Episcopal Office Erfurt-Meiningen

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Episcopal Office Erfurt-Meiningen was a church administration of the Democratic German Republic (GDR) lying diocese shares of the Roman Catholic dioceses of Fulda and Würzburg and the direct predecessor of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Erfurt . The areas of the Diocese of Fulda were in West and Central Thuringia, those of the Diocese of Würzburg in South Thuringia .

Emergence

Due to the division of Germany and the increasing handicap from the GDR, it became more and more difficult for the bishops in Fulda and Würzburg to administer their diocese areas in what is now Thuringia . For the territories in the Soviet zone of occupation , the Episcopal-Fulda General Vicariate was founded in Erfurt in 1946 and an Episcopal Commissariat of the Diocese of Würzburg in Meiningen . The Würzburg deaneries Meiningen and Saalfeld were also raised to the general vicariate in 1959.

1973 which formed Holy See in the course of a reorganization of the Catholic Church in the GDR by decree the "Episcopal Office Erfurt-Meiningen" based in Erfurt . The legal affiliation to the dioceses of Fulda and Würzburg continued to exist, but the jurisdiction of the bishops of Fulda and Würzburg over their areas in Thuringia was suspended.

With effect from July 8, 1994 , the Episcopal Office Erfurt-Meiningen was raised by the Holy See in Rome to the "Diocese of Erfurt". The Thuringian areas were spun off from the dioceses of Fulda and Würzburg. Pope John Paul II appointed Titular Bishop Joachim Wanke, who had been the administrator until then, as diocesan bishop . The dean's office Geisa remained because of its close ties with the diocese of Fulda. For the Meiningen region, this meant the end of almost 1,000 years of membership in the Würzburg diocese.

→ See also: Deanery Meiningen

management

The episcopal office of Erfurt-Meiningen was headed by an apostolic administrator who held the title of titular bishop . The apostolic administrator was Hugo Aufderbeck from 1973 to 1981 . Karl Ebert , previously Episcopal Commissioner in Meiningen, became Auxiliary Bishop in the Episcopal Office of Erfurt-Meiningen in 1973 . Joachim Meisner succeeded him as auxiliary bishop in 1975 . After Meisner took over the office of bishop in Berlin in May 1980 , Joachim Wanke was appointed coadjutor of the apostolic administrator in the Episcopal Office of Erfurt-Meiningen in the autumn of the same year and, after Aufderbeck's death, held the office of apostolic from January 1981 to 1994 Administrators. Hans-Reinhard Koch was auxiliary bishop from 1985.

swell