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Vatican investigator closes Austrian seminary

By Catholic News Service

SANKT POLTEN, Austria (CNS) -- In consultation with the Vatican and the local bishop, a Vatican-appointed investigator has announced the closing of the seminary in the Diocese of Sankt Polten "effective immediately."

Austrian Bishop Klaus Kung of Feldkirch, whom Pope John Paul II appointed to investigate the diocese and its seminary where thousands of pornographic photographs had been found on computers, made the announcement Aug. 12.

The bishop, in a statement published on the Sankt Polten diocesan Web site, said "several" of the seminarians were healthy, holy, committed men who would be assisted in finding a new place to continue their studies for the priesthood.

"Unfortunately," the bishop said, "serious erroneous trends" were found among many of the seminarians. He cited in particular the practice of viewing and downloading pornography from the Internet and the development of "active homosexual relations" among members of the seminary community.

Without directly criticizing Sankt Polten Bishop Kurt Krenn, Bishop Kung said, "Over the past years, too little attention was paid to the necessary criteria" for accepting candidates for the priesthood.

"The more pressing the lack of priests," Bishop Kung said, "the more balanced, more sincere and more virtuous must be those chosen to become priests."

In late July, Pope John Paul appointed Bishop Kung to make an apostolic visitation of the seminary and the diocese.

The appointment came after a student was arrested on charges relating to child pornography and after an Austrian magazine published photographs police had found on the seminary computers.

The seminary rector and vice rector resigned after the photos were published showing staff members and seminarians kissing and fondling each other.

Bishop Krenn initially downplayed the seriousness of the photos, saying they were part of a boyish prank during a Christmas party.

After Bishop Kung was appointed, Cardinal Christoph Schonborn of Vienna, president of the Austrian bishops' conference, said the bishops' conference and the nuncio to Austria had "warned for months" that Bishop Krenn was "dangerously ignoring the rules of recruitment" by admitting students to the Sankt Polten seminary without checking why they had been rejected elsewhere.

Bishop Kung said "all past and future candidates" for the priesthood in the Sankt Polten Diocese would undergo pastoral and psychological counseling for their own good and for the good of the church.

"It is a painful hour for the Diocese of Sankt Polten and for the church in all Austria," he said. "I am, however, convinced that in the end this will be good for the church."