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The 22 canons will surprisingly meet in Chur tomorrow Monday: they are supposed to choose the new pastor from a Roman list of three. Possibly a moderate one.
the Einsiedeln monastery abbot, Urban Federer, during his speech at the inauguration of the St. Peter and St. Paul Island Church on the island of Ufenau in 2018.
Photo: David Baer
Now The time has come: the 22 canons of the Diocese of Chur will meet in Chur on Monday morning to elect the successor to Bishop Vitus Huonder. This newspaper found out about this from a reliable source. The diocese’s information officer, Giuseppe Grazia, does not want to comment on this.
The election was postponed for years, but the current timing is a surprise. The election was supposed to be moderated only by the new apostolic nuncio, who is due to take office in Bern in January.
Traditionalist nuncio Thomas Gullickson, who resigned in late 2020, had repeatedly tried carrying a conservative candidate, and sent lists of names of priests loyal to Huonder to Rome. Apparently under the influence of liberal circles, a list of moderate candidates has recently been circulating among the clergy. So, for example, Richterswil pastor Mario Pinggera (51), Horgner pastor Adrian Lüchinger (55), Lucerne pastor Ruedi Beck (56) and Episcopal vicar Joseph Maria Bonnemain (72), who belongs to the powerful and controversial elite organization Opus Dei.
It would also be a favorite of the moderate wing: DLucerne Shepherd Ruedi Beck.
Photo: Ueli Abt
The base wing favorite was also on the list: Urban Federer (51), abbot of the Einsiedeln Monastery. More interested in aesthetics and spirituality than church politics, the Zurich resident enjoys the reputation of a moderate and honest ecclesiastic. The portal Kath.ch He recently appointed two other abbots as bishopric candidates: Vigeli Monn (55), abbot of the Benedictine monastery of Disentis, and Ticino Mauro Giuseppe Lepori (61), former abbot of Hauterive and currently abbot general of the Cistercians in Rome.
Skepticism among believers
However, many believers view the choice with skepticism: the 22 canons are mostly conservative and share the course of Vitus Huonder and hismeter former Vicar General Martin Grichting. 15 voters are between 65 and 90 years old. After all, Pope Francis seems to have recognized the unusually difficult situation in the diocese for decades. When the unpopular Vitus Huonder offered his resignation in 2017 when he turned 75, Francisco initially left him in office for two more years. 2019 then puttAs an extraordinary measure, he welcomed Pierre Bürcher, former Bishop of Reyk, from Valais.javik, temporarily to the Apostolic Administrator.
Catholics on the ground hope that Pope Francis has made the election of the bishop of Chur a top priority and created the list of three himself. The Jesuit in the chair of Peter likes to elevate the religious to the highest positions. So that the Benedictines Urban Federer and Vigeli Monn have a good opportunity. It would not be the first time that the Holy See relies on religious to solve the problemsecondIt consists in calming Chur: in 1993 he had appointed the Jesuit Peter Henrici and the Marianist Paul Vollmar as auxiliary bishops in the diocese of Chur, and in 1998 the Benedictine Amédée Grab even as bishop.
