully committed to the Roman line, he high-handedly set about streamlining his diocese. (See the report by N. Sommer in Publik-Forum on 3 December 2010 and also the report in Spiegel online on 15 November 2010.) He also ignored a public letter from ten of his priests accusing him of excessive spending, of dealing arrogantly with his clergy and of fostering a general climate of fear in the diocese (reported in Frankfurter Allgemeine, 17 September 2012).
Specifically, he has been taken to task for treating himself to an exorbitantly expensive and opulent episcopal palace to replace the modest housing of his predecessor. On his instructions, the new vicar general has warned the clergy to observe discretion and maintain secrecy, thus leaving them afraid to speak out and tell the truth about the prevailing conditions in the Church; the editors of church newspapers are being pressured to avoid controversial topics; every effort is being made to re-clericalize diocesan life. The candidates for the priesthood are once again inculcated with clerical arrogance, and, contrary to an explicit decision by the diocesan Council of Priests, clerics who toe the line are once again being rewarded with Roman titles like ‘Prelate’ or ‘Monsignor’. Meanwhile, lay people are being marginalized and are no longer permitted to act in the name of the Church, e.g. lay theologians serving in pastoral and liturgical roles are no longer called ‘pastoral ministers’. Under no circumstances are remarried divorcees permitted to receive Holy Communion or homosexual couples to receive a blessing. The overall prevailing policy is to put an end to the parishes as they have existed for centuries and replace them with centres of worship staffed by the few remaining priests. This means that the diminishing numbers of practising Catholics must make ever-longer journeys to receive the sacraments at these centres.
Surely, one can understand the cry for help from the priests affected by such policies. In their open letter to their bishop they wrote:
Are we old-fashioned models that are being phased out? We are pastors who wish to be close to and truly share in the lives of the people in their parish; priests who have come to love their parishes and who do not want to change and accumulate parishes as you would change your shirt; who are committed to a loving community of discussion and prayer …; who are involved in parish councils; who have taken on responsibility and are increasingly finding themselves relegated to the margins as though they were just pieces of furniture …; artists and intellectuals who perceive very clearly that their world is not the world of finery and tassels once again used by the Church for embellishment and adornment nor the world of glossy, puffed-up kitsch expressed in empty phrases …
The letter could equally have been addressed to Bishop Georg Ludwig Müller of Regensburg, a former professor of dogmatic theology and friend of Ratzinger, who enjoys an even worse reputation than his colleague in Limburg, thanks to his authoritarian, anti-ecumenical church policies and hostility to the laity. But, already in February 2010, Müller was declaring that the Church had everything under control. He