BERLIN, July 28 (Reuters) - A German Roman Catholic priest suspended for sharing communion with Protestants criticised church leaders on Monday, saying he was being punished for his refusal to conform to a Nazi-style level of obedience.
Father Gotthold Hasenhuettl also told German television he found it strange the church suspended him for taking Christian unity too far at an ecumenical church meeting while at the same time did not punish sexual offenders in the church.
"I was always taught in Rome never to be as obedient as Eichmann," Hasenhuettl said, referring to Hitler's henchman Adolf Eichmann, who was executed in Israel in 1962. Eichmann had argued he was raised as a good Christian to obey authority.
"We were taught by the church never to put obedience above our own conscience or ethical responsibility," Hasenhuettl added, saying Eichmann had claimed he was only obeying orders when he sent Jews to Nazi concentration camps.
"That's precisely the way we should not act," said the suspended priest, who told the Saarbruecker Zeitung newspaper on Saturday that bishops wanted "Eichmann-like obedience" from him.
Hasenhuettl was suspended by Trier Bishop Reinhard Marx because he had shared communion with Protestants at a Catholic mass he said during the church meeting in Berlin in May and refused to promise that would not happen again.
Marx said Hasenhuettl had undermined Church authority and refused to show remorse. He said he had no choice but to suspend Hasenhuettl and also stripped him of his right to lecture as a professor of theology at Saarland University.
SEX OFFENDERS NOT SUSPENDED
"I stand by this disobedience," said Hasenhuettl, 69, who has challenged his suspension.
"I could never show any remorse for that. It's rather strange that sex criminals who seduced children and youths, such as the former archbishop of Vienna (Hans Hermann) Groer and other priests are not suspended while I was suspended for inviting Protestant Christians to communion."
Cardinal Groer was forced to resign as archbishop of Vienna in 1995 after being accused of sexually abusing a schoolboy 20 years earlier.
"Isn't that a bit strange?" Hasenhuettl asked. "I did nothing more than invite those who want to share communion with Christ."
Pope John Paul reasserted in an encyclical in April the Church doctrine that forbids joint communion, a ban liberal Catholics like Hasenhuettl consider outdated and contrary to efforts to promote unity among all Christians.
The Vatican bans joint communion because Catholics believe the bread and wine used at mass are transformed into Christ's body and blood while Protestants see the service as a symbolic re-enactment of his Last Supper with his Apostles.
Protestants invite all Christians to communion. Ecumenical groups in Europe and the United States sometimes share communion in defiance of Vatican rules, but usually do so quietly