Liechtenstein: Bishop Haas Takes a Firm Stance Regarding “Gay Pride”

On Saturday June 11, 2022, the municipality of Schaan hosted the first Gay Pride ever organized in the territory of the Principality of Liechtenstein. And the head of the community, Daniel Hilti, not only welcomed it, but participated in it and even gave a speech.

When he became aware of this fact, Msgr. Wolfgang Haas, Archbishop of Vaduz, who was conferring the sacrament of confirmation on the feast of the Holy Trinity, Sunday June 12, 2022, immediately made it known that there would be no communal meal with the municipal manager.

Usually, it is the community that invites the representatives of the church to lunch. But Archbishop Haas told the parish of Schaan that he will not participate in the communal meal this year. The parish priest of Schaan, Florian Hasler, confirmed this information.

The Archbishop of Vaduz is not prepared to be conciliatory, explains Florin Hasler. From the archbishop's point of view, two “divergent ideas” clash: the march on Saturday and confirmations on Sunday. “Here, we celebrate confirmed people who consciously choose the Christian faith. On the other side, there is an event that does not correspond to the Christian faith,” he further explained.

For his part, the municipal official preferred to remain silent on this affair. Asked about this, Daniel Hilti replied: “There are questions from journalists that we are not obliged to answer and the one you are asking today is one of them.”

The Archbishop of Vaduz is not the first to protest against LGBT demonstrations. Last March, Msgr. Haas published his pastoral letter for the season of Lent. He developed at length the need for fidelity to the faith, to revealed morality, and to the order placed in His Creation by God.

He clearly spelled out his thinking. “In the order of the grace of redemption, the Son of God forever rehabilitates the original order of creation. We need to listen to this – especially in a time and in a world where this divine order of Creation is often broken and even fundamentally challenged.”

“The attack on God-willed marriage and family is a diabolical attack on that which is founded from the very beginning in the will of salvation of the Creator and Redeemer and over which man has no power.”

Needless to say, this firm attitude is vilified in every way: by calling the bishop an “ultra-conservative prelate” for example. Or else by contrasting with him the attitude of more conciliatory prelates, such as that of Msgr. Joseph Bonnemain, bishop of the diocese of Chur, the former bishopric of Msgr. Haas, from which he was removed in 1997, to be placed at the head of a fraction of his former diocese.

The intervention of the Archbishop was necessitated by the ongoing discussion on the possibility of the adoption of a partner's child for same-sex couples, as well as, more remotely, to legislate on marriage for all.