"Austrian bishop hangs banner of nude trans activist over main altar for Lent"

"The Catholic bishop of Innsbruck, Austria, inaugurated a 'Lenten' decoration of the main altar of the historic University church of Saint John Nepomuk, a baroque jewel from the early 18th century. The 'decoration' shows an enlarged partial inverted photograph of a naked young man with scars and tattoos lying on a bed and has been placed as an altarpiece above the tabernacle of the former main altar of the church. The piece of contemporary art by Carmen Brucic was specially chosen by Bishop Hermann Glettler, and bears the title: 'Tired.'

Bishop Glettler has campaigned for the blessing of same-sex couples in the past (more on that later).

In itself, the more-than-life-size picture (4.5 by 3 meters) is completely incongruous over an altar because it has no religious meaning. But the picture of this nude young man lying on his back in an exhausted attitude, barely missing the display of his genitalia, is doubly scandalous. Besides its obvious indecency in such a setting, it portrays a prominent figure of the 'queer' scene in Tbilisi, thus openly glorifying a 'gay' activist from Georgia whose image will remain over the tabernacle holding the Real Presence of Our Lord in the Eucharist until the end of Lent.

The said young man, David Apakidze, 23, is half Georgian, half Ukrainian – a somewhat obvious way of presenting the photo installation as a reflection on the current Russian invasion of Ukraine. But he is better known as an activist of the Bassiani club where Georgian homosexuals, drag queens and other self-proclaimed promoters of sexual deviancy had found a 'safe space' for techno music, rave parties, and 'LGBTQ' performances. The club was founded in 2014 and hosted performances that can only be qualified as hellish...

The bishop cannot have ignored Carmen Brucic’s other work, dark and tortured, abounding in images of death, waste, and de-structured human figures. Nor can he have missed the short video showing the artist’s work for the Tbilisi Festival, with its images of transexual men and the full series of the homo-erotic shots of Apakidze.

Apakidze’s own Instagram account shows many equivocal pictures of trans men, tortured faces, homosexuals kissing, and altogether weird and disturbing young people who have no idea of their own dignity. It includes the photograph of a contemporary art exhibit labeled 'Abortion Pills' set up – according to the 'artist' – as 'a corner of the icons of the Virgin Mary, which is an advertising campaign for abortion pills.'

'Abortion is a sacral act in which a woman reclaims the right to reproduce,' Apakidze further comments.

This man’s picture is now hiding the baroque altarpiece of an Austrian church, with the dubious blessing of the local bishop who not only inaugurated the work together with Carmen Brucic last Tuesday, but who claims full responsibility for choosing and organizing what must be a blasphemous installation, given the context.

Hermann Glettler is not unknown to LifeSite readers. In January 2019, he announced that he would 'host a set of seminars for divorced and ‘remarried’ couples, at the end of which the couples will be allowed to receive Holy Communion and a ‘celebration of reconciliation and of blessing,’' reported Maike Hickson at the time. These 'seminars' were based on Amoris Laetitia, stated the website of the Austrian bishops’ conference.

'Even if a second Church marriage is not possible,' explained Glettler, 'we want to assure all couples that they have their place at the center of the Church.'

'We rejoice that people, after experiences of failure in life, take courage again and dare to enter new relationships,' the diocese added.

Two months later, Glettler allowed a 'Jesus Clock' made from an upside down corpus with broken arms to be installed in the Spitalskirche in Innsbruck throughout Lent; he also allowed an artist to set up scaffolding featuring an inscription that read: 'So long as God has a beard, I will be a feminist.'

In 2020, he said that the Church’s doctrine that women cannot be ordained as priests is an 'inequality' that is 'difficult to justify.'"