The bishops of Germany and a number of heads of Vatican offices listen to Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican secretary of state, during a meeting Nov. 18, 2022, at the Augustinianum Institute for Patristic Studies. The German bishops were making their “ad limina” visits to Rome. Seated next to Cardinal Parolin is Cardinal Marc Ouellet, prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops. (CNS photo/Vatican Media)
How does the Catholic Church in the United States evaluate the situation of the church in Germany?
The answer to this question obviously depends on whom you ask, but it is fair to say that for many bishops, priests, religious, and engaged laity paying attention in the United States, there is deep suspicion of what the German Catholic Church is doing with respect to synodality. At times this borders on despair, since it is clear that the German bishops have no interest in listening to the universal Church, leaving little hope that the Germans will self-correct. The impression is that they have an agenda to change the Church, and they want to force their vision on the universal Church.
The German bishops have received rebukes from Cardinal prefects of key Vatican dicasteries (Cardinals Ouellet and Ladaria and Parolin), an open letter of 103 Cardinals and Bishops from around the world, a very public exchange with one Archbishop from the United States, along with countless other calls for caution, including from the Polish and Scandinavian bishops, not to mention deep reservations expressed by the Holy Father himself.
And yet the Germans carry on as if none of this has occurred and act as if they are endowed with a special mission to save the Church. This reveals a level of arrogance that suggests a rejection of the spirit of synodality as promoted by the Holy Father. The Germans, in this respect, have rejected the Holy Father’s vision of a humble, listening church that remains Catholic.
It is also telling that none of the more than 270 bishops from the United States have expressed support for the German bishops. Apart from a few exceptions in northern Europe, the worldwide episcopate has also offered no encouragement. This silence is significant. The German church has largely isolated itself and yet does not seem to care.
One of the deepest concerns that I have heard from key voices here in the United States is that the Germans will undermine a potentially important initiative from the Holy Father. While there are serious concerns over the emphasis of process and the initial documents produced by the Synodal Way, the movement toward a more synodal Church has possibilities that are being hijacked by an ideologically driven cohort of bishops from Germany. Should they continue to dominate the conversation, the good that is potentially within reach will be lost to the self-centered interests of the German church. Whatever opportunity there is of the Church widening her perspective in a fruitful and genuinely Catholic way will be lost to the noise around the efforts of the German bishops to fundamentally change key teachings of the Church.
The impression here is that the German Church is motivated by a desire to attract more people back to church through an accommodation of the zeitgeist. More secularization is the path to growth, so the Germans propose. And yet this is the exact opposite experience of the church in the United States. The local churches and communities that are growing here are the ones that are uncompromisingly faithful to all the Church’s teachings. This seems to be the case in other continents as well, most especially Africa. It is a shame that the German bishops do not wish to learn from the experience of others.
The liberalization of the United States Church in the 1970s and 1980s led to a mass exodus from the pews, but this trend has been reversed in those pockets of faith where an evangelical spirit, rooted in a personal relationship with Jesus, and the fullness of the Church’s teachings is celebrated. It is in the parishes that teach the faith lovingly and unapologetically that are filled with young families, not those who have succumbed to the spirit and values of the age.
This is a primary reason for the suspicion of the direction of the Church in Germany. These same efforts failed in the United States forty years ago and continue to fail today. Liberalizing the faith does not bring people back into the pews. What works is a counter-witness to the zeitgeist—one that is loyal to the faith in all her beauty, which is ever ancient and ever new. It is the mystery of the fullness of the faith that is attractive. I wrote about one example of this recently that perhaps can be instructive to the German bishops.
Others here in the United States question the financial relationship between the German Catholic Church and the government. The arrangement of a faith tax is not familiar to the American experience, and there is naturally great distrust of government involvement in church affairs here in the United States. It seems that there is at least a smell of practical compromise by the German church to maintain the sizable flow of tax dollars. Whether or not this is the case, it is an impression that exists and makes the motivations of the Germans suspect.
It has also been observed that the German bishops frequently use their experience of clerical sexual abuse as a reason for an aggiornamento that walks away from key teachings of the Church. Again, here in the United States, the answer has not been to accommodate the values of sexual liberalization but to hold onto the teachings of the Church more fully. Using the failure of German episcopal leadership to aggressively push the universal Church to follow their judgement regarding moral law is, well, curious. It takes a level of arrogance that will surely lead to more leadership failures.
Some have argued that the German church more closely reflects the mind of the Holy Father with respect to synodality. This, too, is a curious claim, almost laughable, since it is the German bishops who have been rebuked by the Vatican. It is the Germans who have been single-minded in pursuit of heterodoxy through their Synodal Path. In fact, the poll commissioned by the German bishops revealed that their efforts do not reflect even those around the world closest to the German Church. There is a theological and ecclesiological imperialism coming from Germany that threatens the global Church.
The fear regarding the German efforts is real, but there is hope that the Holy See will intervene. Only the Holy Father can bring the crisis created by the Germans to an end, and there is an expectation here in the United States that in time he will act decisively to stop the confusion the German bishops have created. It will come at a cost of confusion being sowed, but there is an expectation that the Germans will be corrected.
How they take that correction is another question altogether.
Source: catholic world report