Austrian Bishop Joins Kasper & Co.

His Excellence Manfred Bishop Scheuer

You may recall the name of Bishop Manfred Scheuer from a story that broke earlier this summer. He's the bishop who authorized the suspension of Fr. Thomas Ladner as catechist for the apparently insufferable crime of teaching his students on the last things, including judgment, heaven, hell and purgatory - subject matter explicitly rejected by the Diocese of Innsbruck as being "outmoded" and "antediluvian."

It made no difference that the teachings were received with great interest and enthusiasm by the students, that it helped to strengthen the faith of the entire parish, and that they all rushed to defend their beloved pastor from this bizarre judgment.

Many of the parishioners naively assumed there had been some failure in communication; that perhaps the diocese thought Fr. Ladner was teaching error. Upon clarification, however, it was made obvious that it was precisely because he was teaching the orthodox Catholic faith that he was no longer wanted as a catechist in the diocese.

If that action left any trace of doubt regarding the heterodoxy of Bishop Scheuer in the minds of readers, full confirmation of the same is now available. In an interview with Austrian ORF yesterday, the bishop announced that he holds the same position on the reception of Holy Communion by the divorced and remarried as that of the German Cardinals Kasper and Marx.

Given the theological views of Cardinal Kapser, as well as the ecclesiological views of Cardinal Marx, is anyone surprised to find a man who takes an equally heterodox position on things eschatological agree with them in their machinations to override magisterial teaching with pastoral graduality?