Vatican cardinal cites Nazi theology in German reform

By NICOLE WINFIELD
Associated Press

ROME (AP) — A new debate has erupted over the German Catholic Church’s reform process. A Vatican cardinal has appeared to compare the undertaking to the thinking that sustained Germany’s Nazi era. Swiss Cardinal Kurt Koch told a German Catholic newspaper that the German reform process was seeking to introduce new sources of divine revelation. Koch said that is what some pro-Nazi Protestants did when they “saw God’s new revelation in blood and soil and in the rise of Hitler.” The German bishops’ conference is pursuing reforms as a response to the clergy sex abuse scandal and the hemorrhaging of Catholic faithful. The head of the conference demanded a retraction from Koch, but the cardinal refused.