German bishops are divided sharply over implementing blessing guidelines for same-sex couples, with a comprehensive survey by katholisch.de revealing stark divisions across the country’s 27 dioceses, three months after the publication of the controversial pastoral handout.
Five dioceses — Cologne, Augsburg, Eichstätt, Passau, and Regensburg — have explicitly refused to implement the handout, all referencing the Vatican’s Fiducia Supplicans as their standard.
Eleven German dioceses have either officially endorsed or at least maintain pastoral practices aligned with the nonbinding guidelines titled “Segen gibt der Liebe Kraft” (“Blessings Give Strength to Love”), which were issued by the German Bishops’ Conference and the Central Committee of German Catholics (ZdK).
The remaining 11 dioceses have adopted various middle positions, with some expressing caution about the handout’s implementation or deferring to individual pastoral discretion.
Augsburg outlines objections
The Bavarian Diocese of Augsburg provided a substantive critique of the German handout, with Bishop Bertram Meier identifying several points where the guidance conflicts with Vatican teaching.
He noted that while Fiducia Supplicans emphasizes that such blessings should not be promoted or have a prescribed ritual, the German handout explicitly speaks of “blessing celebrations” and intends to evaluate experiences with such blessings.
The diocese also expressed concern that the handout suggests “planned and aesthetically appealing design of a liturgical blessing celebration” with music and singing, which contradicts the Vatican’s guidance for brief, spontaneous blessings.
The Catholic initiative Neuer Anfang — “New Beginnings” — has sharply criticized the German guidelines, arguing they promote “the opposite of the stated intentions” of Pope Francis and contradict the original purpose of Fiducia Supplicans, reported CNA Deutsch, CNA’s German-language news partner.
New Beginnings contends that many German bishops are failing to uphold Catholic sexual ethics in their implementation approaches, warning that the handout encourages practices that go well beyond what the Vatican document envisioned.
Cardinal Müller strongly condemns the ‘fraud’
Former Vatican doctrine chief Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller has delivered a scathing critique of the German implementation in a guest contribution for Die Tagespost.
Müller compared the current situation to medieval indulgence trading, which “endangered the eternal salvation of deceivers and deceived and brought us the continuing division of Christianity to this day.”
The cardinal and professor of theology argued on July 18 that according to biblical understanding, marriage exists only between a man and a woman, making ecclesiastical blessing rites for irregular life situations both “ineffective before God” and constituting “pious fraud” toward participants, CNA Deutsch reported.
In previous writings, Müller warned that Fiducia Supplicans — which has received a mixed reaction across the globe — was “confusing” and contradictory to previous doctrinal documents.
Some dioceses proceed with implementation
Despite these serious concerns and criticisms, the northern German dioceses of Limburg, Osnabrück, and Trier have published the guidance in their official bulletins.
The Diocese of Würzburg is going so far as to promote “blessing services” for same-sex couples at wedding exhibitions, katholisch.de reported.
Bishop Georg Bätzing of Limburg, who also serves as president of the German Bishops’ Conference, claimed that implementing the guidance aims to strengthen people in partnerships “who live together in love and responsibility.”
In Mainz, Bishop Peter Kohlgraf recommended his staff “proceed according to the handout in your practice.” At the same time, the Diocese of Fulda expressed support, describing the controversial document as “an important step toward a Church that is oriented to people’s life realities and respects love in all its expressions.”
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We read: “The Bavarian Diocese of Augsburg provided a substantive critique of the German handout, with Bishop Bertram Meier identifying several points where the guidance conflicts with Vatican teaching.”
Of course, the so-called “Vatican teaching” struck many as flawed in itself. But, whatever. It’s good news to hear that the five solid dioceses are no longer standing alone, with the twenty-two remainders now split 11-11.
So, where is Cardinal Kasper in all of this? He has chided Germania from more-or-less breaking with the universal Church, but is he not the one who also lit the match to the haystack with his two-hour ramblings introducing the first session of the synod on the family in 2015? The luminary Kasper, only to be corrected at the beginning of the second session by Cardinal Erdo of Hungary, who raised eyebrows by simply stating the obvious: “There are absolutely no grounds for considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remotely analogous to God’s plan for marriage and family.”
