News Briefs

Mainz, Germany, Mar 4, 2020 / 11:30 am (CNA).- The secretary of the German bishops’ conference has been reelected to his position, despite announcing last week that he was not a candidate to remain in the role.

Jesuit Father Hans Langendörfer was returned in office by the German bishops on Tuesday, during their spring assembly, currently meeting in the city of Mainz. The priest had said he was stepping down to allow a younger person to fill the role.

On Feb. 26, Langendörfer announced that “I have come to the conclusion that it is now a good time to hand this position over to younger hands,” and suggested that a layperson could fill the role.

Several media outlets in Germany speculated that many in the conference, including Langendörfer, hoped that a woman would be elected to fill the position, which plays a key organizational role in the ongoing “synodal process” being conducted by the German bishops’ conference and the Central Committee of German Catholics (ZdK).

Langendörfer, who has held the position since 1996, indicated on Wednesday that he had  accepted his reelection on a temporary basis, fueling speculation that the bishops had failed to agree on a suitable candidate to replace him.

A brief press release from the German bishops’ conference, released March 4, said that he would not remain in office for the full term, and was continuing in the role on an interim basis.

“The spring general assembly of the German bishops’ conference today (March 3, 2020) in Mainz has reelected the previous secretary of the bishops’ conference, Father Dr. Hans Langendörfer, SJ. re-elected,” the statement said.

“Fr. Langendörfer has announced that he will be performing this task until the end of 2020 at the latest.”

Langendörfer’s announcement last week that he would quit the position he has held for nearly 25 years came shortly after the news that the chairman of the conference, Cardinal Reinhard Marx of Münich and Freising, was also stepping down from the conference leadership. In a statement in February, Marx said he hoped to spend more time in his diocese and that it was time for a “younger generation” to assume leadership of the Church in Germany.

Langendörfer’s reelection as secretary followed the announcement of the new chairman of the conference.

Bishop Georg Bätzing of Limburg was confirmed as the new chairman on Tuesday, replacing Cardinal Marx.

Bätzing was elected after no candidate received the necessary two-thirds majority during the first two rounds of voting; he was chosen on the third ballot with a simple majority of votes cast and will lead the conference for a six year term.

In his first remarks as chairman, Bätzing expressed his “full support” for the so-called binding synodal process, which formally opened during the first week of Advent, 2019, but held the first meeting of the synodal assembly in January.

Despite several cautionary interventions from Rome, the assembly’s working groups will offer proposed changes to various aspects of Church teaching and discipline, including on women’s ordination, clerical celibacy, and human sexuality.

Bätzing himself co-chairs the synodal working group on “Life in Successful Relationships – Love Live in Sexuality and Partnership,” together with Birgit Mock, the ZdK spokeswoman on family policy. The ZdK has called for a total revision of Church teaching on homosexuality and for the blessing of same-sex relationships in churches.

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London, England, Mar 4, 2020 / 03:01 am (CNA).- For years, the dramatic paintings of Artemisia Gentileschi, a Catholic artist of the Counter-Reformation, were misattributed to male artists – most often her father, Orazio, who was also a painter.
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Moscow, Russia, Mar 3, 2020 / 08:01 pm (CNA).- A definition of marriage as between a man and a woman are among several amendments to the Russian constitution proposed by president Vladimir Putin.

The State Duma, Russia’s lower parliamentary house, approved the constitutional reform bill in January. Putin’s amendments will be included in a second reading next week.

A public vote on the constitutional amendments will take place April 22, but will first have to undergo approval from the Constitutional Court.

Neither same-sex marriage nor civil unions are legal in Russia.

Two weeks ago, Putin spoke on same-sex marriage, saying Russia would not legalize the practice while he is in power.

“As far as ‘parent number 1’ and ‘parent number 2’ goes, I’ve already spoken publicly about this and I’ll repeat it again: As long as I’m president this will not happen. There will be dad and mum,” Putin said.

Critics charge that the changes to the constitution are a means for Putin to maintain power, whose fourth term as president ends in 2024.

Other proposed amendments would include a reference Russians’ “faith in God”, and one on “historical truth” that would preserve “the great achievement of the people in their defence of the Fatherland”.

