Trier is a popular hunting ground for new bishops, if the last two appointments are an indication. First Germany’s oldest diocese lost its vicar general to Limburg and today one of its three auxiliary bishops is announced as the sevent bishop of the Diocese of Aachen. Bishop Helmut Dieser succeeds Heinrich Mussinghoff, who retired in December.
54-year-old Helmut Dieser was born in Neuwied, north of Koblenz, and studied Catholic theology and philosophy in Trier and Tübingen. He was ordained a priest in 1989 and in 1992 he was attached to theological faculty of Trier University, promoting there in 1998. From 2004 onward he worked as a parish priest and teacher of homiletics at the St. Lambert study house in Lantershofen. In 2011 he was appointed as auxiliary bishop of Trier and titular bishop of Narona, a former diocese in what is now southern Croatia. In the German Bishops’ Conference he is a member of the faith commission and the pastoral care commission.
The appointment of Bishop Dieser was announced at noon in Trier. Dean of the cathedral chapter Manfred von Holtum described the incoming ordinary like this. “I am happy that, with him, we receive a bishop in continuity with his predecessors, Bishop Heinrich Mussinghoff and Bishop Klaus Hemmerle, who is open to new pastoral directions. The new bishop of Aachen, Dr. Helmut Dieser, stands for synodality in the Church and especially for ecumenism.”
Bishop Karl Borsch, auxiliary bishop of Aachen and diocesan administrator during the sede vacante, added: “In the meetings of the German Bishops’ Conference I have gotten to know and appreciate Bishop Helmut Dieser as a spiritual and communicative person. In the Conference he is a member of the faith and pastoral care commissions, where his counsel as a proven theologian is asked. He is an experienced shepherd, and I know that, as such, he is looking forward to meeting the faithful and communities in our diocese.”
Bishop Stephan Ackermann of Trier described his erstwhile auxiliary bishop as a “man of the Church and a powerful witness of the Gospel”. He also underlined his communicative skills, in part due to Bishop Dieser’s experience in teaching homiletics.
Speaking in Trier, Bishop Dieser himself describes his new mission as something great, something big in his life. “But I can say yes to this great thing, since I am confident that I will draw nearer to God, answering Him, as I follow Jesus: in this new office. God’s call does not remain vague, it becomes tangible. As tangible as this hour and as tangibe as the Diocese of Aachen and its people.”
Bishop Dieser also discussed the topic of synodality, thanking Bishop Ackermann for calling and organising a synod in the Diocese of Trier in recent years. “The experience of the synod left a deep impression on me, and its results have given us a sense of which direction to look and proceed. What I have learned and experienced in the synod, I now want to take with me to Aachen. I was happy to find, in a speech from Bishop Heinrich Mussinghoff from 2011, that the Diocese of Aachen under his guidance has started in similar directions as our synod in Trier. Also in Aachen, the idea of a “community of communities” creates greater pastoral spaces which can give shape to various forms of Church life, interconnecting them.”
About his new ministry of service, he says,
“it will be a service to the faith of the people. The faith of the Gospel must in modern times be won, found and continued differently then in the past.
Many of our contemporaries are convinced: I know that I do not need to know whether God exists or not. I can live very well without knowing precisely. The Church, however, is convinced that, if we want to know more about ourselves, want to know deeper what our own life, the world, other people are and mean, we need faith. The God who surpasses all knowledge and understanding (cf. Phil. 4:7) has become completely knowable and meets us in a historical man and his life on earth: in Jesus and His Gospel.”
The bishop continues by explaining the ecumenism is an important element in this endeavour. He wants to help people acknowledge that they want to be Christians and so also know why they want to be Christians. Church life, he says, develops through the answers that people give to God and to Jesus, with their own lives and spiritual gifts, their charisms.
“So I am confident: we do not need to save the Church! She grows where the Gospel is being proclaimed and heard and answered. And there is not and will not be a time, until the end of the world, when the Gospel is not current!”
Photo credit: Bistum Trier
