Karel Otčenášek

Karel Otčenášek ( born April 13, 1920 in České Meziříčí, † 23 May, 2011 in Hradec Králové ) was a Czech Roman Catholic bishop in the Diocese of Hradec Kralove. 1998 awarded him the Pope 's personal title of archbishop. He was the senior bishop of the universal Church.

Life

Karel Otčenášek was the son of a wheelwright. From 1931 he attended the Archdiocesan high school in Prague and began in 1939 to study theology in Hradec Kralove. Even before the war he was sent by Bishop Mořic Pícha to study in Rome. There he acquired at the Pontifical Collegium Nepomucenum the Pontifical Lateran University, the theological licentiate and was ordained priest on 17 March 1945.

After the war he returned to his home and worked as a chaplain in Týnec nad Labem, Pardubice and in Horni Rovni at Žamberk. From October 1949 he was Vice-Rector of Königgrätzer Seminary, which was, however, already closed in 1950 by the ruling since February 1948 overthrow communist rulers of Czechoslovakia. After Bishop Mořic Pícha was interned at his residence since early 1950, and his episcopate was not allowed to exercise, he consecrated with the approval of Pope Pius XII. the first thirty years of Karel Otčenášek on 30 April 1950 in the Episcopal chapel of St. Charles Borromeo bishop. At the same time the Pope Karel Otčenášek appointed Titular Bishop of Chersonesus in Crete as well as auxiliary bishop in Hradec Kralove and authorized him if it should be necessary to take over the leadership of the diocese.

Tracking

Since the consecration was done secretly and without the consent of the state authorities, Karel Otčenášek was arrested and in 1951 transferred to a detention center for priests and religious in the monastery Seelau, where the archbishop of Prague František Tomasek was imprisoned. After unsuccessful attempts reeducation Otčenášek was brought to the detention center Pardubice in 1953 and 1954 were preceded in Hradec Kralove in a show trial, the interrogations, solitary confinement, psychological and physical pressure, sentenced to 13 years in prison for high treason.

He spent the next years in the prisons of Hradec Kralove, Mírov, Leopoldov and others. Even after the dismissal by way of amnesty in May 1962, he was not allowed to pastoral work and worked until 1965 in a dairy in Opočno.

After an intervention by Pope Paul VI. he was allowed from 1965, although as a pastor in Trmice in Ústí nad Labem be active, but remained under observation by the security authorities and was not allowed to leave the place. During the political liberalization under Alexander Dubček he was from 1968 to 1973 in his diocese as pastor of Hradec Kralove Hradec Kralove suburb Plotiště nad Labem work. Although he rehabilitated during the Prague Spring of 1968 and the judgment of 1954 was repealed as unlawful, he was allowed from 1973 again no longer work in his diocese, as the political reforms leading to the so-called normalization has been withdrawn. Otčenášek had to go back to the remote Trmice, where he was again under surveillance by state security services.

Bishop

Only after the Velvet Revolution of 1989 Karel Otčenášek could begin in early 1990 the episcopate in Hradec Kralove, for which he had been consecrated nearly forty years before. At the official inauguration on January 27, 1990, inter alia, participated President Vaclav Havel and Archbishop of Paris Jean -Marie Lustiger.

As bishop, he undertook all efforts to build the church life in his diocese and the pastoral care of the communities again. He led the most necessary repairs of churches, chapels and presbyteries. With financial support from the Austrian Diocese of St. Pölten the Bishop's Palace was repaired. In the former Jesuit College, a center for culture, pastoral care and evangelism was established and named after the patron saint Adalbert, Nové Adalbertinum '. On the financing of this measure, sponsors from Austria, Germany and the Swiss canton of Thurgau involved. The Archbishop's School, founded in 1992 was named the born in Hradec Kralove Jesuit Bohuslav Balbin.

He donated his Auxiliary Bishop Joseph Kajnek (1992) and his successor Dominik Duka (1998) involved a bishop and was in the joint consecration of suffragan bishops of Olomouc January Graubner and Joseph Hrdlicka in April 1990.

Former Bishop

For reasons of age Karel Otčenášek gave up the post on 26 September 1998. He was until his death chairman of the commission, Justice and Peace ' of the Czech Bishops' Conference. He sat down for the reparation and compensation for the wrongfully persecuted and condemned pastors, religious priests and nuns as well as of political prisoners and for the recording of their painful experiences a ( book series: Kaminky ).

Honors and titles

For his services he Pope John Paul II in 1998 granted the personal title of archbishop. As early as 1995 drew him to the Czech Republic from the named after Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk Order, First Class. The Charles University awarded him its Gold Medal, the University of Hradec Kralove an honorary doctorate. The villages Týnec nad Labem, České Meziříčí, Trmice and Rudoltice appointed him honorary citizen. In 2000 Otčenášek was a signatory to the Memorandum of the Catholic Student Association Pragensis Prague and whose only honorary member.

Publications

• Tesserae: Small testimonials about the persecution of Christians during the time of communist totality and on their efforts for the freedom and welfare of the fatherland initiator and patronage: Mons. ThLic. Otčenášek; translated into German by Wilhelm custom. 1st ed - Hradec Králové: Diocese of Hradec Králové, 2004, 237 pp.; . 21 cm. ISBN 80-239-2992-5 ( paperback )