About the so-called blessings, whether spontaneous or now scripted, the below-the-belt Cardinal Kasper had no time for below-the-equator African dissenters: (https://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2014/10/dont-listen-to-the-africans-says-catholic-cardinal). (With a later apology.) So, a footnote to the above article—in addition to the German dioceses now dissenting from a memo on German letterhead, non-amnesiacs also recall dissent from Fiducia Supplicans, itself, from: all of continental Africa, Hungary, Poland, Peru, the Netherlands, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, parts of France, Spain and Argentina, and numerous individuals as well as the Coptic Church and the patriarch of Bulgaria (who expressed “shock”). Cardinal Muller’s earlier remarks are found here: https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2024/02/does-fiducia-supplicans-affirm-heresy
SUMMARY: The German Luther was initially right when he declined to give absolution to those in the confessional who refused to repent and, instead, hid behind fig-leaf certificates awarding fraudulent “indulgences.”
This “debate” about The Deposit Of Faith is only occurring due to the fact that Vatican II, by refusing to affirm The Charitable Anathema, Instituted By Jesus The Christ, for The Salvation Of Souls , and out of a false ideology, lacking in Charity, and thus void of authentic Life-affirming and Life-Sustaining Salvational Love, that was permitted to subsist within The One Body of Christ, creating a counterfeit, fraudulent magisterium that in denying The Word Of Perfect Divine Eternal Love Incarnate, is anti-Christ, anti Filioque, and anti Papacy, existing in direct conflict with Christ’s True Magisterium, making it appear as if it Christ’s Church is no longer One, Holy, Catholic, And Apostolic Church, In The Unity Of The Holy Ghost, The Spirit Of Perfect Divine Eternal Love Between The Father And His Only Begotten Son, Who Proceeds From Both The Father And His Only Begotten Son. The question is, why are the Faithful not demanding that the counterfeit magisterium that is attempting to subsist within The One Body Of Christ, be anathema when the Faithful know through both Faith and reason, you can only have a Great Apostasy from The True Church Of Christ, and Christ, Himself, warned us that this day would come?
Who’s “debate,” and maybe you can diagram that first sentence?
Notice the effort of the bishops to obfuscate instead of simply following Scripture:
Romans 1:26-27
New International Version
26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.
1 Corinthians 6:9-11
New International Version
9 Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men[a]
10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.
11 And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
The legacy of Bergoglio continues.
(Sigh.)
Evil. Error. Confusion. The normalization of sin.
Even though Bergoglio has departed, the Church remains under assault by the Dark Vatican and its minions.
Pope Leo, please move decisively to set things right.
We must stop crucifying our poor, suffering Jesus!
Pope Leo needs to retract Fuducia Supplicans, clarify Church teaching on Amoris Laetitia,reinstate the Latin Mass…
Francis was a disaster. The German Church needs correction.
Let’s face facts – unpleasant as they are to talk about. The Church in Germany (as is the case for the Church in America and elsewhere) is divided between those clergy who are homosexual and support the homosexual agenda and those who are not homosexual. It is divided between those who accept the order of creation as God designed it and those who reject God’s design. The Church is divided between those who recognize sin for what it is and those who do not. The Church in Germany and elsewhere is divided between those who sow confusion and those who prefer clarity. Everyone gets to decide where they fall whether or not they admit it.
Sfiducia Supplicans is heteropraxy. As such, it leads Catholics away from union with God to promote sinful unions with each other.
Why would most German Bishops want this? To be sure, all the usual Protestant reasons: peer pressure, pleasure, popularity, etc.
One reason less discussed for this apostasy is greed. Germans who check the box to declare themselves Catholics pay taxes to the Church. Roughly 75% of those folk agree with these fraudulent “blessings.” Together, German Catholics pay over 5 billion euro in taxes every year to the Church. Lord knows this money piles up and gives inordinate power to those, like Cardinal Marx and his friends, who control it. Some studies think the total assets of the German Catholic Church is 265 billion euro. Most diocese have more money than the Vatican. God knows, none of this is fully transparent.
