(ZENIT News / Augsburg, 02.22.2024).- From February 19th to 22nd, the Conference of Catholic Bishops of Germany held its General Assembly in Augsburg. This was the first meeting for all Catholic bishops in the country after the Synod on Synodality that the Catholic Church held globally in the Vatican in October 2023. The objective of this meeting of the German episcopate was the approval of the founding document of a Synodal Council, which ultimately was not voted on, at the Pope’s prohibition. The discussions over these four days revolved around three themes: 1) responsible handling of authority, 2) strengthening the separation of powers in the Church, and 3) stricter implementation of accountability requirements for officials.
One of the measures arising from this Assembly is that a bishop will personally oversee queer pastoral care (a term borrowed from English defined as ‘strange’ or ‘unusual’. It relates to a sexual or gender identity that does not correspond to established rules of sexuality and gender), as a representative. This is the auxiliary bishop of Essen, Ludger Schepers. It was noted that until now there were only representatives for queer pastoral care at the diocesan level, so this is the first time that this position exists at the level of the German Episcopal Conference. They also approved an «inclusive» and «simpler language» prayer.
The Assembly also planned the pilgrimage of altar servers to Rome for this coming summer, published a new document on ethics of peace, and distanced themselves from what they call the extreme right-wing party, citing the political party AfD by name.
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