VATICAN CITY
Reuters
By James Mackenzie
ROME | Mon Jul 2, 2012
(Reuters) – Pope Benedict on Monday appointed German bishop Gerhard Ludwig Mueller to head the Vatican office in charge of Church doctrine, one of the central bodies responsible for enforcing Church discipline at a time of exceptional upheaval.
Mueller’s appointment to a powerful job the pontiff himself held for more than two decades – prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith – comes at a time when the Vatican is beset by controversies including allegations of corruption and internal intrigues, as well as a lingering child abuse scandal.
Mueller will have the delicate task of overseeing issues ranging from overhauling Church practice in the wake of the scandal of child sexual abuse by priests to reconciling the position of dissident ultra traditionalist movements.
The 64-year-old bishop of the southern German city of Regensburg, where the pope himself taught theology in the 1960s, is a well respected conservative theologian and the author of some 400 publications.
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