Eleven dead in Austria school shooting
POPE LEO XIV expressed his condolences to the families affected by a shooting at a secondary school in Graz, Austria, on Tuesday, in which 11 people were killed. At least 30 were hospitalised when a 21-year-old former student opened fire at the Dreierschützengasse high school. He then killed himself. One victim remains in a life-threatening condition. The country has declared three days of national mourning; its Chancellor, Christian Stocker, described it as “a dark day in the history of our country”, an act of “unimaginable violence”, and a “national tragedy that has shocked us all”. In his General Audience on Wednesday, the Pope said: “My thoughts are with the families, the teachers, and the students.” He asked God to “welcome these children into his peace”.
Dr Rowe resolves complaint against Bishop Andrus
THE Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States, Dr Sean Rowe, has reached an accord with the former Bishop of California the Rt Revd Marc Andrus to resolve a disciplinary complaint against him. Bishop Andrus, who retired in July after 18 years as a diocesan bishop, was restricted in his ordained ministry last year owing to “a credible allegation of an inappropriate relationship with an adult” (News, 18 October 2024). The restriction was issued by the Rt Revd Mary Gray-Reeves in her position as presiding bishop-designate in Title IV matters involving bishops. In a statement on Thursday of last week, Dr Rowe said that the allegation “was investigated by a professional with Title IV expertise”, and that, after reviewing the report, the Reference Panel for Bishops referred the matter to Dr Rowe to seek an accord with Bishop Andrus. “Under the terms of the accord, Bishop Andrus will remain suspended from ministry until I am satisfied that he has demonstrated sufficient amendment of life to permit his return.” Bishop Andrus would “undergo a thorough psychological evaluation” and “continue the counselling and spiritual work he began voluntarily when he learned about the complaint. The accord also provides for appropriate care for the pastoral and therapeutic needs of the complainant.”
US Episcopal and Bavarian Churches sign accord
THE Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States, Dr Sean Rowe, and the head of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria, the Rt Revd Christian Kopp, have signed the Augsburg Agreement, after a eucharist at St Matthew’s Lutheran Church in Munich, Germany, on Saturday. The full-communion agreement, which establishes “a new foundation for ecumenical relationships between Lutheran and Anglican Churches”, has been a decade in the making, the Episcopal News Service reports. In his sermon, Dr Rowe said that, by signing, the two Churches were “proving wrong the ways of the world. We have worked long and hard to finalise this agreement, and along the way we have reached across our differences to deepen our appreciation of one another and the ways we have served God over time. Our theologies may have differed over the course of our histories, but we are united in our desire to offer to the world a model of leadership that is, in today’s world, deeply countercultural.”
