VATICAN CITY (LifeSiteNews) — Bishop Athanasius Schneider has expressed gratitude to Pope Leo XIV for granting him an audience on Thursday, stating he was impressed with the Holy Father’s “attentiveness and understanding.”
Wishing the details of the meeting to remain confidential, the auxiliary bishop from Kazakhstan did issue a comment to Vatican reporter Diane Montagna.
“I am deeply grateful to Pope Leo XIV for granting me a private audience, during which I was able to share several proposals aimed at the spiritual good of the Church,” the traditional prelate shared.
“I was impressed by the Holy Father’s attentiveness and understanding. Let us pray for Pope Leo XIV, that he may strengthen the faith, and promote justice and peace in the liturgical life of the Church,” the bishop concluded.
While the substance of the conversation between Schneider and the pontiff remains confidential, during an interview in May, just four days following the papal election, journalist Matt Gaspers asked the bishop what advice he would offer the Holy Father if asked.
“First, I would ask him to do his first task: to confirm, to strengthen all the faithful in faith, as Jesus gave it to Peter, and to him also (as the successor of Peter),” Schneider replied. “This is his first task” (Luke 22:32).
He also focused on three topics which have been points of confusion in the life of the Church. These include:
- “Truth about the uniqueness of Jesus Christ as the only way to salvation, and that other religions are not means of grace or ways of salvation. Must be stated with a crystal-clear affirmation.
- “The divine order of human sexuality must be addressed in a highly clear formula. The main topics which concern this theme, which in our day are evidently causing so much confusion in the Church, are regarding the intrinsic immorality and evilness of homosexual acts and lifestyle and then divorce. This must be stressed. And the indissolubility of marriage.
- “To make a solemn or definitive clarification regarding the sacrament of ordination, establishing that the sacrament of orders – since it is in one sacrament in three grades of episcopacy, preliterate and diaconate – are by divinely established right reserved to the faithful of male sex.”
With regards to the liturgy, Schneider expanded on his previous condemnation of Pope Francis’ restriction of the traditional Mass as contained in Traditionis Custodes, calling for the document to be rescinded.
It is really a humiliation, a persecution of a part of the faithful and also a rejection of the entire tradition of the liturgy of the Church. So this must be healed. He must restore the complete liberty of use of the liturgy of all ages.
Finally, Bishop Schneider suggested the new pope “must very carefully appoint bishops, because bishops should really be men of God, of Catholic faith. To this he should pay much attention.”
Montagna reported that Schneider’s audience with the pope lasted just over 30 minutes and was the first meeting between these two men who, while coming from very different geographies, share an Augustinian spirituality and common background serving the poor in South America.
While the pope grew up in a southern Chicago suburb, Schneider was raised in the Soviet Union.
The first American pope emerged from the Order of St. Augustine, serving as Superior General for two terms and an extensive ministry in Puru.
Schneider remains a member of the Canons Regular of the Holy Cross of Coimbra, a community which follows the Rule of St. Augustine. He further earned his doctorate in Patristics from the Pontifical Patristic Institute Augustinianum in Rome.
Additionally, he spent several years in Brazil on a mission where he received priestly formation, was ordained to the priesthood and served the poor.
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