Archdiocese of Munich – A report with explosive power as far as Rome
Lawyers investigate how abuse is handled in the archdiocese
The new year has just begun and the church news is once again dominated by the subject of abuse. Because when the Munich abuse report is published, it is also about Joseph Ratzinger.
By Christian Wölfel (KNA) | Munich – 01/10/2022
In the third calendar week of the new year, not only Catholic Germany WILL look to Munich. Even in Rome many a prelate, cardinal and also the Pope emeritus Benedict XVI. Are very interested in the results that the lawyers of the law firm Westpfahl Spilker Wastl (WSW) have discovered in almost two years of research. In essence, the question is: When did who know about sexual abuse and how did they act or not? The period from 1945 to 2019 is illuminated.
The Munich report is not the first of this art to be presented in Germany. The firm itself has already created one for the Diocese of Aachen and the Archdiocese of Cologne. The first was published, the other was not. The latest, however, should be the explosive one. Unlike in the Archdiocese of Cologne, three of the highest are still alive in the Munich case, three of the highest are still alive in the Munich case: Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI.), Cardinal Friedrich Wetter and Cardinal Reinhard Marx.
Many acts of abuse are attributed to Peter H.
It is no surprise that the public’s interest is primarily directed towards Joseph Ratzinger’s five-year tenure in Munich. Because even at the beginning of the abuse scandal in 2010, the person of the then incumbent Pope was in focus. Even the “New York Times” reports extensively. Specifically, it is about dealing with a priest to whom a particularly large number of deeds are ascribed.
Peter H. came from the Diocese of Essen in 1980 to undergo therapy in Bavaria, after he had already attacked as a chaplain. But a short time after his move to the Isar, he was again used in pastoral care – and again overriding. A total of 29 people in Munich and Essen are meanwhile on record. It could well be more, they say. Even when H. was sentenced to a suspended sentence by the Ebersberg District Court in 1986, that did not prevent the authorities from reinstating him in a parish.
It was not until 2010 that he was withdrawn from pastoral care. Today he lives under certain conditions in the diocese of Essen. These are also continuously monitored, it says there. In addition, a canonical procedure against the clergy is ongoing, which is about to be concluded, according to the local press office.
What is exciting about the case is whether the new report supports the statement with which the archdiocese quoted the vicar general Gerhard Gruber, who was in office in 1980, in 2010. He therefore takes sole responsibility for the fact that H. was allowed to work as a pastor again under Archbishop Ratzinger. The 2010 incumbent Pope Benedict XVI. War with it relieved. Doubts about this version have never died down.
The same can be said of the WSW law firm itself. For example, the Cologne lawyer Carsten Brenn accused his colleagues in Munich of having problems with standards of expression law, in particular the hearing of the parties. Because of this allegation, among other things, Cardinal Rainer Maria Woelki decided in spring 2020 not to leave the expert opinion on the proceedings in Cologne, which was also commissioned by WSW. Brennecke was one of the archbishopric’s advisors on this matter.
Is the commissioned law firm biased?
Another accusation made by the lawyer is that WSW, as the “house chancellery” of the Ordinariate in Munich, is not independent. It’s no secret that the lawyers from the Lehel district work time and again for the Archdiocese of Munich and Freising. In 2010, Marion Westpfahl was responsible for the first ever abuse report in a German diocese. After studying the files, she certified that the clergy had ruthless protection of their own class and that the archdiocese of the commissioning archdiocese had an “unconditional willingness to enlighten”.
However, their results, summarized in a thick red book, were never published in full. Reference was made to data protection. Such reservations should not apply to the new report. Publication lies solely in the hands of the lawyers, according to the ordinariate. You don’t have any influence. Cardinal Marx will not see it until it is published. At least that is what the law firm WSW does not tire of emphasizing.
Even if nobody knows what conclusions the lawyers will come to: personal consequences are quite conceivable. Cardinal Marx wanted to resign in the early summer of last year in order to take responsibility, expressly also for possible mistakes of his predecessor. Pope Francis denied him that, but Marx did not rule out biting him again. In any case, one thing is already certain: the results have the potential to make international headlines.
By Christian Wölfel (KNA)