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	German Bishop Who Resigned over Slapping Asks for Job Back - Summary Earth Times June 16, 2010 http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/news/329486,job-back-summary.html Augsburg,Germany - The German bishop who resigned after admitting slapping teenagers is to meet Pope Benedict XVI to demand his job back - but the Vatican said Wednesday the move could not be undone. Walter Mixa was urged by the head of the German church, lay people and his own aides to resign, amid criticism that he took two weeks to grudgingly admit he slapped teenagers and helped himself to orphanage funds 30 years ago. There are no sex abuse allegations against him. On Wednesday Mixa, 69, told Die Welt newspaper that he had been under pressure when he resigned as bishop of Augsburg in April. He had retracted three days later, but the pope accepted the resignation on May 8 to make it final, said Mixa, who added he would appeal to a Vatican court. He asserted the resignation was invalid because it was involuntary. Mixa has an appointment in the next few weeks to met the German- born pope but it would not be about making Mixa bishop again, the Vatican said. "It is not foreseeable that the acceptance of the resignation will come up for discussion," Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said. In Augsburg, the chief elected layman, Helmut Mangold, urged the Vatican to appoint a successor quickly and find a new job as a priest for Mixa, who has caused consternation by moving back into the vacant bishop's home. Mixa claimed to Die Welt he had been forced out of office by the head of the church in Germany, Archbishop Robert Zollitsch, and the head of the Bavarian province, Archbishop Reinhard Marx. A Marx spokesman in Munich responded, "It was all legal. There's nothing left to say," then added a parting shot: "I wish Mixa a speedy recovery. His stay in the psychiatric clinic was an important first step." A canon law professor in Germany, Klaus Luedicke, said no appeal was legally possible against the pope's decision to remove a bishop.
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