Roman Catholicism in Austria

The Roman Catholic Church in Austria is part of the worldwide Roman Catholic Church, under the leadership of Pope Francis, the Roman Curia and the Austrian Bishops' Conference. It is the largest membership of any religious denomination of Christianity in Austria. The end of 2013 were 62.4 % of the population member in the Roman Catholic Church. Self-designation of the church 's Catholic Church in Austria.

Structure

The Catholic Church in Austria is divided into two ecclesiastical provinces of Salzburg and Vienna, with a total of nine dioceses. The military bishop, who shall be named Titular Bishop of Wiener Neustadt, also has its headquarters in Vienna. Also, the abbot of the Territorial Abbey Wettingen - Mehrerau is a member of the Episcopal Conference, as the monastery is directly subordinate to the Holy See.

The boundaries of the nine dioceses roughly with the boundaries of the provinces. The most obvious differences is to make the Archdiocese of Vienna corresponding eastern part of Lower Austria and the eastern Tyrol, which is part of the Archdiocese of Salzburg.

In 2012, there were 3,053 Catholic parishes in Austria who are looked after pastorally 2,242 diocesan priests, 1,553 religious priests.

Stephan Turnovszky

History

Christianity came over the Romans in the area of ​​today's Austria. This is evidenced, for example, the martyr Florian of Lorch. In the turmoil of the Migration Christian structures were largely lost.

The Neuchristianisierung was in the Middle Ages, primarily through the 739 founded by Boniface dioceses of Passau and Salzburg. Numerous monasteries emerged: Mondsee ( 748 ), San Candido ( 769 ) Kremsmuenster ( 777 ), St. Florian ( around 800).

The Habsburg Rudolf the Founder left the church of St. Stephen in 1365 to rebuild the cathedral but it was only in 1469 Vienna became a separate diocese and independent of Passau.

From 1520 onwards, the Reformation spread to Austria. However, the Habsburgs operated the Counter-Reformation very energetic and after the Thirty Years' War, the country was Catholic again. In the tolerance patents (1781 and 1782 ) by Joseph II, religious freedom was guaranteed. Nevertheless, Catholicism remained in the Habsburg monarchy politically and socially dominant up to the end of 1918.

In the First Republic, the Catholic Church was very closely associated with the Christian Social Party. The attitude of the Church to National Socialism is ambivalent. The Anschluss was approved by the bishops, on the other hand, there was also a Catholic resistance ( Rosary demonstration ). The Nazis attempted by various harassment, such as expropriation, arrests, ban on preaching, the end of religious education, etc. the influence of the Catholic Church to diminish.

During the Second Republic, religious education was reintroduced and accepted the Concordat of 1933 by the government. Cardinal Franz König contributed to reconciliation with the Social Democrats and took first contacts with the Eastern Churches on. Pope John Paul II visited Austria in 1983, 1988 and 1998, Pope Benedict XVI. , 2007.

Since the affair Groër the numerous abuses of Catholic priests and religious led to the establishment of diocesan ombudsman and an ecclesiastical commission headed Waltraud Klasnics that have since investigated these incidents and compensate those affected. In the spring of 2013 organized some church-critical and critical of religion organizations and the affected platform Churches violence in an unsuccessful referendum against church privileges in Austria, the end of the Concordat and a state investigation of abuse cases.

Development

After the Second World War, the proportion of Roman Catholic members stagnate. Both 1951 and 1961 known to 89% of this religious denomination. The total number of Catholics took until 1971 to continue, as it reached its climax. But already in 1961, the share of Catholics in the total population due to the onset of immigration by members of other religions, and due to the increase of people without confession of 266,000 (1961 ) to 321,000 (1971 ), which is mainly due to defections from the Catholic Church, back. This percentage decline was all the more marked from 1971, the total number of Catholics is declining, while the number of people without confession to 2001 rose to 963,000 people.

In 2010, in connection with the abuse cases discussed at that time the number of Catholics leaving the church with 85 960 former reached its peak. Since then, this number has stabilized at about 50,000 annually outlets, the Catholic Church loses per year, about 1% of their members.

Not only the number of Catholics ( see table at right ), but also the number of participants in the Sunday celebration of Mass has steadily decreased in recent years and was, according to the ecclesiastical statistics in 2012 633 319 people (7.5% of total population) compared with 1.1 million subscribers ( 14% of total population) in 1995.