According to the tactics of bombing and occupying the ground, which we see implemented in a war on our doorstep, the President of the German Bishops’ Conference (DBK), Bishop Georg Bätzing, has declared his desire for changes in teaching of the Church on sexuality.
Msgr. Bätzing, bishop of the diocese of Limburg, gave an interview to the Bunten newspaper on Thursday, March 3, 2022. He spoke out in favor of a revision of the Church’s teachings on sexuality: “We must partly modify catechism,” he said.
To the journalist who questioned him, he concedes that “no one” adheres to the teaching of the Church according to which sexuality should only be practiced within marriage: “It’s true, he admits . “And we have to change the catechism a bit on this issue.” He adds what will serve as his argument: “Sexuality is a gift from God and not a sin.
Which allows him to answer the question: are homosexual relations allowed? “Yes,” he says, “it’s acceptable if it’s done faithfully and responsibly. It does not affect the relationship with God. And he gives an example: “Jens Spahn, for example, is a good Catholic.
* Jens Spahn: German politician, member of the CDU, elected to the Bundestag in 2002. He was Minister of Health. Of Catholic faith, he lives with Daniel Funke, a journalist with the Bunten newspaper.
Msgr. Bätzing adds, regarding people employed by the Church: “No one should be afraid of losing their job because of their sexuality. How someone lives their personal intimacy is none of my business,” he concludes.
As Martin Brüske, a professor at the University of Friborg in Switzerland, pointed out in an interview with CNA Deutsche, Bishop Bätzing’s argument is a (very) crude sophistry: “Georg Bätzing implies that the catechism, and therefore the Church tradition says that sexuality is a sin. But where to find such an affirmation in the catechism or in the tradition of the Church?
On the contrary, the Church has always considered such a view to be erroneous. Need we recall the battles of the Fathers and theologians against all those who condemned sexuality like the Manichaeans or the Cathars. Saint Augustine and Saint Dominic, to name but a few, stand before the sophist of Limburg.
Professor Brüske aptly continues: “By contrasting this fallacy with his second assertion, that sexuality is a gift from God, without restriction, the whole question is removed from morality. It is no longer necessary to distinguish the way in which sexuality is practiced.
On the contrary, we must remember that the Church has always ordered sexuality to conjugal love between a man and a woman. Bishop Bätzing’s position justifies the theory of desire according to which all sexual desire, as long as it is lived in a “faithful and responsible” way, is moral.
Bishop Bätzing also spoke out in favor of ending compulsory celibacy. “Priests must be able to live marriage and the family, it is not un-Christian. It’s just unusual.
Likewise, he could very well imagine that “women entering the ordained ministry, deaconesses would be a first step…. The tradition that you always have to be a man no longer holds, I feel it in our communities. We need the strength of women.
In this second proposal, it is no longer a question of changing a discipline dating back to the Apostles, but of going against a given of the faith. But he doesn’t care. And Rome continues to be silent.
