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In the bustling heart of Catholicism that is Rome, Archbishop Georg Gänswein once stood as a close aide to Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI. On Tuesday, the former prefect of the Papal Household found himself seeking solace in a tiny Bavarian hamlet called Maria Vesperbild, which typically boasts a modest population of 34.
A German cardinal was publicly criticized by the powerful Central Committee of German Catholics (ZdK) on Monday for formally warning a priest over same-sex blessings in the Archdiocese of Cologne.
The Catholic Church in Germany is facing an unprecedented crisis, with more than half a million baptized Catholics leaving the Church in 2022, according to figures released by the German Bishops’ Conference on June 28.
This past weekend, a German bishop and a German state premier took part in an initiative to bring bells stolen by the Nazis during World War II to their rightful homes in Poland.
Birgit Kelle, spokeswoman for the German lay group Neuer Anfang (New Beginning) in a May 29 interview with EWTN Noticias explained that its members reject the Synodal Path initiated by the Church in Germany because they want to “remain Catholic.”
Pope Francis on Wednesday met briefly with a group of abuse victims who undertook a bicycle pilgrimage from Germany to Rome this month to ask the pope to do everything in his power to heal and prevent abuses in the Catholic Church.
The Prefect of the Vatican Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments has intervened against the implementation of resolutions of the German Synodal Way that demand lay people should be able to regularly baptize and preach the homily at Holy Mass in churches across Germany.
Pope Francis accepted the resignation of a German bishop on Saturday who played a key role in the German Synodal Way and had come under pressure over his handling of clerical sexual abuse in his diocese.
A peal of Church bells will ring out across Germany in mourning for Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI on Thursday, the day of his funeral.
An advisory body of sexual abuse survivors on Monday called for canonical procedures against the vice president of the German Bishops’ Conference.
The German Synodal Way was designed from the outset to avoid legal sanctions while simultaneously creating “pressure” on the Church to change Catholic teaching, one of the founders of the process told German media Friday.
Pope Francis addressed the fight for women’s equality during a press conference aboard the papal plane to Rome on Sunday.