Pray and stay Catholic. Jesus Christ is Lord.
Good to see that Our Bishop here in Augsburg Diocese is finally speaking out against the way the German Bishops are leading us!
And what does it mean “an important step toward a Church that is oriented to people’s life realities and respects love in all its expressions”?, particularly: “love in all its expressions”?!. We forgot Augustine: disordered love is the essence of sin. When we seek ultimate happiness (frui-fruitio) in a created thing, like money, power, or another person, we are loving it in a way that it wasn’t meant to be loved.
“… an important step toward a Church that is oriented to people’s life realities and respects love in all its expressions.” This statement is not even clever enough to count as deceitful. It is a blatant invitation to engage in sinful behavior.
Some of those expressions of love are still criminally prosecuted. Even in Germany.
“Love” has its boundaries.
One has to wonder if the authors of Fiducia Supplicans weren’t some of the very people Pope Francis was aiming his supposed “faux pas” repeatedly saying there is “too much faggotry” within the Vatican at. Clearly they suffer from a scheming mindset to so clearly state the Christ’s clear teaching to us only to then intentionally labor with their words to restrict the Church’s freedom to bring God’s blessings through our liturgical life (the “Work of the [God’s] People”). They do this by legal lingo slight of hand. FS’s Intro II.8. does this with the words, “Blessings are among the most widespread and evolving sacramentals” hint, hint. Then, “Indeed, they lead us to grasp God’s presence (small “p” because we are not sure He really is Present???) in ALL the events of life…” again, hint, hint. Then in Intro II.9. “From a STRICTLY liturgical point of view, a blessing requires that what is blessed be conformed to God’s will, as expressed in the teachings of the Church.” Only to then (after two more buffering paragraphs for camouflage sake) state in Intro II.12. “One must also avoid the risk of REDUCING THE MEANING OF BLESSINGS to this point of view alone…” But for those awake enough to see the lie of our enemy the Divider (Diabolos)/False Accuser (Satan) worked in here, it is precisely this artificial framing of the Church’s liturgical life under terms of pharisaic legal restrictiveness that is the slight of hand, for this is an utterly false framing! Oh Lord Jesus Christ our Good Shepherd, have mercy and bring humbling repentance to the hearts, minds and lives of all such “wolves in shepherds clothing” who would make themselves the servants of the dragon against Your Church in these ways!!!
Is there a possibility that the pro-gay-blessing German clergy/bishops could break away (schism?) from the Roman Catholic Church and establish a “new” type of Catholic Church in Germany? It does sound like the “gay rights crowd” of Catholics is in the minority–is this correct? Or do they outnumber the traditional Catholics, if not in population, perhaps in funds (from various “stars” and celebrities)?
From what I understand, Germany has a history of tolerance for sexual behaviors that are generally considered “sinful” by both Catholic and Protestant churches (as well as by Muslims). After WWI, there were entire blocks of the big cities that were filled with nightclubs catering to various non-straight sexual appetites. (The music Cabaret makes this clear, although I’m not sure how much of that is true to real-life.) And even though Adolf Hitler condemned homosexuality and sent many homosexuals to concentration camps, he tolerated it for his staff and military leaders.
Is this “legacy” making a comeback in Germany?
This is the war to decapitate the Body of Christ.
“Eminence” Marx, (like his American counterparts of the “Francis-Legacy-cult”) is an office-holder of “The Revolution of the Janitors.”
Per this essay:
https://crisismagazine.com/opinion/revolt-of-the-janitors-on-the-detroit-massacre
They are fit to be confronted and opposed and fought.
And the he obfuscating bishops and the Vatican not only ignore scripture (see my citation of Scripture above) but also great Christian thinkers like St. Augustine:
“Those sins which are against nature, like those of the men of Sodom, are in all times and places to be detested and punished. Even if all nations committed such sins, they should all alike be held guilty by God’s law” (Confessions 3.8).
As for the homosexuality that the Catholic Church in Germany endorses, their open borders policy with regard to those worship an islamic god will take care of that problem. The solution will not be a pretty one.