Cardinal Johannes Degenhardt, 76; German Prelate

Cardinal Johannes Joachim Degenhardt, one of the first German bishops to drop a counseling program that paved the way for an abortion, died of heart failure Thursday. He was 76.

Degenhardt died at his residence in Paderborn, one of the most heavily Catholic parts of Germany. A spokesman for the archdiocese said his death was unexpected.

Appointed cardinal last year by Pope John Paul II, Degenhardt had conservative views. He halted participation in a program to counsel pregnant women, a step that is required before they can obtain abortions in Germany. He also was known as an advocate of political cooperation in Europe and tolerance between Germans and foreigners.

In 1992, he made headlines by removing Father Eugen Drewermann’s right to celebrate Mass, after Drewermann challenged the virgin birth and other basic church tenets.

Degenhardt was born in 1926 in Schweim, in the Paderborn Archdiocese. In 1941, at age 15, he was arrested and imprisoned by the Gestapo for three weeks for his work as a youth leader in the Catholic group Bund Neudeutschland, or New German Union, which was banned by the Nazis.

He was briefly imprisoned by the Allies at the end of the war because he worked for the German air force, but was released in 1946 and returned to school. He was ordained in 1952. He became a bishop in 1968 and archbishop in 1974.