The German Catholic news agency KNA reported Stephan Rixen has stepped down as head of the Independent Commission for the Investigation of Abuse in the Archdiocese of Cologne and has withdrawn from the body.

Mr Rixen told KNA on 5 December that his initial doubts about the independence and effectiveness of the committee had been confirmed.

The state government of North Rhine-Westphalia had appointed Rixen, a constitutional lawyer, to the committee made up of representatives of the diocese, scholars and people with practical expertise, as well as victims of abuse.

Rixen recalled a discussion the commission had with Woelki, the cardinal's office manager and the intervention officer of the archdiocese. The conversation about abuse allegations against Fr Winfried Pilz, a prominent priest, had left him with a "massive sense of unease," the lawyer said.

Rixen said he did not want to have to constantly ask himself whether someone was really telling him the truth. "I lack the confidence that a reappraisal that also affects Cardinal Woelki himself is really desired," he said.

Woelki is accused of not having initially informed the diocese about the abuse allegations against Pilz, who worked with a children's mission society.

KNA reported Rixen complained that a climate had arisen in which new "misunderstandings" may be intentionally arising "that always have the same result: Cardinal Woelki has made no mistakes".

Rixen said he had the impression that the majority of members of the Cologne commission did not want to come into conflict with the leadership of the archdiocese.

After accusations of the mishandling of priests accused of sex abuse, Woelki took a sabbatical from October 2021 to March 2022. He has submitted a letter of resignation to Pope Francis, who has not yet made a decision.

In a May meeting with editors of 10 Jesuit magazines in Europe, Francis said he was waiting to see how the situation in Cologne evolves.

"What is happening is that there are a lot of pressure groups, and under pressure, it is not possible to discern," Francis said. "To be able to discern, I am waiting until there is no pressure. The fact that there are different points of view is fine. The problem is when there is pressure. That does not help."

Sources

National Catholic Reporter

CathNews New Zealand

Municipal officials in Cologne say after consulting representatives of the city's 35 mosques, a two-year pilot project would be implemented. The project will then be re-evaluated and may be extended.

A few municipal rules have been developed to accompany the new provisions.

• Muezzins may call the faithful to Friday prayers, the holiest day of the week for Muslims, between 12 p.m. and 3 p.m.
• The call to prayer must not exceed five minutes.
• All mosques will have to first request authorization from the city and then comply with sound level regulations.
• Mosques must inform the inhabitants of the neighbourhood beforehand.
• Each community must designate a person to respond to possible complaints.

Henriette Reker, Cologne's mayor, says the project is a "sign of the mutual acceptance of religions".

"We take into account the legitimate religious interests of the many Muslims in our cosmopolitan city," said Reker who was attacked in 2015 by a knife-wielding, right-wing extremist.

"When we hear the call of the muezzin in addition to the bells of the churches in our city, it shows that diversity is valued and practiced in a real way in Cologne," she says.

Cologne's Catholic cathedral claims to house the bones of the Three Kings who attended Christ's Nativity. It is considered the tallest cathedral in the world. Cologne - a former bastion of Christianity, is also the seat of Germany's largest Catholic diocese.

Cologne is also home to 120,000 mainly Turkish Muslims, who make up 12 percent of the city's population.

They are welcoming the decision to allow the call to prayer.

"This measure demonstrates the establishment of Muslims who have been living in Germany for generations," says the Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs.

Bülent Ucar, director of the Institute of Islamic Theology at Osnabrück University, believes allowing the call to prayer is "overdue".

He's urging Muslim leaders not to use loudspeakers "so as not to disturb the neighbourhood too much".

Not everyone is on side with making the call to prayer public, however.

An ethnic Turkish CDU party MP says she "does not need the call to prayer to exercise her right to religion".

A colleague from the Social Democratic Party sees it as a way for the Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs to impose its views on opponents of the Turkish regime.

A Muslim psychologist says the experiment is a "naive, symbolic act" that "does not strengthen acceptance of Muslims, but leads to more divisions in society.

"In a secular society, it should not be a question of the presence of religion in the public sphere, but of freedom of belief," he says.

Strong opposition to the call to prayer is coming from Germany's far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD).

It claims the call to prayer "is an expression of a political demand for power, submission and Islamisation".

In the German cities that already allow the call to prayer, regulation is left to local authorities.

Source

• La Croix
• Image: DW