An Example of the Priest Shortage in the Tyrolean Diocese of Innsbruck -- False Summary?

(Innsbruck) Next Sunday Bishop Manfred Scheuer of Innsbruck (in office since 2003) will ordain four deacons and priests. A joy for the church as a whole. Nevertheless, it is almost a zero-year for the Austrian diocese. Only one of the new priests ordained for the diocese and this is not from Tyrol, but from Ethiopia. The priesthood receives the Franciscan, John Unterberger from Upper Austria, the former Comboni missionary Korabza Kidane from Ethiopia, the Croatian-born Capuchin, Miro Matekic from Salzburg, and Carinthian Premonstratensian, Maximilian Stefan Thaler of Wilten near Innsbruck.

In 2012, Bishop Scheuer ordained five new priests, two of them for the Diocese of Innsbruck, the East Tyrolean Ferdinand Pittl and the Upper Silesian, Gabriel Thomalla from the Diocese of Opole who is completing his doctoral studies in Innsbruck. The other three new priests are the Tyrolean Premonstratensian, Adrian Gstrein of Wilten, the Tyrolean Jesuit Hans Brandl and the Indian, Julius Desouza, who was ordained for the Diocese of Basel.

2011, the Bishop scoured up only one new priest, the Tyrolean, Bernard Kopp, however, for this diocese.

2010, no ordination

2009, no ordination

2008,Bishop Manfred Scheuer consecrated two deacons and priests, including one for the diocese, the Tyrolean John Laichner. The second was a new priest of Tyrol, Premonstratensians, Jörg Schlechl for Wilten.

2007, Bishop Scheuer, two new priests, both Tyrolean and both for the Diocese of Innsbruck: Hans Jörg Pfurtscheller Sailer and Willi.

The deceased in January Innsbruck's 92 year old, Bishop Reinhold Stecher already desired during his tenure from 1980 to 1997, to resolve the problem of the shortage of priests by the abolition of celibacy and the admission of married men. He volunteered this point of view after his retirement. Most recently in 2011 he expressed sympathy for the rebels' call for disobedience by the priest who was the former Vicar General of Vienna Helmut Schüller, in which women priests were demanded. Stecher weight in for ORF and Tiroler Tageszeitung on his 90th Interviewed birthday, saying there "would be no objection" against a woman consecration in a "purely biblical-dogmatic".

Perhaps Bishop Stecher was himself the reason for the shortage of priests.

Text: Giuseppe Nardi Image: Wikicommons Link to katholisches...