German priest quits diocese over Fiducia supplicans implementation

An 86-year-old German Catholic priest has publicly cut ties with his diocese in protest at its embrace of Fiducia supplicans.

Father Winfried Abel announced in an open letter that he will no longer identify as a priest of the Diocese of Fulda, northern Germany. The diocese is led by Bishop Michael Gerber, who supports women’s ordination, married priests, and blessings for same-sex unions.

Fr Abel cited the diocese’s official support for a local “Christopher Street Day” gay pride parade and new Church policies permitting blessings for homosexual unions as reasons for his decision.

Fr Abel sharply criticised diocesan leaders for endorsing the pride parade in Fulda. Vicar General Martin Stanke had published a welcoming message to participants of the event on the diocesan website. In response, Fr Abel’s letter denounced so-called “pride marches” as “a colourful display of perversions, the glorification of tasteless obscenities, and a spectacle of the loss of the sense of modesty”. He argued the Church should not congratulate or bless behaviour that “exceeded the bounds of decency and morality”, linking the spirit of LGBT “Pride” to the sin of pride that led to man’s fall in Genesis.

The priest also condemned his diocese’s willingness to bless same-sex unions in church. Fr Abel lambasted this development, saying the Church cannot bless a relationship “clearly directed against God and the order of His creation.” He observed that “if a homosexual couple asks the Church to bless them to confirm their way of life, the Church must refuse this blessing!”. Such blessings, in Fr Abel’s view, are a capitulation to the zeitgeist. “A Church that bows to the spirit of the times ends up being taken seriously by no one,” he warned, accusing those who invoke Fiducia supplicans to justify these practices of “interpreting the word of God ideologically” and setting up “their own magisterium.”

After six decades of ministry in Fulda, Fr Abel proclaimed that he can no longer in good conscience remain part of the local hierarchy. In his letter’s conclusion, he stated that henceforth he will call himself a “priest of the Roman Catholic Church” rather than of Fulda. He stressed that only fidelity to the Pope’s ministry in Rome guarantees the Church will not fall to error, invoking Christ’s promise that “the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” That promise, Fr Abel wrote, “is no longer guaranteed to the Church of Fulda.”

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