An ultra-traditionalist British bishop who denies the Holocaust has been removed from his post as the head of a conservative Roman Catholic seminary in Argentina.In a statement, the Society of St Pius X not only announced the removal of Bishop Richard Williamson but also rejected his views saying they "in no way" reflected the organisation's position.
Controversy erupted last month when Pope Benedict XVI decided to lift Williamson's excommunication.
The Vatican said the Pope had been unaware of Williamson's views and has since ordered him to renounce them.
In a statement, the head of the Latin American chapter of the Society of St Pius X, which runs the seminary in La Reja, outside Buenos Aires said Williamson had been relieved of his position as director.
"Monsignor Williamson's statements do not in any way reflect the position of our congregation," said Father Christian Bouchacourt in a statement issued at the weekend.
"It is clear that a Catholic bishop cannot speak with ecclesiastical authority except on matters concerning faith and morality," the statement said.
The reinstatement of British-born Williamson provoked an international outcry since he has made a number of statements denying the full extent of the Holocaust.
In a recent television interview he said the “historical evidence” was against six million Jews having died in the Nazi gas chambers.
"I believe that the historical evidence is strongly against, is hugely against six million Jews having been deliberately gassed in gas chambers as a deliberate policy of Adolf Hitler," he said.
After Williamson's reinstatement outraged Jewish groups and provoked a response from the German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the pope expressed "full and indisputable solidarity" with Jews.
In his statement, Bouchacourt, the order's South American head, reacted "with sadness" to Williamson's "inopportune" remarks.
Williamson was one of four bishops welcomed back to the church in a bid to heal a decades-old split with traditionalists who did not accept the reforms of the Second Vatican Council of the early 1960s.
The bishops all belonged to the ultratraditionalist Society of St Pius X, which has now expelled Williamson.
The pontiff's move to rehabilitate Williamson triggered sharp criticism from Robert Rozem, head of the Yad Vashem Holocaust History Museum in Jerusalem.
Rozem said it was "scandalous" that someone of Williamson's status should deny the Holocaust.
He described his remarks as "unacceptable and hateful."
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(Source: AKI)