High-ranking officials within the Catholic Church are reportedly some of the many employees who have been caught trying to access pornography on their work devices.
The Cologne diocese in Germany apparently detected 1,000 separate attempts to access “questionable” and “unwanted content”, tracing such efforts back to 15 individual users employed by the Church.
According to German reports on August 17, some of these officials are thought to be “high-ranking clerics” within the diocese.
The single most prolific alleged offender is thought to be a layperson who is under investigation for “possession and procurement of criminal content”.
Those under suspicion are described as no longer being employees of the Church.
Reports also indicate that, while watching pornography is a sin within Catholicism, none of the 15 are suspected in this instance of breaking either Church or German law.
Speaking of the issue, Cologne vicar-general Guido Assmann said he was disappointed by the news and how it might undermine the positive activities of many in the diocese.
“We have a large number of dedicated and reliable employees and it pains me greatly when the behaviour of individuals casts a shadow over their work,” he said.
The alleged revelation comes at a time of sustained controversy for the Catholic Church in Germany, which has frequently found itself in conflict with the Vatican over issues of doctrine.
German church officials have also become embroiled in the culture war at home, with the leader of one lay organisation in the country recently lashing out at the populist Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) political party.
Irme Stetter-Karp, the president of the Committee of German Catholics, demanded that advocates for the AfD be banned from holding lay office within the organisation, accusing the group of expounding values contrary to Christianity.
Such claims provoked outrage among Catholics in the party, with Maximilian Krah MEP accusing Stetter-Karp of overseeing “a club of functionaries who mostly live off church taxes full-time, cannot be placed on the primary job market and therefore hate themselves, the Church and faith”.
