Word: betzner
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...bishop on Reformation Day. Next to go was the assistant pastor at Würzburg's Deutschhaus church, the Rev. Karl-Heinz Tillmann, 39, married and the father of three. But the final and most embarrassing blow came last month with the resignation of the Rev. Gerhard Betzner, the popular pastor of the church at Neuendettelsau, a stronghold of Bavarian Lutheranism...
Neuendettelsau is small (pop. 6,000), but it boasts the widely respected Augustana Theological University, a Lutheran hospital, and a Lutheran institute. Pastor Betzner, renowned for his homespun sermons, had raised church attendance and tripled the number of communions in his six years there...
...Betzner's letter told his parishioners that he no longer felt at home in the church. He was particularly displeased that a woman "apprentice pastor" was allowed to celebrate the Eucharist in his own parish, but he objected as well to new "lay preachers" who also were being allowed to infringe on the office of the ordained minister. "The church of God exists essentially through the spiritual office," Betzner said. "Without it, there is no grace." As for ordaining women, he contended that such a step is not based on Lutheran doctrine...
...Betzner and the others may of course have made their break in vain, especially if Rome eventually heeds a growing number of Catholic theologians who say that women can and should be ordained...
...What guarantee does Betzner have that the Catholics are not going to have women priests soon?" asked a young woman at Augustana. "The only thing left for him then is to convert to Islam...
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