The historical truth amendment would emphasize the Soviet Union’s role in World War II, during which some 27 million Soviets lost their lives fighting Nazi Germany.

Another amendment would forbid the turning over of any Russian territory, which could strengthen Russia’s claims to Crimea, a Ukrainian region it annexed in 2014, and to the Kuril Islands, an archipelago it administers but some of which is claimed by Japan.

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Mainz, Germany, Mar 3, 2020 / 10:30 am (CNA).- The German bishops’ conference has elected Bishop Georg Bätzing of Limburg as its new chairman. Bätzing replaces the outgoing chairman, Cardinal Reinhard Marx of Münich and Freising, and will lead the conference for a six year term.

The election of Bishop Bätzing was confirmed Tuesday, following a vote by the German bishops at their spring assembly, which is currently underway in Mainz. CNA Duetsch reported March 3 that, after no candidate received the necessary two-thirds majority during the first two rounds of voting, Bätzing was elected on the third ballot with a simple majority of votes cast.

The bishop used his first press appearance as chairman to reaffirm the conference’s support for the ongoing “synodal way” being conducted in partnership with the Central Committee of German Catholics (ZdK).

“At the center of our considerations is the ‘Synodal Way.’ I fully support that,” Bätzing said Tuesday.

The so-called binding synodal process formally opened during the first week of Advent, 2019, but the first meeting of the synodal assembly was convened in January. The assembly’s working groups will offer proposed changes to various aspects of Church teaching and discipline, including on women’s ordination, clerical celibacy, and human sexuality.

The 58 year-old Bätzing was consecrated bishop by Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki on September 13, 2016.

Bätzing was asked Tuesday if some of the stated aims of the synodal process, in particular women’s ordination, had not been effectively ruled out by Pope Francis in his recent apostolic exhortation following the synod on the Amazon.

“On the contrary,” Bätzing said. The bishop explained that from his view the pope “did not take a position” on a number of questions posed in the final synodal document on the Amazon, and did not rule out any eventual conclusions of the German process.

Last year, Pope Francis wrote a letter to the whole Church in Germany, warning against allowing the Church conform to modern secular morals and thought. Pope Francis cautioned against “a new Pelagianism” which seeks “to tidy up and tune the life of the Church, adapting it to the present logic.”

The result of such errors, Francis said, would be a “well organized and even ‘modernized’ ecclesiastical body, but without soul and evangelical novelty.”

Vatican officials subsequently informed the German bishops’ conference that the synodal plans were “not ecclesiologically valid,” and called for them to be substantially revised.

As conference chairman, Bishop Bätzing will now co-chair the synodal assembly, along with the ZdK leadership.

Last month, Bätzing was elected to co-chair the synodal working group on “Life in Successful Relationships – Love Live in Sexuality and Partnership,” together with Birgit Mock, the ZdK spokeswoman on family policy. 

The ZdK has called for a total revision of Church teaching on homosexuality and for the blessing of same-sex relationships in churches.

In September, 2019, Bishop Bätzing co-chaired an ecumenical working group of Catholic and Protestant theologians which produced a document, titled “Together at the Lord’s Table,” which concluded that “mutual participation in the celebration of the Lord’s Supper / Eucharist is theologically justified.”

At the time of the document’s release, Bätzing noted that he had joined the group late in the process and initially asked himself “whether [he] can agree to this or not.”

“But I have to say, the theological justification in this basic paper is so clear to me that I did not want to and could not escape.”

In the Catholic Church, only baptized Catholics in a state of grace are permitted to receive Communion. The Code of Canon Law outlines very narrow circumstances in which non-Catholics may be admitted to Communion. While bishops in several northern European countries have repeatedly called for Eucharistic intercommunion, this has been rejected by Rome.

Acknowledging this at the time of the report’s release, Bätzing said that his own certainty on the issue did not mean he was free to alter sacramental discipline.

“However, this does not mean that I am a bishop alone, but the theological discussion must now be raised to the level of a teaching reception, i.e. an acceptance by the Magisterium of the Catholic Church. And this process is pending,” he said.

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