Germany has three vacancies, but no ordinary over 75. The U.S. will have 12 on Saturday, and seven of those are 76 or older. With Cardinal Prevost getting his legs under him, it seems to me the simplest explanation for delayed appointments is right there in Luke's final line: bureaucracy.
An even simpler explanation is the idea that the Germans have the habit of being easily offended, seem to think that they are "special" and should be treated as "special" and can have a "superiority" complex.
Give the stats above regarding the time between appointments in other countries Germany is not being targeted for poor treatment.
Some in the German Church just feel "entitled."
They do send an awful lot of state extracted "Church" money to Rome, maybe they'll try that to leverage what they desire. Rome, in its ambiguous handling of the "Synodal Way" has not seemed to concerned about this.
I think implying that Francis has some grand plan to punish the German episcopate over the Synodal Way fight suggests a coherence and aptitude within Rome that does not align with evidence.
But if you were to say he's finding it hard to find any priest who wants to walk into this minefield, or Francis feels he can't trust any candiate in Germany to be loyal... I actually buy that one pretty strongly.
How is there no edit or delete option? *sigh*
I took care of it for you!
Germany has three vacancies, but no ordinary over 75. The U.S. will have 12 on Saturday, and seven of those are 76 or older. With Cardinal Prevost getting his legs under him, it seems to me the simplest explanation for delayed appointments is right there in Luke's final line: bureaucracy.
An even simpler explanation is the idea that the Germans have the habit of being easily offended, seem to think that they are "special" and should be treated as "special" and can have a "superiority" complex.
Give the stats above regarding the time between appointments in other countries Germany is not being targeted for poor treatment.
Some in the German Church just feel "entitled."
They do send an awful lot of state extracted "Church" money to Rome, maybe they'll try that to leverage what they desire. Rome, in its ambiguous handling of the "Synodal Way" has not seemed to concerned about this.
I think implying that Francis has some grand plan to punish the German episcopate over the Synodal Way fight suggests a coherence and aptitude within Rome that does not align with evidence.
But if you were to say he's finding it hard to find any priest who wants to walk into this minefield, or Francis feels he can't trust any candiate in Germany to be loyal... I actually buy that one pretty strongly.
After the recent article about Cardinal Pizzaballa, I wonder if the Vatican will become more open to missionary Bishops in countries like Germany.
Great analysis! Thanks for writing this! It was a very informative.